Erotic Darkover

Darkover, under its passionate red sun, has always had an erotic element in it. This is certainly the intent of the author herself, who was immersed for much of her life in hippie culture and "experimental" relationships, including polyamory. In those fragrant '60s, they took group grope seriously, and ultimately, in a simplification of Freud, regarded all sexual repression as bad. Sex, of various kinds, was considered a form of salvation, where a miserable lost repressed person could be bedded into happiness.

This is what's going on in the illustration above. Bradley created a form of magic based on esoteric sexual energy, perhaps inspired by the Indian tantra or the magick of Aleister Crowley. In order to make it work and keep it working, you had to abstain from sex or in the case of high-powered magic users, take a vow of celibacy. But if sex was salvation, then celibacy was a form of sin, and needed removing.

This is what the characters did in Bradley's "The Forbidden Tower," a melodramatic tale of a magical vestal virgin type who needed to break free of the old rules and let the magic fly. Under the influence of mind-expanding drugs (Marion lived in Berkeley, California during the '60s) the four main characters have a polyamorous play date awash in psychic energies. I don't know whether this whole thing is, uh, "dated," but it gave me the opportunity to draw nudes.

Black ink on illustration board, 8 1/2" x 11", fall 1983. This is a fan magazine cover. "Jumeaux" means "Twins" or "Gemini," as the Red Star of Darkover was supposed to be seen from Earth in the constellation Gemini.