'Moonlighting' syndrome
Jul. 31st, 2008 09:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
resonantThe spouse is reading a book about Shakespeare. It claims that Shakespeare must have had an unhappy marriage, because none of his plays are about happy marriages. The spouse scoffs at this. "Nobody wants to see a play that's like their marriage, and nobody wants their marriage to be like a play," he says. "If you're lucky, your marriage is the opposite of dramatic."
Remember "Moonlighting"? Remember how sexy Maddy and David were as they bickered and maneuvered and claimed not to feel what they were feeling? Remember how fast all that sexy went away as soon as they actually acted on what they felt?
And yet ... And yet. As a person, I like having a relationship that can be measured in decades. As a writer, I like a challenge. And I don't believe that there's no way to write an established relationship except as the grave of a romance or a backdrop for nonromantic derring-do.
You can write a long-term relationship that still has the romantic and sexual tension you need to keep the sex sexy. Not many people do, but you can.
Two things I don't mean:
Resolve the romantic tension, then put them in danger or give them a difficult project to do together. This works in the sense that the story can go on, but if your goal is a romance, it fails because it pushes the romance into the background, replacing "Will they be able to make it as a couple?" with "Will they live through this?" Adventure suspense is not the same thing as romantic suspense.
Try to duplicate the urgency of a first-time story by separating them for a long time, so that their desire is stoked to a fever pitch by the time they see each other. The problem with this is that even if they haven't had sex for months, it's still not going to be first-time sex, because there's no doubt. They're not wondering whether it's going to happen. They're just wondering when. Frustration is not the same thing as suspense.
So what do writers do to maintain the romantic suspense once the relationship starts?
1. Introduce a new conflict to push them further apart.
This is very common in romance novels. It can be done well, but it almost never is.
The usual romance-novel method is to have someone tell the heroine something awful about the hero, and have her believe it without asking him. Or to have her see him with another woman and jump to the conclusion that she has a rival.
This is dumb, of course. What works, I think, is to pick up a conflict that's inherent in the relationship itself. What you want is for the reader to think, not, "Where the hell did that come from?" or, "You idiot, just ask him," but, "Aww, I really thought they were going to be able to sneak past this, but I should have known it was too good to be true."
Conflicts like these:
Everything looks great now, but just wait till she has to choose between you and the Air Force.
You thought you could handle being the lover of an important public figure, but now you realize that your life is not your own.
Can you bear to watch him puts himself in danger?
You do realize, don't you, that his whole life back to age eighteen is classified, including the parts that make him wake up screaming.
2. Privilege one sex act and withhold it for a while.
Do people do this in romance novels? I've never seen it. It's extremely common in slash, of course, and that does have to affect how you approach it. You can either say, "That's a cliche, so I won't do it unless I can do it with a little twist," or else you can say, "That's a trope, so if I do it, I'm going to really go all the way with it. Push it to the limit, totally fulfill the kink, write the very best darned delayed-kissing story that anyone has ever written."
Of the two common approaches, one (withholding penetration) is often perfectly in character given the attitudes and experiences of the guys in question, and yet it bores me to tears. The other one (withholding kissing) is often totally implausible, and yet I have a great goofy love for it. So who knows.
3. My favorite: Find a new barrier to intimacy, and let us watch them try to push through it.
Romances often imply that two people can go from friendship to total honesty and communion in one step, but of course this isn't true. There are always new barriers, new ways that people save themselves from vulnerability by keeping their loved ones at a distance. Exploring these is a great way to keep the sexy suspense in an established relationship.
Some writers think they're doing this, but actually they're just introducing problems. "Let's complicate things the way real life complicates things," they think. "Chores, money, in-laws, work -- let's build their conflict out of real-life problems."
This can work, but usually it doesn't, because usually those aren't intimacy problems.
What are intimacy problems? Name a character, and think of ways that character will try to protect himself/herself from being truly, deeply known.
Benton Fraser? Won't sleep with you unless he's in love with you -- but mere true love isn't enough to make him admit that he's afraid, or that he needs something. (Another approach: It's also possible that his upbringing and experience have persuaded him that some of his sexual desires are natural and acceptable and others are dirty and disrespectful.)
John Sheppard? Probably has no problem having sex with someone he doesn't love, but may have a problem having sex with someone he does love. May also simply not know how to fight; either the relationship is running smoothly or he breaks it off.
Rodney McKay and Ray Kowalski strike me as people who would perform pre-emptive rejections; when you began to get so close that losing you would be unbearable, they would either split up with you or make themselves so obnoxious that you'd have to split up with them.
