The Art of Seduction Book Study

Ripper

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wayword said:
This book is a novel and seems to focus on how to handle different female archetypes.

Can anyone sum up his core principles, though? Like general stuff you can apply to any girl? Cuz I don't think I have time to read through that tome (or this uber-thread, for that matter).
No, the book isn't a novel, he just uses examples from famous seducer's of the past to illustrate his points.

It's far more subtle and nuanced than being a glorified pick-up book. At heart, I think, (coupled with the 48 laws of power) the book is really a discourse on human nature and behaviour. As he says near the start, you can't seduce a happy person. It seems to me his main point, the starting point for seduction is need. In other words, you can't seduce someone who wants for nothing. Seduction is predicated on need, it's about satisfying the need of the the target. In fact, I think you could go as far as to say that he considers this to be the primary paradigm of human relationships. i.e. we gravitate towards those and build relationships with those who fulfill some sort of need we have.

The other sense I get about the book is that Greene believes that successfull seducers can take their ego out of the situation so that they can analyse the situation and be rational about it. The problem with emotion is that it clouds judgement according to him and you always need to be in a position to judge accurately if you want to be a successfull seducer. You might be able to leap from here to saying that men are perhaps more naturally dispositioned to be seducers because they can check their emotions more easily than women and act against what they feel much more easily than women but that is somewhat controversial. Interesting discussion there I reckon.
 

Ripper

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Jayer said:
Ok I just read the Charismatic. I feel its similar to the Charmer section in that its geared more toward political seduction or seduction to mass audiences. I am going to post the parts I think can be relevant for seduction of women to be discussed.

The idea of being resolute in your actions and having strong conviction is what's mentioned over and over again in this section.

"Your eyes must glow with the fire of a prophet" I would assume this refers to mystical confidence with of course if the number 1 key to success with women.

Being uninhibited in actions (3 second rule) and not apologizing for your desires as a man (ross jeffries) as displayed by Rasputin all come into play here.

What are all your thoughts? Like with every section, can anyone provide real world examples?
Yeah I found this one interesting because charismatic types seem to be far less frequent than rakes and coquettes. Perhaps, it's because the conditions for charismatics, i.e.rallying people for a cause of some sort etc. are far more rare in society than the situations rakes and coquettes find themselves in.
 

Reyaj

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Ripper said:
No, the book isn't a novel, he just uses examples from famous seducer's of the past to illustrate his points.

It's far more subtle and nuanced than being a glorified pick-up book. At heart, I think, (coupled with the 48 laws of power) the book is really a discourse on human nature and behaviour. As he says near the start, you can't seduce a happy person. It seems to me his main point, the starting point for seduction is need. In other words, you can't seduce someone who wants for nothing. Seduction is predicated on need, it's about satisfying the need of the the target. In fact, I think you could go as far as to say that he considers this to be the primary paradigm of human relationships. i.e. we gravitate towards those and build relationships with those who fulfill some sort of need we have.

The other sense I get about the book is that Greene believes that successfull seducers can take their ego out of the situation so that they can analyse the situation and be rational about it. The problem with emotion is that it clouds judgement according to him and you always need to be in a position to judge accurately if you want to be a successfull seducer. You might be able to leap from here to saying that men are perhaps more naturally dispositioned to be seducers because they can check their emotions more easily than women and act against what they feel much more easily than women but that is somewhat controversial. Interesting discussion there I reckon.
Very well put. I am glad you joined this discussion. I'd definitely like to hear real world examples (if you have any) as how you've used traits from these characters in real life. You can even backtrack to rake, coquette etc.....

That's really my whole purpose of doing this study. Green uses many classical examples and I want to truly see if the essence of the strategies are classic....
 

Ripper

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Well, it's always interesting to try to see the real life situations in which his tales and interpretations are applicable. What really does complicate such a task is the fact that his examples from antiquity and the like are quite often prestigious settings which I would argue make seduction easier. Call it the James Bond Syndrome if you will. Yes, he's incredibly smooth and charming etc but the situation always works from him in that women get the chance to feel the rush of danger and romance precisely because of the situation he's in.

