lunabee34 | Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things that may be

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meta: porn

Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things that may be

Let's talk about sex, y'all. In specific, sex scenes in fanfic.

I have some theories (could be bunnies) followed by some questions.

I admitted recently to

crazydiamondsue that I often skip or skim over the sex scenes in fanfic. I don't always do this: if the sex is hitting my narrative buttons or my kinks or if it's unusual or interesting, then yeah. I read. But sometimes I skip even well-written, interesting sex scenes because I'm more interested in the plot or the dialogue or whatever else is going on. This is a 180 from my early days of fandom when I would avidly read every single word of every single sex scene I came across, and boy was that a lot of Xander's chocolatey orbs staring at Spike's marbled chest than I care to admit. In the beginning, fanfic was all about the porn for me as a reader. Over time, it's become far more about characterization and plot and being *surprised* by what I'm reading than anything else. (And let's be honest. There's very little in the world that's less surprising than the old "one finger, two finger, three finger, ho!")

As a writer, I have on occasion, more so as a newbie than currently, included sex scenes in a fic because I feel like they are expected from stories labeled slash, femslash or het by the fandom at large. I also get the general sense that stories with sex scenes get more attention from fandom on average than those that don't. My personal philosophy as a fanfic writer has shifted almost as much over time as my reading philosophy. I began somewhere about, "OMG THIS IS SO COOL I WILL DO ANYTHING TO GET YOU GUYS TO READ ME YAY!" and have ended up here where the things that I'm most interested in as a writer are canon compatibility and the exploration of peripheral characters. I'm interested in porn as a writer, but mostly (unless I am totally yanking down my imagination pants and wallowing in a good long wank of ~~Sheppard is Caldwell's sex slave~~ indulgence fic) as a vehicle for characterization. What does the kind of sex and how and when and with whom that these characters are having tell me about the kind of beings they are?

So I'm wondering how you guys approach sex scenes in fanfic. Therefore, I poll. Certain questions would not lend themselves well to a poll: What should a good sex scene do? What should the purpose of sex in fanfic be? What do you do to keep sex scenes fresh and original as a writer? What would you like to see more of in sex scenes? What works best for you as a reader and/or writer of sex scenes? Got any links to sex scenes that you think work really well?

I want to know ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING YOU HAVE TO SAY ON THIS SUBJECT!

*chin in hands*

[Poll #1521360]

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His marbled chest? Sounds like Antiques Roadshow porn. I'm holding out for decoupage, myself.

I very seldom write femslash, not because I have any objection to ladyparts, but because there's just no vocabulary for *talking* about them that doesn't sound all wrong. And I can never think of anything interesting or fresh to say to describe an orgasm.

Now those are some marbled chests. *points to icon* :)

I know what you mean about the language of sex in fiction. Penis and vagina and anus all sound clinical (which might be what you're going for in certain stories but I'd venture to say that most sex scenes aren't going for distanced, clinical observation). I've heard plenty of people object to the words cunt and pussy to describe female genitalia. And let us not forget the hallowed purple glory of such phrases as "her mound" and "his member" and "center of pleasure."

Or her Almond Joy. Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't.

*badomp ching*

I like to think both my reading and writing styles and preferences have matured as I have matured. When I first found slash I was like OMG, gimme the PWP... now, I appreciate the character development and the lead in to the relationship. I want to see it in a realistic manner true to the characters. Its the relationship and the intimacy (in all types) that is now intriguing.

*nods*

I know just what you mean. When I first started writing fanfic, that was the first creative short story writing I'd done since I was a child. It took me a good two years to figure out the sorts of themes I'm interested in as a writer, what's important to me in terms of *fanfic* writing in particular, and just how to execute that philosophy. I imagine that who I am as a writer will continue to change for as long as I keep doing it.

On that last question, my feelings about them have changed but I don't think it has anything to do with my fannish involvement, but rather to do with ways I'm changing that have little to do with fandom.

Also, I wasn't sad to include the sex scenes that I included because I felt they were expected of me and I think they were necessary to the story. But upon reflection, I think the story might have been better if I'd chosen to write gen instead of smut. And I'm not saying what fandom it was. :)

*nods*

This is a generic comment, not one aimed at you directly, for I've greatly enjoyed all the fic you've written that I've read. I think you have a deft hand at characterization and plotting, and I haven't noticed this problem in your work. But I have noticed many times in fanfic that a lot of stories seem either

a) built entirely around the idea of the two characters having sex rather than the other way around; that the sex is the point and the story just a wee bit of scaffolding to allow that to happen (and I'm not even talking about PWP)

or

b) perfectly interesting good stories with sex tacked on in various places in ways that don't serve the plot or characterization.