I admit I've never done this, but theoretically it ought to be possible for the tension to increase as the relationship continues. After all, the longer they've been together, the more they have to lose.
Remember "Moonlighting"? Remember how sexy Maddy and David were as they bickered and maneuvered and claimed not to feel what they were feeling? Remember how fast all that sexy went away as soon as they actually acted on what they felt?
And yet ... And yet. As a person, I like having a relationship that can be measured in decades. As a writer, I like a challenge. And I don't believe that there's no way to write an established relationship except as the grave of a romance or a backdrop for nonromantic derring-do.
You can write a long-term relationship that still has the romantic and sexual tension you need to keep the sex sexy. Not many people do, but you can.
Two things I don't mean:
Resolve the romantic tension, then put them in danger or give them a difficult project to do together. This works in the sense that the story can go on, but if your goal is a romance, it fails because it pushes the romance into the background, replacing "Will they be able to make it as a couple?" with "Will they live through this?" Adventure suspense is not the same thing as romantic suspense.
Try to duplicate the urgency of a first-time story by separating them for a long time, so that their desire is stoked to a fever pitch by the time they see each other. The problem with this is that even if they haven't had sex for months, it's still not going to be first-time sex, because there's no doubt. They're not wondering whether it's going to happen. They're just wondering when. Frustration is not the same thing as suspense.
So what do writers do to maintain the romantic suspense once the relationship starts?
1. Introduce a new conflict to push them further apart.
This is very common in romance novels. It can be done well, but it almost never is.
The usual romance-novel method is to have someone tell the heroine something awful about the hero, and have her believe it without asking him. Or to have her see him with another woman and jump to the conclusion that she has a rival.
This is dumb, of course. What works, I think, is to pick up a conflict that's inherent in the relationship itself. What you want is for the reader to think, not, "Where the hell did that come from?" or, "You idiot, just ask him," but, "Aww, I really thought they were going to be able to sneak past this, but I should have known it was too good to be true."
Conflicts like these:
Everything looks great now, but just wait till she has to choose between you and the Air Force.
You thought you could handle being the lover of an important public figure, but now you realize that your life is not your own.
Can you bear to watch him puts himself in danger?
You do realize, don't you, that his whole life back to age eighteen is classified, including the parts that make him wake up screaming.
2. Privilege one sex act and withhold it for a while.
Do people do this in romance novels? I've never seen it. It's extremely common in slash, of course, and that does have to affect how you approach it. You can either say, "That's a cliche, so I won't do it unless I can do it with a little twist," or else you can say, "That's a trope, so if I do it, I'm going to really go all the way with it. Push it to the limit, totally fulfill the kink, write the very best darned delayed-kissing story that anyone has ever written."
Of the two common approaches, one (withholding penetration) is often perfectly in character given the attitudes and experiences of the guys in question, and yet it bores me to tears. The other one (withholding kissing) is often totally implausible, and yet I have a great goofy love for it. So who knows.
3. My favorite: Find a new barrier to intimacy, and let us watch them try to push through it.
Romances often imply that two people can go from friendship to total honesty and communion in one step, but of course this isn't true. There are always new barriers, new ways that people save themselves from vulnerability by keeping their loved ones at a distance. Exploring these is a great way to keep the sexy suspense in an established relationship.
Some writers think they're doing this, but actually they're just introducing problems. "Let's complicate things the way real life complicates things," they think. "Chores, money, in-laws, work -- let's build their conflict out of real-life problems."
This can work, but usually it doesn't, because usually those aren't intimacy problems.
What are intimacy problems? Name a character, and think of ways that character will try to protect himself/herself from being truly, deeply known.
Benton Fraser? Won't sleep with you unless he's in love with you -- but mere true love isn't enough to make him admit that he's afraid, or that he needs something. (Another approach: It's also possible that his upbringing and experience have persuaded him that some of his sexual desires are natural and acceptable and others are dirty and disrespectful.)
John Sheppard? Probably has no problem having sex with someone he doesn't love, but may have a problem having sex with someone he does love. May also simply not know how to fight; either the relationship is running smoothly or he breaks it off.
Rodney McKay and Ray Kowalski strike me as people who would perform pre-emptive rejections; when you began to get so close that losing you would be unbearable, they would either split up with you or make themselves so obnoxious that you'd have to split up with them.
I admit I've never done this, but theoretically it ought to be possible for the tension to increase as the relationship continues. After all, the longer they've been together, the more they have to lose.
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(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 02:15 am (UTC)Edited because I cannot spell.
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 02:17 am (UTC)Oh, I think that's canon -- the way he and Dave interact IMHO totally support that he has *no* clue how to fight.
