"Destined to be a classic, Exquisite Masochism gives a new depth of thinking to central topics of the novel and turns received wisdom inside out. Love, desire, depiction, but also delay, refusal, and dispersed artistic energy—Jarvis takes us through core scenes of the Victorian and modernist novel to recalibrate our sense of their force and form. The book’s tremendous importance extends beyond literature, to our imaginations of marriage, individuality, pleasure, and erotic life and their place in art and society."