The Art of Seduction (59 page)

seemed paler than ever. He was polite, and a whole day might pass without her seeing him, but these brief absences had a paradoxical effect: now Tourvel realized what had happened. She missed him, she wanted to see him. This paragon of virtue and goodness had somehow fallen in love with an incorrigible rake. Disgusted with herself and what she had allowed to
Disarm Through Strategic Weakness and Vulnerability • 289

happen, she left the château in the middle of the night, without telling
The old American proverb
anyone, and headed for Paris, where she planned somehow to repent this
says if you want to con
someone, you must first get

awful sin.

him to trust you, or at least

feel superior to you (these

two ideas are related), and

Interpretation.
The character of Valmont in Choderlos de Laclos's
get him to let down his
guard. The proverb

epistolary novel
Dangerous Liaisons
is based on several of the great real-life
explains a great deal about
libertines of eighteenth-century France. Everything Valmont does is calcu-
television commercials. If
lated for effect—the ambiguous actions that make Tourvel curious about
we assume that people are
not stupid, they must react

him, the act of charity in the village (he knows he is being followed), the
to TV commercials with a
return visit to the château, the paleness of his face (he is having an affair
feeling of superiority that
with a girl at the château, and their all-night carousals give him a wasted
permits them to believe
they are in control. As long

look). Most devastating of all is his positioning of himself as the weak one,
as this illusion of volition
the seduced, the victim. How can the Présidente imagine he is manipulat-
persists, they would
ing her when everything suggests he is simply overwhelmed by her beauty,
consciously have nothing to
whether physical or spiritual? He cannot be a deceiver when he repeatedly
fear from the commercials.
People are prone to trust

makes a point of confessing the "truth" about himself: he admits that his
anything over which they
charity was questionably motivated, he explains why he has gone astray, he
believe they have
lets her in on his emotions. (All of this "honesty," of course, is calculated.)
control. . . .
•
TV com-
mercials appear foolish,

In essence he is like a woman, or at least like a woman of those times—
clumsy, and ineffectual on
emotional, unable to control himself, moody, insecure. She is the one who
purpose. They are made to
is cold and cruel, like a man. In positioning himself as Tourvel's victim, Val-
appear this way at the
conscious level in order to

mont can not only disguise his manipulations but elicit pity and concern.
be consciously ridiculed and
Playing the victim, he can stir up the tender emotions produced by a sick
rejected. . . . Most ad men
child or a wounded animal. And these emotions are easily channeled into
will confirm that over the
love—as the Présidente discovers to her dismay.

years the seemingly worst

commercials have sold the

Seduction is a game of reducing suspicion and resistance. The cleverest
best. An effective TV

way to do this is to make the other person feel stronger, more in control of
commercial is purposefully
designed to insult the

things. Suspicion usually comes out of insecurity; if your targets feel supe-
viewer's conscious
rior and secure in your presence, they are unlikely to doubt your motives.
intelligence, thereby
You are too weak, too emotional, to be up to something. Take this game as
penetrating his defenses.
far as it will go. Flaunt your emotions and how deeply they have affected —WILSON BRYAN KEY, you. Making people feel the power they have over you is immensely flatter-
SUBLIMINAL SEDUCTION

ing to them. Confess to something bad, or even to something bad that you did, or contemplated doing, to them. Honesty is more important than virtue, and one honest gesture will blind them to many deceitful acts. Cre-
It takes great art to use
ate an impression of weakness—physical, mental, emotional. Strength and
bashfulness, but one does
achieve a great deal with it.

confidence can be frightening. Make your weakness a comfort, and play
How often I have used
the victim—of their power over you, of circumstances, of life in general.
bashfulness to trick a little
This is the best way to cover your tracks.

miss! Ordinarily, young

girls speak very harshly

about bashful men, but

You know, a man ain't worth a damn if he can't cry at the

secretly they like them. A

right time.

little bashfulness flatters a

teenage girl's vanity, makes

— L Y N D O N BAINES JOHNSON

her feel superior; it is her

290 • The Art of Seduction

earnest money. When they

Keys to Seduction

are lulled to sleep, then at

the very time they believe

you are about to perish

from bashfulness, you show
We all have weaknesses, vulnerabilities, frailnesses in our mental makeup. Perhaps we are shy or oversensitive, or need attention—

them that you are so far
whatever the weakness is, it is something we cannot control. We may try to
from it that you are quite

compensate for it, or to hide it, but this is often a mistake: people sense
self-reliant. Bashfulness

makes a man lose his

something inauthentic or unnatural. Remember: what is natural to your
masculine significance, and

character is inherently seductive. A person's vulnerability, what they seem
therefore it is a relatively

to be unable to control, is often what is most seductive about them. People
good means for
who display no weaknesses, on the other hand, often elicit envy, fear, and
neutralizing the sex

relation.

anger—we want to sabotage them just to bring them down.