Let's take an example. I'll go with Goldeneye seen as that's the one I know best. There is a rather memorable scene abour 2/3s of the way through where Bond escapes from the military archives protecting Natalya and then when he loses her through no fault of his own he goes after her in a tank!

Now from a woman's perspective, the situation allows her to feel that rush of danger and at the same time being protected by a man. The key is that Bond has the opportunity to seduce people precisely because of the situations they are in. He can fulfill needs easier than in a mundane day-to-day existence.

The key then, I think, is having diagnosed (and greene does this himself, I don't claim to take the credit) that most existence is rather mundane (get up, go to work, come home etc.) it is the duty of seducers in our context to actually work to create an environment which is conducive to seduction right before we even get to the psychology of the whole thing.

Having (hopefully) explained what Greene is driving at, i can try to answer your question about real life examples.

Sticking to my original insight from the previous post that seduction is always predicated on need the best example of this from my life was my first year at University. I'm 22 now, so this would have been around autumn/winter 2004/5.

Having been educated in a boarding school in England, living away from home has never been an issue for me. Yes, it was tough to begin with but by the time I left at 18, I actually felt more comfortable away from home than I did at home. This meant, of course, that when I went to university, living away from home was like water off a duck's back to me. This however, is not by any means the norm. The majority of those who go to uni in Britain have never lived away from home for any considerable length of time before. And such was the case with one certain girl, let's call her Sarah, who I met in the fresher's week.

Sarah came onto my radar because she hooked up with my best mate who I'd gone to school with and naturally was spending all my time with having jsut arrived at uni. After a week fling or so (or that is what everyone was lead to believe though I think it might have gone on for longer) he kicked her to the curb at least publically.

What has to be realised about me at that point was that I was very naive when it came to girls. Id had one LTR at school and was hopelessly what you might call an AFC. Coupled to that I've always had a caring streak (probably from my parents which I'm very grateful for).

As they obviously spent some time together, I got to know her a little bit and genuinely feeling sorry for her (it wasn't some AFC saviour paradigm which Rollo talks about and is highly prevalent I think), I tried to comfort her and just generally feel nice as I felt bad on my friend's behalf for the way that he was treating her.

The upshot of all this was that fast forward a few months and she had fallen for me completely. Everyone in our social circle kept telling me yet I was completely uninterested in that way as I felt no attraction towards her physically.

So how does this all relate to AoS? Well it seems looking back (what a thing hindsight is) that essentially what I did was to basically play the role of the big brother. The fact that she was away from home for the first time and had never spent more than two weeks away from her family in 18 years meant that crucially she had no support system. In the months I got to know her, I became that very system yet curiously, I never projected a sexual exterior to her. I didn't know how to! And the real kicker is and what really interests me about seduction then is that in some, arguably many cases, the advice in AoS actually seems to go against the conventional wisdom of SoSuave. It is like operating on a whole other level,that is subliminal and underground. That is what piques my interest and why when I now anaylse a romantic situation between anyone, I consider it qua what are the relevant party's needs and who or what is fulfilling them?

What do you think Jayer, apologies for the length, had much to say!
 
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Reyaj

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Ripper said:
Well, it's always interesting to try to see the real life situations in which his tales and interpretations are applicable. What really does complicate such a task is the fact that his examples from antiquity and the like are quite often prestigious settings which I would argue make seduction easier. Call it the James Bond Syndrome if you will. Yes, he's incredibly smooth and charming etc but the situation always works from him in that women get the chance to feel the rush of danger and romance precisely because of the situation he's in.

Let's take an example. I'll go with Goldeneye seen as that's the one I know best. There is a rather memorable scene abour 2/3s of the way through where Bond escapes from the military archives protecting Natalya and then when he loses her through no fault of his own he goes after her in a tank!

Now from a woman's perspective, the situation allows her to feel that rush of danger and at the same time being protected by a man. The key is that Bond has the opportunity to seduce people precisely because of the situations they are in. He can fulfill needs easier than in a mundane day-to-day existence.

The key then, I think, is having diagnosed (and greene does this himself, I don't claim to take the credit) that most existence is rather mundane (get up, go to work, come home etc.) it is the duty of seducers in our context to actually work to create an environment which is conducive to seduction right before we even get to the psychology of the whole thing.

Having (hopefully) explained what Greene is driving at, i can try to answer your question about real life examples.

