Jean-Jacques Pauvert, yet at the time her authorship was still unknown. An English-language edition of the interview was released in the United States in 1979 by Viking Press. Eventually, Desclos publicly admitted that she was the author of The Story of O in 1994, 40 years after the book was published, in an interview with The New Yorker. She also explained the pseudonym of Pauline Réage: she chose the first name in homage to Pauline Bonaparte and Pauline Roland and she randomly picked up the name of Réage on a topographic map. Documentaries Writer of O, a 2004 documentary film by Pola Rapaport, mixed interviews with re-enactments of certain scenes from the book. In the documentary, the real author of Story of O, Dominique Aury (actually a pen name of Desclos), talks about the book A Girl in Love. This book was written about how Story of O was written. A documentary was also made for BBC Radio 4 entitled The Story of O: The Vice Francaise, presented by Rowan Pelling, former editor of the Erotic Review, which looked at the history of the book and its author Desclos. Erotica: A Journey Into Female Sexuality, a documentary by filmmaker Maya Gallus, featured the final interview with 90-year-old Dominique Aury (a pen name of Desclos) before she died. In the film, she recounts the extraordinary love story behind Story of O and marvels that she has reached such a grand age. Personal life Desclos had a long-term relationship with her employer, Jean Paulhan, the director of the prestigious Nouvelle Revue Française, who was 23 years her senior. She was bisexual, and had a liaison with historian Édith Thomas, who may have been an inspiration for the character of Anne-Marie in Story of O. She had a son from a brief marriage in her early twenties. Legacy In 2007, the National Leather Association International inaugurated awards for excellence in SM/fetish/leather writing. The categories include the Pauline Reage (a pen name of Desclos) award for fiction novel. In 2020, Desclos was inducted into the Leather Hall of Fame. See also Chantons sous l'Occupation – a documentary film References External links The complete Story of O website: all about Histoire d'O and Dominique Aury (updated) Writer of O, a 2004 documentary film by Pola Rapaport Name Upon Name at Rain Taxi 1907 births 1998 deaths 20th-century French journalists 20th-century French novelists 20th-century French women