On smut (writing of) and shame (lack of)

[resonant]

cedar85 writes:

I wonder what separates those that can write smut from those who have to bite their lip to keep from giggling while writing. Does it have to do with being comfortable with oneself? Is it all about reckless abandonment of modesty? Or maybe it's my whole idea that fics are closer to my heart than I'd like to admit? Is it even something that should bother me in the first place, since they aren't even real people anyway?

We've got a lot of cultural taboos about talking about sex. And to write good smut, you basically have to learn to ignore them.

Essentially most modern people view "talking about sex" as being in itself a sexual act. And I don't know about men, but as a woman, I've spent a lifetime being encouraged only to perform sexual acts with people I'm in love with, or at the very least with people I like, trust, and feel intimate with.

So setting out to write an explicit sex scene can, to the inhibited among us, feel like setting out to have sex with a bunch of strangers.

When I first started reading slash, I was so bashful about smut that I even had a hard time writing feedback. I mean, typing, "This was really sexy" felt scary and wrong to me.

I got over that sufficiently to send a few shy little LoCs to Cesca for her Sentinel stories, and she kept saying, "I take requests." So one day I wanted to write her and say, essentially, "You do a really good version of Blair talking dirty. I'd like to see more of that." Only I couldn't bring myself to write "talking dirty" to a comparative stranger, so I spent four sentences beating around the bush trying to say it without saying it.

My first story, Anoint, was NC-17, because I forced myself -- I knew it was what I wanted to write, and I knew that if I allowed myself to get into the habit of fading to black, I'd never get out of it. But I kind of cheated because the story is tagless -- i.e. I only had to write what they said, not what they did. (Link provided for historical purposes only, not because I'm suggesting it's a good story.) So then, even after having posted one story with explicit sex in it, I still had inhibitions I had to get over.

I got over them, over time, not by writing smut, but by betaing smut, my own and other people's. Because when you actually have to go and get people's help to make a sex scene sexier, you have to talk about it. In detail. And then you get used to it.

Exhibit A is this bit from the chat log when Cesca andjulad were doing beta on Alive In Here:

Julad: I'm inclined to suggest that he doesn't even say "live"
Cesca: it's not really elegant, that
Julad: could he say "come"?
Cesca: he could, but only if
Cesca: the supporting narration connections orgasm to life
resonant8: Draco's not coming again, anyway.
resonant8: He's spent.
Julad: ah, damn
Cesca: hmmm
Julad: can't he have another orgasm?
resonant8: He really doesn't get very much time for it.
Cesca: Do it in reverse, then
Cesca: "Come on," Draco whispered, all flushed and--and never looking so alive.
resonant8: OK, my viscera suggest that that's a good solution.

I don't know if this is any help to beginning smut-writers like Cedar, but basically for me, learning to write smut was a process of desensitizing myself to that set of cultural taboos. If you think of it like that, maybe it will feel all liberating and all. Or not.

Comments

[strawberrythief.livejournal.com]

Your viscera are much more helpful than my viscera.

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

You don't get that spike-to-the-gut thing that tells you, O, yes, this is really working, this is moving and sexy both at the same time?

I use that spike like a geiger counter. Click ... click ... clickclickclickclickclickclick ...

[strawberrythief.livejournal.com]

For me, it's more like building a house of cards. "I'll try this... okay, that didn't bring it down, so now I'll add this..."

Viscera sound like more fun.

[destina.livejournal.com]

I remember getting over it by laughing at myself while I was writing, because I could write the most inventive sex ever and yet could not discuss it after the fact. To this day, I can't talk about smut in a live setting, such as a con. Email, chat, pages of filthy raunch, yes. Look you in the eye and say "Yeah, I like those leather-kink stories where the guy on the bottom comes without stimulation..."...? Uh, no. *g*

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

[laughing helplessly] In real life I can't even say "fuck" without a certain amount of inward preparation. It's surprising how relatively foul-mouthed my chat persona is.

Whenever I hear about people collaborating on a sex scene in real life, in three dimensions, in real time, that just stuns me. I haven't gotten that far yet.

[beck-liz.livejournal.com]

I've never finished any fanfic, myself (although I might be trying soon), but I am in a LJ RPG right now, and I'm trying to psyche myself to do smut for it. Friend of mine is willing to let me practice on her *G*, but I haven't quite made it yet. But it's really helpful to know that people who write really good scenes (although I've never written to tell you so - bad girl!) have the same sort of trouble that I do.

[out-there.livejournal.com]

I don't know if this is any help to beginning smut-writers like Cedar, but basically for me, learning to write smut was a process of desensitizing myself to that set of cultural taboos.

Interesting. I've always wondered how much it had to do with RL experiences/personality. I'm not much of a socially out-going personality myself, and I wondered if it just came down to lack of experience (and thereby, gave myself an 'out' to avoid writing anything beyond a PG rating).

Although, thinking about that argument rationally, it's not as if many authors actually have literal experience (C'mon, hands up? How many have actually slept MR? I thought not.), and even in the PG rating, all writers use a good deal of imagination to make the stories work.

I got over them, over time, not by writing smut, but by betaing smut, my own and other people's. Because when you actually have to go and get people's help to make a sex scene sexier, you have to talk about it. In detail. And then you get used to it.

I think that my main concern is that I wouldn't be a good beta... Hmmm... I need to think about this. Thanks for the food for thought.