Sticking to my original insight from the previous post that seduction is always predicated on need the best example of this from my life was my first year at University. I'm 22 now, so this would have been around autumn/winter 2004/5.

Having been educated in a boarding school in England, living away from home has never been an issue for me. Yes, it was tough to begin with but by the time I left at 18, I actually felt more comfortable away from home than I did at home. This meant, of course, that when I went to university, living away from home was like water off a duck's back to me. This however, is not by any means the norm. The majority of those who go to uni in Britain have never lived away from home for any considerable length of time before. And such was the case with one certain girl, let's call her Sarah, who I met in the fresher's week.

Sarah came onto my radar because she hooked up with my best mate who I'd gone to school with and naturally was spending all my time with having jsut arrived at uni. After a week fling or so (or that is what everyone was lead to believe though I think it might have gone on for longer) he kicked her to the curb at least publically.

What has to be realised about me at that point was that I was very naive when it came to girls. Id had one LTR at school and was hopelessly what you might call an AFC. Coupled to that I've always had a caring streak (probably from my parents which I'm very grateful for).

As they obviously spent some time together, I got to know her a little bit and genuinely feeling sorry for her (it wasn't some AFC saviour paradigm which Rollo talks about and is highly prevalent I think), I tried to comfort her and just generally feel nice as I felt bad on my friend's behalf for the way that he was treating her.

The upshot of all this was that fast forward a few months and she had fallen for me completely. Everyone in our social circle kept telling me yet I was completely uninterested in that way as I felt no attraction towards her physically.

So how does this all relate to AoS? Well it seems looking back (what a thing hindsight is) that essentially what I did was to basically play the role of the big brother. The fact that she was away from home for the first time and had never spent more than two weeks away from her family in 18 years meant that crucially she had no support system. In the months I got to know her, I became that very system yet curiously, I never projected a sexual exterior to her. I didn't know how to! And the real kicker is and what really interests me about seduction then is that in some, arguably many cases, the advice in AoS actually seems to go against the conventional wisdom of SoSuave. It is like operating on a whole other level,that is subliminal and underground. That is what piques my interest and why when I now anaylse a romantic situation between anyone, I consider it qua what are the relevant party's needs and who or what is fulfilling them?

What do you think Jayer, apologies for the length, had much to say!
Definitely a real world example, I appreciate your feedback. Basically what you described is what SoSuave would call the "friend zone" however it seemed to create attraction in your case. My question upon reading that is, do you think your lack of sexuality towards her was more seductive? Did you ever hook up with her?

Your point about a need being necessary and fufilling that need is dead on as far as what Green discusses and I'm glad you brought it up as the essential point as I feel that's been missing in this discussion thus far.

Still... the question I have is how do you turn the fufillment of that need into sexual attraction? Sure the James Bond examples makes complete sense... but niether of us live in a movie world.........
 

Ripper

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I'm in the middle of a dissertation right now which is eating all my time but I'll post a response when I get a chance. I like your line of questioning.
 

Ripper

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Ok Jayer, sorry for the long pause, just had to nail 20,000 word thesis for my finals. I'll answer both your questions in one because I think the answers to them are basically the same, or ultimately stem from the same place.

Did I ever think my lack of sexuality towards her was more seductive? Did I ever hook up with her?

and

How do you turn the fufillment of that need into sexual attraction?

Yeah, we kissed a couple of times but nothing more. Looking back now, she gave me ample opportunity to sleep with her but me still being the afc I was, I was concerned about 'using' her and thus turned down the 'opportunities' she gave that I did actually pick up on. Regarding the sexuality thing, I think she was more easily able to trust me and be comfortable around me and open up because she wasn't thinking in the back of her mind 'I wonder/think this guy just wants to get into my pants' which she might well have done if I she sensed that I had interest in her sexually. I suppose with regard to the PU community they would say that I was going through a 'rapport' stage or whatever they call it where you aim to bring down the inbuilt resistance on a girl's part to sleeping with you. That's far too mechanical for my liking though and there was much more to it than that. I suppose on top of that I was getting lucky (quite literally!) with a few girls so I suppose that might have raised her interest.

