Marriage
In November 1891, at the age of 32, and still a virgin, Ellis married the English writer and proponent of women's rights, Edith Lees. From the beginning, their marriage was unconventional, as Edith Lees was openly lesbian. At the end of the honeymoon, Ellis went back to his bachelor rooms in Paddington. She lived at Fellowship House. Their "open marriage" was the central subject in Ellis's autobiography, My Life.
According to Ellis in My Life, his friends were much amused at his being considered an expert on sex. Some knew that he suffered from impotence until the age of 60. He then discovered that he could become aroused by the sight of a woman urinating. Ellis named this "undinism". It is now more commonly called urolagnia. After his wife, Edith Lees, died, Ellis formed a relationship with Francoise Lafitte who was French. She found his desire for ``undinism charming and indulged it with him.
Read more about this topic: Havelock Ellis
Famous quotes containing the word marriage:
“Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Men commonly couple with their idea of marriage a slight degree at least of sensuality; but every lover, the world over, believes in its inconceivable purity.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Let a man do what he will by a single woman, the world is encouragingly apt to think Marriage a sufficient amends.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)