Erotic novels have never lived quietly on the literary margins…
For nearly three centuries they’ve been banned, prosecuted, smuggled, plagiarised, fetishised, rediscovered, and occasionally dragged back into the cultural spotlight.
From obscene tales of debauchery and provocative memoirs to racy ‘bodice rippers’ and saucy pulp fiction, erotic novels have consistently been the place where literature tests how much desire it can hold before society flinches. Books like Lolita, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Story of O, Fifty Shades of Grey, and The 120 Days of Sodom have triggered moral panics, court cases, copycats, and entire subgenres.
Choosing the ‘best’ erotic novels, or even the most popular, is highly subjective… so for this guide, I’ll instead be taking you on a tour of 14 influential classics that have shaped how we see the genre.
What Are The Most Famous Erotic Novels?
Fame in erotic literature doesn’t come from quality alone – it comes from impact.
Some of these books were widely banned, others have been adapted for film, stage and television, or have topped the best-sellers lists for weeks.
None produce an instant gut reaction – from the title alone – quite like #1 on our list…
1. Lolita (1955)
By Vladimir Nabokov
We start with a controversial title that has caused a lot of backlash over the years.
The content and plot of Lolita is undoubtedly contentious and has been called ‘the filthiest book…ever read’ as well as ‘repulsive’ and ‘disgusting’.
Nabokov’s tale of middle-aged Humbert’s obsession with 12-year-old “nymphet” Dolores Haze is arguably the most beautifully written novel on this list… and certainly the most unnerving.
It’s an erotic novel only in the sense that it charts a man’s sexual obsession in exquisite, excruciating detail.
Culturally, Lolita is a juggernaut: it’s been adapted to film by Kubrick, added a permanent term to our lexicon (including the name of the infamous jet used by Jeffrey Epstein), and ultimately it has sparked endless debate on art vs. filth. I’ll admit, rereading Lolita still leaves me conflicted. Nabokov’s style is so mesmerizing and witty that you find yourself sympathizing with a predator… then feel guilty about it.
That deliberate moral vertigo is part of the book’s genius. Few works of literature, erotic or otherwise, have ever matched Lolita’s mix of lyrical craft and transgressive charge.
The book is regarded as a classic work of literary fiction and is also praised for being an ‘unforgettable masterpiece of obsession’.
Filth Factor: 7/10 – The controversial nature of the subject matter means that Lolita will always be 100% filth – but it does not compare in graphic detail to titles like 120 Days of Sodom or Story of the Eye (see below).
2. Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928)
By D. H. Lawrence
Once upon a time, Lady Chatterley’s Lover was the most scandalous book you could get your hands on.
Lady Chatterley is a young, married and wealthy woman of the upper echelons of British society. Her husband was injured in the Great War and is paralyzed from the waist down. She is soon to be found having an affair with Oliver Mellors, the estate gamekeeper. It’s a saucy romp that depicts the rough and tumble of a passionate love affair between classes but is also a socio-political romance.
The book was banned in many parts of the world including in Lawrence’s own country, England. It was finally published in the UK in 1960 but was immediately part of an obscenity trial. The publishers won and the title went on to sell another 3 million copies as a result of the publicity.
On one level, the book is seen as being just another filthy novel and there is no doubt that the sex is very passionate. However, it is the dynamics of a relationship between an upper-class woman and a working-class man that make it all the more taboo, particularly in the strict class-based society of the time.
Culturally, the title is seen by many to have played an important part of the sexual revolution, particularly in Britain during the 1960s.
Filth Factor: 5/10 – Reading it now, I smile at how innocent it feels compared to some others on this list… yet it’s exactly this novel’s once-shocking openness about female desire and intimacy that paved the way for all the rest.
3. Story of O (1954)
By Pauline Réage (Dominique Aury)
This is hardcore BDSM erotica written with the cool poise of a Parisian fashion sketch. The novel follows O – a willing slave – through a secret château where she’s rigorously trained to serve her lover and bear every mark of his dominance (rings, brands, etc).
After her training at the chateau, she falls in love with her Master, Sir Stephen, who brands and claims ownership over her. In the novel, O is required to lure and seduce another young girl into the society. Much of the rest of the book is given over to various sex scenes in which O is shared at parties as an object.
When it was first published, the novel won the coveted Prix des Deux Magots; an award given to the best new French literature. This, despite the French authorities trying to ban the title.
Story of O has been criticized by feminists and other groups who claim it glorifies violence, objectifies women and, according to one journalist, allows the “Gestapo into the boudoir”.
For decades the author’s identity was a mystery, adding to its mystique, until Aury revealed herself in the 1990s as a woman in her 80s. It was considered a surprise given that the consensus was the sex scenes could only have been written by a man!
