My book doesn’t have a genre. It’s too many things, but two things it is are spiritual and erotic. Okay, so in my mind, I think, “spiritual erotica.” I like it.
Anyhoo, I would like to direct your attention to today’s Thmazing’s Thmusings post by Eric Jepson on “The Erotic in LDS Lit, Part I: Why?” Very thoughtful piece. Tyler of Chasing the Long White Cloud appears on the verge of addressing the subject himself. Then there’s The Visitors’ Center, which is a blog “celebrating Mormon sexuality,” and I’m wondering…
Is this serendipity that a whole bunch of us are coming up with this just in the last couple of years or so or has it been simmering on the back of the stove for a while and is now gathering steam and getting ready to blow?
Well, MOJO, now I have to write it! Actually, I started working on my treatment of the issue yesterday. But since I start my doctoral work next Monday and I’m currently in the midst of several essays, I don’t know exactly when it will pop up (I’m hoping sooner than later).
I don’t know if it’s serendipitous or not that the issue of eroticism has cropped up in LDS literary circles lately, but I imagine that it has something to do with the general progression of the American and Mormon social-intellectual climate. As I see it, more Mormons seem willing to confront the issues surrounding gender and sexuality because that’s the tenor of the world we live in and we can’t escape it. And it’s not going to go away; such issues, IMO, will just become more and more prevalent especially since, as The Family Proclamation states, “Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.” And if central in defining our identity and purpose, why not central to our spiritual-intellectual-cultural discourse?
Why are so many people afraid of sex and their own sexuality?
I don’t know.
Why is genre romance afraid of religion and sex in the same story?
It’s troubled me for some time, especially in the ’90s, writing genre romance, trying to fit, unhappy with the fact that if I wanted to write an older virgin (or at least not-very-experienced) heroine, I had to make her all angsty and in need of therapy to justify it. I didn’t need all my heroines to be virgins, but…just…one, maybe? By choice? With a religious reason?
I explored this fear of sexuality through one of my characters because I felt I had to explain that his whole life had been defined by (and made worse for) his fear that his sexuality had or would damn him–what he wanted versus what he thought was sinful. By doing that, I hoped to encapsulate our entire culture in him. I still don’t know if I got it right.
I want to “amen” your whole comment, really, and I look forward to your posts on it. And good luck on your doctoral work.
I’d be interested to read your treatment of that character. Is the story anywhere accessible?
He (Bryce) is one of the characters in my book. The excerpt is here, but you won’t see any of that from that little bit. He’s arguably the most scarred character in the book (IMO).
Let me say this: He leans toward a dom/sub sexual expression and he spent his life thinking that by simply having those desires, he was sinful and thus, didn’t attempt to seek out a woman of faith along those lines. He then has a crisis of faith and casts everything aside to find what he wants. Only, he doesn’t really cast it aside, which he realizes at the “ritual death” part of his story.
In any case, the book will be out some time around Halloween.
I’ll have to keep my eyes open for it.
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Again, I read this post, and all I want to say is “Bad pun.” I have a feeling I’ll never get over this.
Which pun are you speaking of, precisely? 😉
The word that comes to mind for me is “oxymoron.” (Er, oxymormon?)
Before I started writing erotica I had no idea that simply tying up your partner-or even WANTING TO- was a Don/sub expression. I wasn’t paying attention to the slight powerplays that could happen within the bedroom and how they expressed themselves. So when you start writing it, and YOU know what it is, but it’s the reader’s first foray- it’s quote …interesting.
I think there are gradations of Dom/sub in every sexual relationship. They may never manifest very clearly, they may ebb and flow with the mood of the partner, they may switch out or change over time, and/or it may just be an emotional thing, but I don’t think any long-term committed relationship is ever truly equal all the time.
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”
…and getting ready to blow?
“
[snicker]
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