How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
'Unnatural lot of bastards,' said the priest. Tristram admired the priestly language. 'The sin of Sodom. God ought to strike the lot of you dead.' (1.10.19)
In the biblical Book of Genesis, God destroys the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to punish the sins of their people, and only one man and his two daughters are allowed to escape. Is The Wanting Seed telling the exact same story? Is the global food blight in the novel God's punishment for the State's promotion of homosexuality?
Quote #8
When they lay panting more slowly, detumescence magically synchronically achieved, his arm under her relaxed body, she wondered if perhaps after all she hadn't meant that to happen. (1.11.1)
There's nothing like fancy language to make a sex scene sound less dirty. This is another of those moments when the novel's narrative voice seems to be poking fun at Beatrice-Joanna's love affair with Derek. The fact that the two achieve orgasm "magically" at exactly the same time suggests that we're not meant to take the realism of this scene very seriously.
Quote #9
He chuckled. 'A surprising number of policemen are being eaten, I gather. God works in a mysterious way. Epicene flesh seems to have the greater succulence.' (3.8.24)
Whereas Father Ambrose is content to shout homophobic threats and slurs, Father Shackel seems to take a lot of pleasure in the fact that police officers with indeterminate genders (that's what the word 'epicene' means) are being cannibalized.