Filth Factor: 9/10: There is no stone left unturned in the world of BDSM for the central character of O who is routinely stripped, whipped and chained for the pleasure of others. Her training involves the widening of her anus by the insertion of increasingly larger plugs as well as branding, piercing and subjugation.
4. Fanny Hill, or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (1748)
By John Cleland
The great-great-grandmother of erotic novels, Fanny Hill had enormous influence in the genre. Written in 1748 by John Cleland while he was literally in debtor’s prison, this novel is a first-person account of a young prostitute’s bawdy adventures in London.
The novel consists of two letters, written by a middle-aged and wealthy English woman; Frances (or Fanny) Hill. A former prostitute, Hill recounts tales of her scandalous former life in great detail.
Considered the first English pornographic novel, it was instantly banned and infamously remained banned in the UK for over 200 years. Think about that: people could legally read it in Britain only after 1970!
Although there are no explicit phrases, the use of euphemisms is extremely creative. After the book was published, Cleland returned to prison for ‘corrupting the King’s subjects’ and copies were withdrawn from circulation. As ever, once a book becomes ‘taboo’ it generally becomes far more popular and pirated copies were soon changing hands across the UK, Europe and even in the United States.
The book has been adapted for the stage, film and television in the UK, USA, Germany and Italy including an Off-Broadway musical production in 2006. The last major adaptation was by the BBC in 2007 with a two-part broadcast filmed for BBC Four.
Filth Factor: 5/10 – Boy, I hope you like flowery metaphors! For its time, the concept of explicitly describing intercourse was filthy enough. If you thought you knew all of the best expressions for male and female genitalia, this book will open your eyes!
5. 120 Days of Sodom (1785)
By Marquis De Sade
120 Days of Sodom is probably one of the most widely-read and influential ‘erotic’ novels of the last two centuries. It is also one of the most controversial.
Declared insane several years after writing the book (actually, it was written on a 12m length of paper), the Marquis de Sade was sent to an asylum where he later died. His name is still used today to describe acts in which people derive pleasure from hurting others.
The plot of the book tells the story of four rich nobles who, just for the hell of it, decide to lock themselves inside a castle to experience debauched and wild gratification. What ensures is a series of disturbing sex acts and orgies involving the 46 victims that they have chosen for their pleasure. The acts increase in violence and perversion with 120 Days of Sodom culminating in the slaughter of all of the young men and women.
There have been two notable films made from the book, L’Age d’Or (1930) and Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma (1975). The first is a surrealist film whilst the latter is often cited as one of the most controversial films ever made. The book itself is still banned in some countries where the content is deemed too extreme, cruel and pornographic for public print. The Guardian calls it “the most impure tale ever written“.
Filth Factor: 10/10 – There are very few fetishes and taboos not covered in some way by this exhaustive catalog of fictional depravity. From extreme BDSM to incest, mutilation and torture… this is NOT light reading.
6. Emmanuelle (1959)
By Emmanuelle Arsan
Emmanuelle might be the quintessential erotic fantasy novel, and the inspiration for one of the most famous adult movies ever made.
Yes, this is the book that inspired the famous 1970s softcore film of the same name.
The novel follows Emmanuelle, a young French woman who arrives in Bangkok to join her husband – and with his firm encouragement, she embarks on a journey of sexual liberation and experimentation (with both men and women) in the expat high society of Thailand. This is long before the neon lights of Soi Cowboy and Patpong!
The story is basically a series of seductions and sensual lessons: an older aristocratic woman initiates Emmanuelle into Sapphic delights, a wise roué named Mario gives philosophical monologues about the nature of pleasure (whilst fucking, naturally), and Emmanuelle tries just about everything on the menu.
It was first published on the down-low in France and became a notorious bestseller in the ‘60s. It definitely waxes philosophical more than most erotica, which can be a pro or con depending on your mood… but if you’ve seen the movie, the novel itself deserves credit for being one of the early erotic works that women readers picked up in droves.
Filth Factor: 6/10 – Frequent but mostly tasteful, the novel is filled with explicit sexual encounters of all sorts: hetero, lesbian, orgies, anal play. More sensual and celebratory than outright shocking.
7. Tropic of Cancer (1934)
By Henry Miller
Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer is a swaggering sexually raw tour through 1930s Bohemian Paris.. and it’s also one of the crucial works that dragged erotic content into modern literature… kicking and screaming.
A chronicle of the sexual adventures of an American write in Paris during the 1920s and 1930s, the Tropic of Cancer is part fiction, part autobiography. It follows Miller’s life (non-chronologically) in a series of first person and stream of consciousness scenes of life and sex involving pimps, prostitutes and bohemians.
The book is more than just an erotic novel and explores the human condition in a way that is often bawdy and comic as well as profound and moving.
