What We Do in the Shadows TV - Jessica Valenti - Huffington Post online - The Borgias TV - Diary of a Teenage Virgin TV - Voltaire - William Shakespeare - Exodus 22:16&17 - Leviticus 21:13&14 - Judges 11:37 - I Kings 1:2 - Esther 2:2-4 - Matthew 25:1 - Acts 21:9 - Geoffrey Chaucer - Charlotte Bingham - George Carlin - John Milton - A C Green: Iron Virgin TV - Virgin School TV - David Attenborough TV - Robert Bartlett TV -
Vampires love virgins. It’s their favourite food. What We Do in the Shadows s1e2: City Council ***** Guillermo, BBC 2019
The desirable virgin is sexy but not sexual. She’s young, white, and skinny. She’s a cheerleader, a babysitter; she’s accessible and eager to please (remember those ethics of passivity!). She’s never a woman of color. She’s never a low-income girl or a fat girl. She’s never disabled. ‘Virgin’ is a designation for those who meet a certain standard of what women, especially young women, are supposed to look like. As for how these young women are supposed to act? A blank slate is best. Jessica Valenti, The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women
For those unfamiliar with the ritual, a purity ball is a religious ceremony in which fathers and daughters dress up in ball gown attire, spend a night of dinner and dancing together, and end the evening with a vow to abstain from sex until marriage. As photographer David Magnusson explains in Purity, a photography book on the subject: ‘The girls make a pledge to remain pure and live pure lives before God, to stay sexually abstinent until marriage. The fathers sign a commitment undertaking to protect their daughter’s purity’. Huffington Post online article 5th May 2014, ‘Welcome to the Bizarre and Beautiful World of Purity Balls’
A virgin – you must be unique in your family. The Borgias: The Borgias in Love s1e5, husband Giovanni Sforza to Lucretia, Showtime 2011
Filming over one long summer, they’ve agreed to share their innermost thoughts on what it’s like to be a virgin. Diary of a Teenage Virgin, Channel 4 2013
One in ten of young Britons lose their virginity abroad. ibid.
It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that virginity could be a virtue. Voltaire
Perhaps he love you now ...
For he himself is subject to his birth ...
Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open ...
The chariest maid is prodigal enough
If she unmasks her beauty to the moon. William Shakespeare, Hamlet I iii 14, 18, 31, 36-37, Laertes to Ophelia
Tender yourself more dearly. ibid. I iii 107, Polonius to Laertes
Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence;
Set your entreatments at a higher rate
Than a command to parley. ibid. Hamlet I iii 121-123
Your old virginity is like one of our French withered pears: it looks ill, it eats drily. William Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well I i
I thought her
As chaste as unsunned snow. William Shakespeare, Cymbeline II v 12
And if a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife.
If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins. Exodus 22:16&17
And he shall take a wife in her virginity.
A widow, or a divorced woman, or profane, or an harlot, these shall he not take: but he shall take a virgin of his own people to wife. Leviticus 21:13&14
And she said unto her father, Let this thing be done for me: let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows. Judges 11:37
Wherefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish him, and let her lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat. I Kings 1:2
Then said the king’s servants that ministered unto him, Let there be fair young virgins sought for the king.
And let the king appoint officers in all the provinces of his kingdom, that they may gather together all the fair young virgins unto Shushan the palace, to the house of the women, unto the custody of Hege the king’s chamberlain, keeper of the women; and let their things for purification be given them:
And let the maiden which pleaseth the king be queen instead of Vashti. And the thing pleased the king; and he did so. Esther 2:2-4
Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. Matthew 25:1
And the same man had four daughters, virgins, which did prophesy. Acts 21:9
Filth and old age, I’m sure you will agree, are powerful wardens upon chastity. Geoffrey Chaucer
An isolated outbreak of virginity ... is a rash on the face of society. It arouses only pity from the married, and embarrassment from the single. Charlotte Bingham, Lucinda
Virginity: you don’t get that back, because you were in such a big hurry to get rid of it in the first place. George Carlin, A Place for My Stuff
Some say no evil thing that walks by night,
In fog or fire, by lake or moorish fen,
Blue meagre hag, or stubborn unlaid ghost
That breaks his magic chains at curfew time,
No goblin, or swart fairy of the mine,
Hath hurtful power o’er true virginity. John Milton, Comus 432-437
My virginity weighed like a millstone around my neck. It had been of such enormous importance to me for so long that my habit was to defend it at all costs. I had been defending it for five years and I was sick of it. Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
When A C Green joined LA Lakers they were at their peak of stardom. A C Green: Iron Virgin, ESPN short 2016
‘We joked about how long he would last before he had sex.’ ibid. teammate
‘What a perfectly matched set of ball players.’ ibid.
‘The solution is abstinence.’ ibid. A C
‘Played sixteen years and missed less than five games.’ ibid. teammate
‘A C is iron-man to us.’ ibid.
A C Green set a record for playing 1,192 consecutive games. The most games in history by a virgin. ibid.
Having sex for the first time is one of the most significant moments in our lives. But what if that all-important first time passes you by? What if you remain a virgin? For male virgins who have lost all hope there is one place that can help: Virgin School. Virgin School, Channel 4 2007
96% of people have sex by the time they are 25. ibid.
18 is the average age a man loses his virginity in the UK. ibid.
Female Komodo dragons can give birth to live young without having contacted the male. And female aphids can clone themselves to produce thousands of copies. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s2e1: Virgin Birth, Sky 2014
In 1926 an expedition was launched by an American called William Burden to find out more. ibid.
They proved to be more gentle and intelligent than expected. ibid.
In 2012 odd breeding behaviour was noticed in two species of snakes: Copperheads and Cottonmouths. Some females were producing through parthenogenesis. ibid.
The cult of virginity exerted a powerful grip on the minds of many medieval women. Robert Bartlett, Inside the Medieval Mind II: Sex, BBC 2008