ExistentialHedonist

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Being Holly

I love being Holly. She excites me! I wake up each day knowing that I am Holly, and it makes me happy. I am convinced that courtesanship is an art, and a tradition that I am proud to carry on.

I have been doing quite a bit of reading on courtesans in history, and have come to some interesting thoughts. First of all, the times in which courtesans existed are all pretty similar: They involved an increasingly wide gap between the rich and the poor, which we are seeing today. Second, courtesans were exceptional women and men (oh, yes, there were male courtesans!) who had experiences in life which made them fascinating people able to earn far more for their attentions than your average girl-or boy-for-hire. Their attributes were things like intelligence, quick wittedness, courage and audacity, combined with their hard-earned ability to feel very deeply (often caused by pain or hardship). They were very fast learners as far as the protocol of the social circles to which they aspired. Most did not come from wealth or standing, but rose from lives of impoverishment and difficulty, to eventually achieve a place in history.

Today, courtesans are very much similar, but also pretty different. Susan Griffin, Author of "The Book of Courtesans" insists there are no loger courtesans, but I disagree. I feel on some levels I am a courtesan, and I identify greatly with the stories of many of the women I have read about. However, I also understand that courtesanship will necessarily be different today for several reasons- not the least of which is the fact that women are no longer required to follow certain strictures of conduct. More on this later...