It gained much notoriety after winning an historic censorship trial in the United States in the 1960s. As a result of the court’s ruling, the Tropic of Cancer was widely credited as being influential in the way free speech is now protected in literature. It was also banned in Canada and Finland but, interestingly, not in the United Kingdom. His later novel, Sexus, was banned in Great Britain.
Some hail it as a masterpiece of free-form prose and existential truth; others find it self-indulgent and juvenile in its obsession with sex.
Filth Factor: 6/10 – It’s true that the novel no longer has the capacity to shock in the same way that it did half a century ago and you won’t find much that is graphic or ‘perverse’. However, the language can be very colorful in places with some unrelenting attention to… detail.
8. Venus In Furs (1870)
By Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
If you’ve ever used the word masochism, you’ve indirectly tipped your hat to this novel.
Venus in Furs is one of the great benchmarks of fetish literature, a book so culturally impactful that the author’s name (Sacher-Masoch) became a term for deriving pleasure from pain. Quite the legacy, old boy!
The book charts the obsession of one man’s desire to be dominated by women. The central character, is unnamed but speaks of his desires to a friend, Severin von Kusiemski, who directs him to read a manuscript , Memoirs of a Suprasensual Man. It is this manuscript which forms the books main narrative and it tells the story of how one man comes to give himself as a slave to one woman, is treated brutally and utterly controlled.
Sure, it has the trappings of a 19th-century frame story (it’s a story within a story, with a dream sequence to boot), and the prose can be melodramatic in places, but strip that away and you have an honest exploration of a specific kink long before we had the vocabulary for it!
The film has been adapted for the big screen in a couple of feature length titles but the 2013 Roman Polanski version is probably the most notable; it won him Best Director at the 2014 César Awards.
Filth Factor: 4/10 – Psychological rather than sexual. The book isn’t obscene nor does it have particularly graphic detail about sex, but it does introduce very early readers to dominance/submission play, and cuckoldry.
9. The Lover (1973)
By Marguerite Duras
Slim, poetic, and quietly incendiary, The Lover is unlike anything else we’ve covered on this list. Marguerite Duras, a revered French author, published this semi-autobiographical novel in her 70th year – reflecting on a passionate teenage affair she had.
The book is semi-autobiographical and follows the accounts of a 15-year old French girl from a hard-up family who is seduced by a wealthy 27-year old Chinese businessman. At a boarding school in Saigon, the book is set against the backdrop of French-colonial Vietnam.
Written by Duras 55 years after the events she describes, the work is clearly a labor of love and the romance and sex are all beautifully written. Duras tells the story in fragmented memories, with a dreamy, melancholic tone that blurs the line between consent and coercion, love and exploitation. It has an enduring appeal which has seen the novel translated into more than 40 languages and earned it a coveted Prix Goncourt literary prize.
Adapted in 1992 in a film of the same name, The Lover was a success at the box office and received good reviews from the public; but US critics gave it a lukewarm reception…
Filth Factor: 5/10: The sex in The Lover is erotic rather than explicit or crude and the book is a popular romance despite the age-gap and pubescence of the central character.
10. Delta of Venus (1977)
By Anaïs Nin
An anthology of 15 short stories published posthumously, Delta of Venus was written by Nin in the 1940s for a private collector. The stories all have a different style and plot but were requested by the collector to be graphic and sexually explicit with “No poetry, no analysis, just sex.“
(I guess somebody was horny!)
Nin has managed to create a collection of exquisitely beautiful erotica – a series of vignettes exploring a wide range of sexual scenarios: a Spanish dancer seducing both men and women, a Hungarian man who lives off the money of the rich ladies he beds, a New York streetwalker’s explicit diary, and many more.
The work is praised by some feminists for being a pioneering and sex positive – whilst some simply see the book as an assemblage of porn.
Culturally, Delta of Venus (and Nin’s companion volume Little Birds) became hugely popular in the late 70s and 80s, especially among women readers who found mainstream erotica not to their taste. It’s fair to say Nin’s work paved the way for female-centric erotica as a genre of its time.
Filth Factor: 6/10: The language in Delta of Venus is beautifully crafted but does not avoid the graphic detail commissioned by the ‘collector’. It is supremely erotic without being obscene.
11. Story of the Eye (1928)
By Georges Bataille
Story of the Eye is a fever dream of sex and symbolism; one that still has readers and critics arguing, “Is this profound or just really fucking perverted?“
I actually enjoyed browsing the various review vlogs on Youtube for this – a mix of disgust, amusement and WTF.
Narrated by a man who is looking back at his teenage sexual exploits, Story of the Eye is a novella that depicts surreal and increasingly more perverse sexual acts. They start with relatively tame fun but soon the boundaries evaporate… there are public orgies, a weird fixation on urine, and increasingly bizarre tableaux involving everything from bull testicles to a literally eyeball (I won’t spoil whose eye it is or how it’s used, but let’s say the book lives up to its title).
It reads… like a mad hallucination.
