The word “sadism” comes from the French writer Marquis de Sade. Donatien Alphonse François de Sade took up his pen while in prison, where he spent a total of about thirty years, accused of various crimes, including sexual ones.
By the irony of fate, during the Great French Revolution, the “first sadist” was sent to prison once again because of his “human-kindness.” Serving as a juror of a revolutionary tribunal, the “citizen Sade” refused to put to the vote a “certain terrible, inhuman постановление” and was accused of “moderation.”
The novel “120 Days of Sodom” was written in the Bastille on a roll of toilet paper in just 37 days and miraculously survived. The manuscript was lost during Sade’s transfer to the Charenton mental hospital and was rediscovered only at the beginning of the twentieth century.