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Landscapes of Cancer and Desire | The New Yorker

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Isaw M.’s sex for the first time on the night of January 22, 2003, in the entryway of my house, at the foot of the stairs leading up to the bedrooms. There is something extraordinary about the first sight of the other’s sex, the unveiling of what was hitherto unknown. So that is what we’re going to live with, live our love with. Or not. We’d had dinner together in a restaurant he knew well on Rue Servandoni, near the Jardin du Luxembourg. He had just left the woman he’d been living with for several months. During the meal, I said, “I’d like to take you to Venice,” and immediately added, “but I can’t at the moment because I’ve got breast cancer, and I’m having an operation next week at the Institut Curie.” He showed none of the signs—the almost imperceptible retraction, the sudden stiffening—through which even the most educated and composed people let their horror show, despite themselves, when I told them I had cancer. The only time he seemed disturbed was when I revealed that my new h

Save this story Save this story I saw M.’s sex for the first time on the night of January 22, 2003, in the entryway of my house, at the foot of the stairs leading up to the bedrooms. There is something extraordinary about the first sight of the other’s sex, the unveiling of what was hitherto unknown. So that is what we’re going to live with, live our love with. Or not. We’d had dinner together in a restaurant he knew well on Rue Servandoni, near the Jardin du Luxembourg. He had just left the woman he’d been living with for several months. During the meal, I said, “I’d like to take you to Venic

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