Please.

Sluts like her have set our gender back decades, not advanced the cause.

Congratulations! Thanks to Erica and her ilk we have to put out or go down on demand if we're to be thought of as feminists.

Yeah, and that's different from our grandmother's generation how??? Oh, yeah. Lots more oral sex than the olden days, and we have the "luxury" of abortion.

Again, thanks...but next time don't do me any favors, Erica.

Erica Jong admittedly made her career by advocating sex and by offering to prove her point at the drop of a hat. Or a name. Easy women have always been popular with men who want sex. So young feminists, heed Erica Jong's advice! Sleep your way to the top. Just remember to take notes. Yeah, there's a great lesson for young feminists to learn. Erica's next book should be called "What I leaned while on my back and my knees: fucking zip."

She seems pretty out of it...but if she's telling young women that blow-jobs are empowering, then preach on, sister-friend!

What I find in this article, and I am a male who is just starting a writing career at 61, is that a writer has to have the courage to write what is in front of her/him. To be concerned about what others think is to squelch one's creativity. I think the selection of the audience comes after the work is at least well on its way, if not completed. In my own limited experience, trying to write for an audience is counter-productive. As to the comments in this section: of what value are the nasty comments on Erica's character and morality? I think it just masks the unfulfilling lives of those who composed the letters. To criticize others whose success is quite apparent is to disguise the critic's own sense of inadequacy. We attract people and experiences into our lives for one purpose: to see who we are and how we percieve the world. To be able to write about life as the writer lives it and have people read and discuss it, is, to me, the ultimate compliment. It is not to have people agree with me, but to excite a passion in them to discuss the ideas that have been sparked.

Thank you for offering part of your life and sharing what you feel is the Truth. Though I have not read any of your books, I feel this interview has given me some insight into who you are, and I respect your candor.

In Peace,

As the gentleman who posted just before you points out: Amen to truth and candor, especially when it precedes a blow job...which is all Jong has to offer in terms if truth and candor, which is what Jessica V. wants her to teach young feminists, which is what will make men very happy. Because they're getting a bj, not because their girlfriends are now somehow magically empowered.

Um, as it is made clear over and over in the article, Erica Jong thinks that the blow-job et al were MISTAKES.

Let's try that again.

They were MISTAKES. Which doesn't sound like she's arguing that all young women should imitate her. Geez, people. Can none of you (besides St. John) understand the difference between doing something, and advocating something? Or have you all lived perfect lives with no mistakes, like our dear President?

Grow up!

Wow, Miss America posted here? I wouldn't think she'd have time with all the appearances she has to make.

Of course Miss America would have a problem with people calling themselves feminist. That's the most anti-feminist title in America today, right after First Lady.

Has written a memoir titled The Sex Doctor in the BAsement. Salon should review it as well.

It's understandable for the interviewer to be intimidated by someone famous. Still, the subtext of the interview was clearly "you may be famous, but wow, you're old". How many times can you allude to it in one article? A lot, apparently.

and i think by calling her appearance there "out of it", you're being quite generous.

she struck me as ill-informed, irrational, and frankly, embarrassing. not only has Jong come to represent capital "F" Feminism, but she got up there on Maher's panel and clearly thought she was carrying the flag of capital "L" Liberalism, too. but sadly, she just came off as not terribly bright and a bit of a crackpot. as someone who considers herself both a feminist and a liberal, i sure wish Bill could have found someone with a few more brain cells to rub together to represent that perspective....

Erica Jong made it o.k. to embrace sensuality during a pretty contentious time between

the sexes in this country. The idea of a woman exercising a rather robust sexuality will always be a cause of discomfort in the U.S. I was living in Europe when "Fear of Flying" came out. When I returned to the States I witness a total different reaction.

And trashing a woman for naked honesty is still one of them, apparently. Is Erica supposed to pour out page after page of shame & guilt for her mistakes (of course, not one us us has ever done anything impulsive & stupid & which we regret later on). Do her personal opinions, her personal experiences, have to be vetted & approved for general pubication? Hey, if you don't like what she has to say, don't listen to her, don't read her books!

Frankly, I think her novels provide wonderful insight into the zeitgeist of the American 70s, 80s, and 90s, as well as being warmly human & funny as hell. In a time of increasingly timid imagination, she's still an electrifying voice, someone who refuses to "know her place" (as defined by everyone else). More power to her!

I have yet to read a book by Ms. Jong, but I have enjoyed the two interviews I have read with her on Salon. In this interview in particular I was impressed by the idea that women writers have killed themselves in order to complete a narrative long-embedded in our culture; the narrative of a woman needing to be punished for her transgressions. The nature of these transgressions seems always to be sexual or intellectual - both linked to power – and judging by many of the letters responding to this article that narrative is still fully at work. Ms. Jong strikes me as a kind of hero in this regard. Admitting mistakes, but refusing to keep quiet and refusing to be punished or off herself in order to satisfy the worst aspects of our collective regard for women and sex. I didn't see Ms. Jong on the Bill Maher show, but I would offer that while Ms. Jong has political interests, she is not a politician and therefore under no obligation to wax down her mind or heart in order to make an audience comfortable. Rebel’s performances, good or bad, rarely satisfy the status quo.