Thinky-Thought... Erm... Wednesday
Broad Strokes of Heroism is coming later this week.
It's time for me to ponder some different type stuff.
It's 2 a.m. And those of you that know me well know that I'm not tired and I probably won't be for another three hours. I'll catch my 3.5 hours of sleep and be ready to roll tomorrow morning. I've been up and down and all around -- I'm not having the easiest time controlling my depression of late, but I've been thinking some thoughts. And since people seem to like it when I do that, here we go. (Btw, unfolded73, if you think we can use any of this... let me know.)
Here's the thing about writing smut.
I like porn without plot just as much as the next person. Only... it's never really without plot. There's always a sequence of events... Okay, side point.
But here's the thing. Writing about just sex is easy. Insert Tab A into Slot B. Turn knobs. Wash, rinse, repeat in different positions.
Writing about intimacy is hard. Because it's so deeply personal. You've got to open the book of yourself and find an experience to build on. Intimacy is about those moments with your lover that you keep close to you and don't tell anyone about because it's that precious.
Intimacy is not sex.
I think this goes back to my issues with the writing as I did as a teenager. I romanticized sex, when I should have been romanticizing intimacy -- which is a lot rarer. You can have good sex with a stranger. I have it on good authority. You can't have intimacy with a stranger.
And my argument here is that you can't write a good love story without a sense of intimacy. A sense of -- this is as permanent as it gets. We go together like peanut butter and jelly. I know you so well and I don't have to show you that through sex -- I can communicate that with a touch of my hand and a cup of your favorite tea.
This is my problem with Twilight. It misses intimacy by like -- a million miles.
"O hai thar, ur standin' ova my bed bein smexy" is not intimacy. It's not even keeping vigil by a loved one's bedside while they're ill -- although that can be intimate. Without feeling behind it, though... there's just nothing to move me to "aww, that's so sweet".
In all of the fics I love, in all of the stories I love, the couples have this indescribable feeling to them. It's in the way Rose and the Doctor sit in the bed and discuss their children in the Chaos Verse. It's the way Rose and the Doctor deal with the marital problems in Paradise Lost. It's the way they make their way cross-country in a blue Morris Minor in the_tenzo's fic...
It's a sense of knowing. And not just knowing. Knowing the right little things to do.
One of my friends was telling me about how her husband makes her cups of tea and slips them unobtrusively next to her computer while she's writing. Another expresses it in her husband's trust in her decisions while she changes her life completely. Another tells me about her boyfriend, across the ocean, who keeps Skype on just so that he can hear her and she can hear him while they putter around on a Saturday.
I don't just want sex. I want that. Not only from my fic. From my life. Although, seeing it in fic would be a lot nicer.
SO. Authors attempting smut for the very first time. You know who you are. Give me more than sex. Give me intimacy. Give me power. Give me more. Because then you'll excite me. I have faith in you.
It's time for me to ponder some different type stuff.
It's 2 a.m. And those of you that know me well know that I'm not tired and I probably won't be for another three hours. I'll catch my 3.5 hours of sleep and be ready to roll tomorrow morning. I've been up and down and all around -- I'm not having the easiest time controlling my depression of late, but I've been thinking some thoughts. And since people seem to like it when I do that, here we go. (Btw, unfolded73, if you think we can use any of this... let me know.)
Here's the thing about writing smut.
I like porn without plot just as much as the next person. Only... it's never really without plot. There's always a sequence of events... Okay, side point.
But here's the thing. Writing about just sex is easy. Insert Tab A into Slot B. Turn knobs. Wash, rinse, repeat in different positions.
Writing about intimacy is hard. Because it's so deeply personal. You've got to open the book of yourself and find an experience to build on. Intimacy is about those moments with your lover that you keep close to you and don't tell anyone about because it's that precious.
Intimacy is not sex.
I think this goes back to my issues with the writing as I did as a teenager. I romanticized sex, when I should have been romanticizing intimacy -- which is a lot rarer. You can have good sex with a stranger. I have it on good authority. You can't have intimacy with a stranger.
And my argument here is that you can't write a good love story without a sense of intimacy. A sense of -- this is as permanent as it gets. We go together like peanut butter and jelly. I know you so well and I don't have to show you that through sex -- I can communicate that with a touch of my hand and a cup of your favorite tea.
This is my problem with Twilight. It misses intimacy by like -- a million miles.
"O hai thar, ur standin' ova my bed bein smexy" is not intimacy. It's not even keeping vigil by a loved one's bedside while they're ill -- although that can be intimate. Without feeling behind it, though... there's just nothing to move me to "aww, that's so sweet".
In all of the fics I love, in all of the stories I love, the couples have this indescribable feeling to them. It's in the way Rose and the Doctor sit in the bed and discuss their children in the Chaos Verse. It's the way Rose and the Doctor deal with the marital problems in Paradise Lost. It's the way they make their way cross-country in a blue Morris Minor in the_tenzo's fic...
It's a sense of knowing. And not just knowing. Knowing the right little things to do.
One of my friends was telling me about how her husband makes her cups of tea and slips them unobtrusively next to her computer while she's writing. Another expresses it in her husband's trust in her decisions while she changes her life completely. Another tells me about her boyfriend, across the ocean, who keeps Skype on just so that he can hear her and she can hear him while they putter around on a Saturday.
I don't just want sex. I want that. Not only from my fic. From my life. Although, seeing it in fic would be a lot nicer.
SO. Authors attempting smut for the very first time. You know who you are. Give me more than sex. Give me intimacy. Give me power. Give me more. Because then you'll excite me. I have faith in you.