This experience seemed to speak to me about human relationships on a very deep level. If I haven't mentioned before, i should say that the whole situation was quite literally extraordinary in that it's not everyday you meet someone who is separated from their support system. I suppose then that Greene would say that it is the job of the seducer to not only spot these situations but also to actively create them

In a nutshell you have right there one of the founding principles of commercialism and modern society. You could make a strong argument that modern Western society/culture is actually one massive seduction writ large.
How do you sell someone something? You convince them that they need it. That's why all those infomercials/commericials start with 'DO YOU SUFFER FROM x/y/z?'...'THEN YOU NEED PRODUCT x/y/z!' The methodology is really just the same.

Once you find these 'situations' I think the target will naturally feel attraction towards you. The mechanism of this I'm not sure of but you can see from above that it is more than likely. So my advice then would be train yourself to spot these situations and using your imagination exaggerate anything you see that is naturally seductive for maximum impact.
 

Reyaj

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Thanks for the response Ripper. As always you put the aim of the book in perspective. You need to fufill a need which is what you did and thus she was attracted to you. I'll take your word that you could have banged her if you pushed it....

You may have inspired me to try what the board will call an AFC move. Stay tuned to my approach journal for the details.

Let's all move onto the next section!
 

sherineo

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Hi guys. Great Thread. I have read this book but after reading this thread I can relate more to it.

I see all these mental states ( rake, charmer, coquette etc. ) so to speak more as stages of mental development.

I remember myself as an AFC few years back...
Socially misfit right from the childhood...with classic symptoms.
I remember three major oneitis' of my life which consumed almost like 8 years of my life...
During this period as well I can remember attracting girls (mind you getting cray over me) without any effort through my natural personality...but being too engrossed in my oneitis' I could never properly utilize that time.
As I stayed more in those oneitis's I grew more pathetically AFC everyday...
One Burnout after another...it was during my last Oneitis' that I came across this community and started realising the truth.

So like a regular, I read pook's eyeopener but a little mysogynist articles grew more aloof but confident and may be became a coquette of sorts...but wasnt succesfull...

During this period my personalities' real atrtributes started shining I started becoming comfortable with my real self after an year of acting like a so called 'jerk' which I guess was as pathetic being an AFC. I guess it was more of AFC+misogynist.

Now I'm at a stage where I know that no matter what I can go and talk for hrs to a chick if I want to. And yes no matter what. Total Control here. and I guess to some extent I can generate feelings in them as well...through my body language, words, eye contact, strategic kino etc...in an artistic sort of way...(but as I said I really like talking to women...and when they talk to me it's them who are losing control and not me on their emotions and not me...)
I also developed what you call a natural witty sense of humor as well...which when in mood works like charm under any condition...

And it's so natural that sometimes when I watch myself actually saying those things I cant believe my ears...

So may be I have achieved what you can call a partial emotional control...
and a charmer's mindset...

(Since you got to control your emotions first before you can aim at controlling other's emotions)


What I have not achieved is may be a complete sense of control over my sexuality...(I still like masterbate almost daily...oops I said it)
To achieve the status of Rake you need two things
1. Emotional Control
2. And Strong Libido (Rightly Channelizaed Sexuality)

I don't say that I was lucky to come out of it and met this community...since I guess it was the part of Natural Evolution..Survival Of the Fittest...And endless quest to be that 'fittest' who canpass on his genes...

I don't say that I have been the best...(since I still procastinate a lot...but I have noticed the more I get involved in risks around my emotions the more I gain control over them)

So getting out of comfort zone and suffring is very important...

And I sort of enjoy it now....

You won't believe I went out to meet my last oneitis just to stir those emotions once again...
But this time I wasnt some weenie following her around but some sort of Don Juan ...No I'm not saying that I took her to bed and had crazy sex with her...but in my own way owing to what happens in my kind of reality...I guess I didnt make any mistake...(we met after 3 years)

I'm 20 right now...

So may be evolution will get me to some respectable level in a few years (may be)
 

Ripper

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Can't wait for tactics. That is the most applicable and relevant stuff I think.
 

FoolsCause

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Ripper said:
Can't wait for tactics. That is the most applicable and relevant stuff I think.
I waited a whole year for tactics but first the Star and victim types. :)
 
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