Sadomasochism in Sarah Kane’s Blasted

Between the social stigma of Sadomasochism and the medical recognition and acknowledgment of it as a complex personality disorder, this paper aims to destigmatize and desexualize Sadomasochism by analyzing it from a psychological perspective and providing a medical diagnosis. In this light, this study identifies the Sadomasochistic characters in Sarah Kane’s Blasted by breaking said stigma of treating Sadomasochism solely as a sexual perversion or deviance and instead, laying the medical and scientific basis for it being a personality disorder that requires a psychological approach. Tracing sexual perversions symptomatically, the need for a cultural reset in regards to the ignorance and mistreatment of Sadomasochism is instigated by presenting a sound analysis of why certain characters behave the way they do. By doing so, the co-existence of other psychological disorders and the way they fundamentally structure Sadomasochism provides the nucleusof this study.