Although it's also hard for me to see John doing something as emotionally active as breaking it off -- I think he'd become more and more slouchy and "I don't care, anything" and forget to call and absolutely *everything* coming out of his mouth would sound sarcastic -- but he would never, ever admit it or acknowledge what he was doing. Passive-aggressive breaking up all the way.
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:58 am (UTC)Passive-aggressive breaking up all the way.
I'll buy that. I once read a story -- I think maybe by
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 02:23 am (UTC)Now I really want fic where characters hook up and then one of them spends ages wondering if the other one was just trying to get them in bed.
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 02:37 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 8/1/08 02:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 02:44 am (UTC)You are right that Gabaldon does a good job with established relationships though. I suppose Sara Donati does pretty well too, although her focus tends to drift to younger generations as the books go on.
(no subject)
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Date: 8/1/08 02:43 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:20 pm (UTC)I adore
I know there must be a hundred examples, but those are the ones that came to mind first.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:23 am (UTC)YES. THIS.
I will memorize this essay because it's so crystallizingly helpful. (The long-term relationship I've learned the most while writing is, um, 6,000 years or so long. I don't dip my toes in the shallow end first!)
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:27 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:35 am (UTC)Any particular recommendations for delayed kissing? That's one of my favorites as well.
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:36 pm (UTC)There's definitely a limit beyond which the audience just starts to find it all comical. Voyager was the first fandom I read, and I followed
For delayed kissing,
(no subject)
From:delayed kissing
From:Re: delayed kissing
From:(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:46 am (UTC)I sense a new Res story on the horizon. Cause you could *totally* do it justice. And I'd love it :D
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:37 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 03:53 am (UTC)As a person married for over 20 years and still in love, I can say that we are happiest now that things are quieter in our lives. The challenges now are different from those when we were younger. One that I have used effectively in established relationship fic and that have been part of our own issues are disability issues. If you live long enough, you are likely to become disabled. And it changes the dynamics and puts a whole new dimension/challenge to relationships.
Other challenges, of course, include children and how we adapt as parents to the way our children change us. Caregiving of elderly parents is another one. Along with the more popular issues of careers and financial strains.
One not very popular but which I am exploring in fiction, is consensual non-monogamy and the way it can change things. I am part of a long term triad. Husband #1 and I have been together 22 years. Husband #2 came into our lives 14 years ago. Although initially challenging, it ended up strengthening our relationship and the three of us are happier together than we were as a couple.
And then the big one. Deaths. How do we handle the loss of others in our lives. Can you survive the loss of a parent? One long term relationship among my friends didn't survive the loss of the man's mother. The woman had always been the one taken care of by him. But when his mother died, his wife had no idea how to comfort him in return and it ended their marriage. The death of a child, for example, can often destroy marriages. A miscarriage rocked ours for a long time.
Very few romance authors take on these challenges of long relationships. I sometimes wonder if people are afraid of or maybe even don't know what it takes to make long time relationships work. My theory, for example, of why the Epilogue in the Harry Potter series feels so "fake" is that JKR herself is divorced and doesn't really know what a twenty year relationship feels like. I wonder what the success rate of most writers' marriages are like. I know that living with a writer can be a challenge. My husbands, mother and child have all spoken about the adjustments they make to live with someone who spends most her days obsessed with people who aren't real.
So this has been long winded but it is a great topic you have brought up.
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:39 pm (UTC)I get the feeling that a lot of romance is written by young writers for young readers; either they don't really know these adjustments exist, or they are aware of them but consider them unromantic, like something only of interest to their parents!
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 04:20 am (UTC)I can believe the conflicts, the ebb and flow, the miscommunications and the love story.
I dunno.
I'm a sap.
I'd like something realistic, well told and with emotional resonance, rather than much of the drama I find.
B
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:41 pm (UTC)I don't necessarily need gut-wrenching angst (though that has its place), but I like the feeling that my characters are moving forward, becoming more intimate and safe with each other -- but not easily. I like to see them struggle through.
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 05:25 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 05:29 am (UTC)You have a lot of interesting scenarios there ... but the kind of story I enjoy most is the first one you don't mean -- give the couple a challenge as a couple. My own experience is that writing an ongoing relationship does get more difficult with time--the 3rd book in the Ransom universe is throwing me some curves--but I think that issues of intimacy and new perspectives on the relationship can come about as a part of how they deal with challenges. Maybe the best example of this I can think of is Lois McMasters Bujold's Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan series. Once Cordelia and Aral get together, they are a solid (and passionate) team--and they have to be to overcome the things life throws at them. Sayers' Busman's Honeymoon is another good one, which would have been a short and fairly mundane love story without the 'detective interruptions.' Charlie Cochrane has something similar in her upcoming Cambridge Fellows mysteries--the characters are actively engaging in detection and the emotional issues arise from the course of the investigations. Elizabeth Peters' Amelia Peabody series is another where Peabody and Emerson are almost absurdly romantic together, in between excavating pyramids and foiling Master Criminals. It's a bit OTT, but it works because she writes the characters as perenially excited by one another. And then there's Robert Parker's "Spenser" series, and Aaron Elkins "Gideon Oliver" series... It may be easier to write ongoing relationships with mysteries, because there's something absorbing for the characters to do. In a strictly romance genre, you're probably right.
