The main character of the novella, named Severin, is obsessed with an erotic fantasy about a woman who will humiliate him. He calls his ideal—the commanding and beautiful lady—“Venus in Furs.” Soon, the man meets an eccentric high-society woman—Vanda von Dunaev—and offers her a chance to fulfill his long-held dream together. At first the girl rejects the proposal, but gradually the game of mistress and slave begins to captivate and excite her more than Severin himself, and the lovers enter into a complicated, psychologically tense relationship.