— S Ø R E N KIERKEGAARD,

Do not struggle against your vulnerabilities, or try to repress them, but
THE SEDUCER'S DIARY,

put them into play. Learn to transform them into power. The game is subTRANSLATED BY HOWARD V. tle: if you wallow in your weakness, overplay your hand, you will be seen as H O N G AND EDNA H . H O N G

angling for sympathy, or, worse, as pathetic. No, what works best is to allow people an occasional glimpse into the soft, frail side of your character, and usually only after they have known you for a while. That glimpse will hu
Yet another form of
manize you, lowering their suspicions, and preparing the ground for a
Charity is there, which is

deeper attachment. Normally strong and in control, at moments you let go,
oft times practised towards

poor prisoners who are shut

give in to your weakness, let them see it.

up in dungeons and robbed

Valmont used his weakness this way. He had lost his innocence long

of all enjoyments with

ago, and yet, somewhere inside, he regretted it. He was vulnerable to
women. On such do the

gaolers' wives and women

someone truly innocent. His seduction of the Présidente was successful be
that have charge over them,
cause it was not totally an act; there was a genuine weakness on his part,
or chatelaines who have

which even allowed him to cry at times. He let the Présidente see this side
prisoners of war in their

Castle, take pity and give

to him at key moments, in order to disarm her. Like Valmont, you can be
them share of their love out

acting and sincere at the same time. Suppose you are genuinely shy—at cer
of very charity and
tain moments, give your shyness a little weight, lay it on a little thick. It
mercifulness.
. . . •
Thus

should be easy for you to embellish a quality you already have.

do these gaolers' wives,

noble chatelaines and

After Lord Byron published his first major poem, in 1812, he became
others, treat their prisoners,

an instant celebrity. Beyond being a talented writer, he was so handsome,
the which, captive and

even pretty, and he was as brooding and enigmatic as the characters he
unhappy though they be,

yet cease not for that to feel

wrote about. Women went wild over Lord Byron. He had an infamous

the prickings of the flesh,

"underlook," slightly lowering his head and glancing upward at a woman,
as much as ever they did in

making her tremble. But Byron had other qualities: when you first met
their best days. . . . • To

confirm what I say, I will

him, you could not help noticing his fidgety movements, his ill-fitting
instance a tale that

clothes, his strange shyness, and his noticeable limp. This infamous man,
Captain Beaulieu,

who scorned all conventions and seemed so dangerous, was personally inse
Captain of the King's
Galleys, of whom I have

cure and vulnerable.

before spoke once and

In Byron's poem
Don Juan,
the hero is less a seducer of women than a
again, did tell me. He was

man constantly pursued by them. The poem was autobiographical; women
in the service of the late

wanted to take care of this somewhat fragile man, who seemed to have lit
Grand Prior of France, a
member of the house of

tle control over his emotions. More than a century later, John F. Kennedy,
Lorraine, who was much

as a boy, became obsessed with Byron, the man he most wanted to emulate.
attached to him. Going

He even tried to borrow Byron's "underlook." Kennedy himself was a frail
one time to take his patron

on board at Malta in a

youth, with constant health problems. He was also a little pretty, and friends
Disarm Through Strategic Weakness and Vulnerability
•
291

saw something slightly feminine in him. Kennedy's weaknesses—physical
frigate, he was taken by the
and mental, for he too was insecure, shy, and oversensitive—were exactly
Sicilian galleys, and carried
prisoner to the Castel-à-

what drew women to him. If Byron and Kennedy had tried to cover up
mare at Palermo, where he
their vulnerabilities with a masculine swagger they would have had no
was shut up in an
seductive charm. Instead, they learned how to subtly display their weak-
exceeding narrow, dark and
nesses, letting women sense this soft side to them.

wretched dungeon, and

very ill entreated by the

There are fears and insecurities peculiar to each sex; your use of strate-
space of three months. By
gic weakness must always take these differences into account. A woman, for
good hap the Governor of
instance, may be attracted by a man's strength and self-confidence, but too
the Castle, who was a
Spaniard, had two very

much of it can create fear, seeming unnatural, even ugly Particularly intimi-
fair daughters, who hearing
dating is the sense that the man is cold and unfeeling. She may feel insecure
him complaining and
that he is only after sex, and nothing else. Male seducers long ago learned
making moan, did one day
ask leave of their father to

to become more feminine—to show their emotions, and to seem interested
visit him, for the honor of
in their targets' lives. The medieval troubadours were the first to master this
the good God; and this he
strategy; they wrote poetry in honor of women, emoted endlessly about
did freely give them
permission to do. And

their feelings, and spent hours in their ladies' boudoirs, listening to the
seeing the Captain was of
women's complaints and soaking up their spirit. In return for their willing-
a surety a right gallant
ness to play weak, the troubadours earned the right to love.

gentleman, and as ready-

tongued as most, he was

Little has changed since then. Some of the greatest seducers in recent
able so to win them over at
history—Gabriele D' Annunzio, Duke Ellington, Errol Flynn—understood
this, the very first visit,
the value of acting slavishly to a woman, like a troubadour on bended knee.
that they did gain their
The key is to indulge your softer side while still remaining as masculine as
father's leave for him to
quit his wretched dungeon

possible. This may include an occasional show of bashfulness, which the
and to be put in a seemly
philosopher Søren Kierkegaard thought an extremely seductive tactic for a
enough chamber and
man—it gives the woman a sense of comfort, and even of superiority. Re-
receive better treatment.
Nor was this all, for they

member, though, to keep everything in moderation. A glimpse of shyness
did crave and get
is sufficient; too much of it and the target will despair, afraid that she will
permission to come and see
end up having to do all the work.

him freely every day and

converse with him.
•
And

A man's fears and insecurities often concern his sense of masculinity; he
this did fall out so well that
usually will feel threatened by a woman who is too overtly manipulative,
presently both the twain of
who is too much in control. The greatest seductresses in history knew how
them were in love with
him, albeit he was not