In one sense, I do prefer a story to be more like my marriage--once the protagonists get the basic relationship functioning, I don't really want to see them charge back and forth over the same angsty emotional territory. That may be a matter of personal taste; I find the uncertainty and anxiety of a budding relationship more annoying than exciting, and my own experience has been that the trust of intimacy creates much better sex than the urgency of first-time. Getting back together after a long separation? Oh, yeah. Much better than the first time. Magnitudes better. If the characters have to use their imaginations to keep their love lives interesting... well, why not?
And real-life problems do create intimacy issues. I totally agree with you about "idiot plots"--the ones that could be solved by five minutes of rational conversation--but biggies, like the first child, or a major career change, or having an aging parent move in, are serious obstacles to intimacy and require emotional growth. I like a more action-adventure plotline, and 'will they both survive this?' works perfectly well for me.
IMO, the problem with "Moonlighting" wasn't that David and Maddy had sex - it was that the consummation wasn't written very convincingly, and that I never did believe the characters had a good basis for a relationship. They had sexual chemistry, sure, but they didn't have the emotional chops for the long haul--at least not with each other. I think a lot of real-life couples have exactly that problem, which is why I also think long engagements are usually a very good idea.
I'd hate to be in a relationship where tension increased with time--except the inevitable fear about who would be the first to go. The issues you name--good ones, really valid ones--are, to me, things that have to be resolved at some level before the lovers can achieve a happy ending. That could be done with a series of shorter fics, but I don't think it would work for actual novels. If the same issues kept recurring, the intimacy-phobes would start to look like big ol' wankers to me. I'm not saying that isn't realistic; I was in screwy relationships with intimacy-phobes more than once in my life. But if people--or characters--can't resolve their emotional issues and find common ground, a happy ending might mean splitting up.
(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 09:49 pm (UTC)I don't really want to see them charge back and forth over the same angsty emotional territory.
It bugs me to read a story where they seem to be facing the same intimacy problems over and over, but I like it when they solve one and then a new one opens up. Up to a certain point, that is -- it's hard to define precisely when something stops being tense and satisfying and becomes just frustrating.
I agree with you about Moonlighting -- honestly, they were both kind of annoying, weren't they? But the getting-there was so sexy. (Kind of like that one episode of MASH where Hawkeye and Margaret got together -- that's a pair made in hell, and yet ...)
(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 06:01 am (UTC)I have read it in romances, although it's not that common anymore. You still see it in 'sweet' and inspirational genres that aren't really positioning it as a tension-heightener so much as a moral stance, even if it still serves as the former as well for the story arc.
I think your point that the conflict has to come from somewhere internal to the characters and the relationship to feel organic is a great one.
(no subject)
Date: 8/3/08 03:15 am (UTC)flagpenis into it and claim it for Spain.(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 06:39 am (UTC)I'm almost tempted to say that you should make this some sort of pan-fandom challenge, and see how many different ways people could manage the established relationship drama successfully.
(no subject)
Date: 8/3/08 03:16 am (UTC)I agree that slash stories can do it right -- maybe specifically because it's one of the areas that the source material usually does wrong, either with endless unresolved UST or with the James Bond approach where with every new movie there's a new "girl" and the old "girl" just vanishes.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 8/1/08 10:18 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/3/08 03:17 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/2/08 01:59 am (UTC)Yes, a thousand times yes.
I may have tried to write that(no subject)
Date: 8/3/08 03:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/3/08 11:11 am (UTC)Thank you for reminding me of "Moonlighting" :) Good, old TV series :) Like "Dempsey and Makepeace" *sighs*
(no subject)
Date: 8/7/08 02:41 pm (UTC)Yes! I particularly like those stories, because there's this combination of (sometimes forced) intimacy with uncertainty.
I guess a more concise way of putting this post would be to say that even happy long-term relationships aren't 100% "established." There's always something more to risk.
(no subject)
Date: 8/8/08 07:48 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/8/08 07:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 8/12/08 12:51 pm (UTC)