The book has some fans in unusual places with the Icelandic singer, Bjork, admitting that she had loved the novel ever since a boyfriend gave her a copy!
Filth Factor: 10/10 – Graphically sexual, the book includes scenes of anal and vaginal insertions (with eggs and, later, a bull’s testes and an eyeball), orgies, blood-play, exhibitionism and S&M. There is also a scene in which the teenage pair have sex next to a dead body. Yes, it’s all here and totally filthy.
12. Fifty Shades of Grey (2011)
By E. L. James
I know. 😬
Look… I don’t want to include it either, but if we’re talking about erotica that has influenced the modern era, we have to address the Fifty elephants in the room.
Love it, hate it, or meme it to death, there’s no denying E. L. James’s fanfic-turned-bestseller injected BDSM into the pop culture mainstream with the force of a silver bullet.
The story itself is basically Intro to Kink, with Cinderella tropes: Anastasia Steele, an innocent, clumsy college girl, falls for Christian Grey, a dashing 27-year-old billionaire who happens to be a control-freak dominant with a Red Room of Pain in his fucked-up penthouse. He wants her to sign a detailed “sex contract”; she’s not sure about this whole spanking business but goes along because she’s dazzled by him.
Originally penned as fan fiction (Twilight) and self-published, there is no adult alive in the western world who has not heard of Fifty Shades of Grey or who haven’t witnessed its meteoric marketing success.
The book has sold well over 130 million copies worldwide but has attracted nearly as many critics as it has fans. The BDSM content is not the only thing that offends people, with some decrying the work as facile and poorly written, pulp fiction ‘trash’. Others, notably those in the BDSM community, have raised concerns about the safe depiction of bondage and S&M play.
The first book is the more filthy with the follow ups exploring more of the psychological and emotional aspects of the relationship between Steele and Grey.
Filth Factor: 8/10 – The scenes in Fifty Shades of Grey are downright filthy and lack no detail. It is basically written pornography, plain and simple.
13. Nine and a Half Weeks (1978)
By Elizabeth McNeill (Ingeborg Day)
Before Christian Grey there was an unnamed Wall Street broker who whispered to our narrator, “I’m going to Controlyourlife™.” Okay, he didn’t literally say that, but he lived it…
Nine and a Half Weeks is a dark little memoir – thinly veiled as fiction, originally published under a pseudonym – of an intense D/s relationship that lasted – you guessed it 9 and a half weeks.
The woman narrator (never named in the text) is a smart, independent New Yorker who finds herself gradually giving total control to her lover. At first it’s thrilling: he blindfolds her, feeds her, uses her body in public places where they mightget caught… all those edgy thrills. But as the weeks go on, he pushes further, testing her limits in real taboo-breaking ways
The pair go through an intense sexual relationship that is characterized by domination and humiliation. Their ‘love’ affair includes some powerfully recounted sexual scenes (some of which are very unusual) and incitement to violent crime. The book reaches its climax in a quasi-rape scene and ‘Elizabeth’ being left in a mental hospital.
There was a film adaptation, but it only touches on the violent peaks that the real memoir recounts and the book is a dangerous and frightening story of subjugation. Penned 30+ years before Fifty Shades of Grey, Day’s depiction of S&M is considerably harder-hitting – and beautifully written.
Filth Factor: 9/10: Nine and a Half Weeks is somewhat uncomfortable to read in places. Though the language may not sink to the obscene, the tone is irrefutably erotic and heady. Anyone who is intrigued by power play or BDSM will probably already be fans.
14. The Sexual Life of Catherine M (2001)
By Catherine Millet
The only non-fiction book on this list, The Sexual Life of Catherine M. is an explicit memoir by a French art critic who decided to lay her entire erotic life on the table with a chilling clinical detachment.
Catherine M partakes in orgies and group sex but has been in an open marriage with the same man for over 30 years. The author, a prominent figure in the art world and editor of Art Press, caused quite a stir when she published this at age 53.
There’s no plot, really; the book is organized by theme as she dissects her experiences and attitudes. Now, if you’re looking for emotional depth or romantic insight… definitely look elsewhere. She writes about herself as if she were a subject in her own lab experiment… rarely delving into feelings, mostly focusing on physical sensations, logistics, and a sort of existential meaning (or meaninglessness) she finds in the act of sex.
And this cool tone is precisely what made the book divisive.
Some praised it as a triumph of liberated female sexuality, others found it dispassionate to the point of being dull. One thing it certainly is: unapologetic.
Filth Factor: 8/10 – The sex starts from the first few pages in a matter of fact and simple way that evokes, not quite eroticism but pure, pornography. It is explicit in detail – told in the first person with an air of intelligent reflection, deliciously intimate throughout.
What other erotic novels do you think deserve a place on this list?
And can you make the case for another classic novel toppling Lolita at #1?!