(Linkfollowing from your MF'd post) I have a suspicion that (b) may well often be the result of the writer starting with (a) and then getting really interested in the 'scaffolding', but then, having explored that in more detail, not trimming down or altering the sex to match the new form of the story. Which is as good a reason for skimming as anything!

That makes a lot of sense.

I know for a fact that my first forays into the world of slash fanfiction only happened because i was quite desperately looking for m/m sex of any sort, as most of my books had only very vague passages, or very fleeting ones, and it was just not *enough*.

So i stumbled across Sharpe fic, The Sentinel and Highlander stuff and oh, oh, oh. Sex! Between men! That didn't fade out, dance around, or then kill them/drown them in a pit of despair! It was wonderful.

Then i found LOTRs, and Harry Potter, and BtVS and i was off. I will freely admit, my first couple years in the fandom i put sex into my stories because it seemed like sex-free stuff didn't get the respect or the readership. I felt like i *owed* people sex.

I've mellowed down off that quite a bit, now. I still write sex, and read it, of course, but stories that don't have explicit passages in them are just fine, and i'm finding myself a wee bit impatient with pwp stuff unless i'm in a particular mood.

I rather like to think - in a big-headed, egotistical way - that my writing has improved since i've left off putting sex in every other scene/chapter/whatever, and that the better stories are the stories where any sex is totally organic, not automated.

I think my entre into fandom is really similar to yours. I had read explicit het and explicit lesbian sex before but not explicit m/m sex and when I found it in fanfic, it was wonderful both for its availability and sheer volume. Over time, I've become much more discerning in my tastes, but nothing can match that first six months where nothing was a cliche or overdone fanon or ridiculous or trite but all was equally wonderful and equally welcome because it was all so new.

As time went on, I started to experience first pairing fatigue and then slash fatigue. I have to mix up the fandoms, pairings and genres that I read pretty frequently or I start to get bored.

I absolutely agree with you that the better stories are the ones where the sex is organic and stems from plot and characterization.

(and it's no secret that I fangirl your writing liek whoa!)

Yes, exactly. The cliched and the silly were *wonderful* because, gods, at last i was actually getting to read *what i wanted*, and had been searching for, for years.

I mean, 'Giovanni's Room' is all well and good, but it teases all around the edges and than leaves you in a hole of black depression, so....

I kind of went all over at first, but now i'm pretty much settled on my otps and such. I'll try almost anything from an author i like, but i do have my favorites that just never get old.

*smooches you*

And i love ya for it, bay-bee.
:)

I said I don't skip sex scenes because I don't skip specifically sex scenes. There are occasionally times when I find myself reading a not-so-great fic where I will start skimming the whole thing just to get to the end and be done with it, but I don't think I've ever skimmed/skipped just sex.

The reason is that I generally expect the sex to serve a purpose in the fic rather than just being there for porn's sake. (If the latter is true and it feels tacked on, then that's bad writing and I'll say so.) So I read it as I would any other part of the fic, because I don't want to miss something essential.

When I first started writing, I did sometimes include sex scenes because I thought fic should have them and/or that it would get me more readers. With some fics where it felt particularly tacked on, I have actually gone in and just edited out the sex. But that was like, the first year I was writing fic, and I don't feel that way anymore.

When I first started reading fic, I was more excited about PWPs, because hey, sex! But then I got burnt out on it, especially after writing in The Establishment for years, where every day I was writing long, detailed sex scenes. By the end I just felt like I never wanted to read or write about sex again. XD

So for a while after that any sex I wrote was pretty brief. I'm finally feeling less burnt out and now am writing more detailed sex again, but I don't feel like it's expected of me, and my sex scenes are still likely to sometimes be just a couple sentences. However, whether they're detailed or brief, these days anything I write about in a sex scene is essential to the story, rather than just being there for the reader to get off on.

We are of the same mind on the purpose of sex in fanfic (well, writing period). If it doesn't advance the plot, if it doesn't tell me something about character or motivation, then it doesn't belong. And I get bored and impatient often with sex that's in a story that's not fulfilling those roles (unless I just want to get off and I'm reading specifically for that reason; although I find I get off better on sex scenes that hit my kinks *and* do all the plotty characterization work at the same time).

What is the Establishment? It sounds vaguely menacing. :)

The Establishment is an RPG about a kinky sex club. :D

Ah. Gotcha.

I'm kind of a purist, and I think that if dialogue is really good then it should be possible to omit "Jack said" or "Sam replied" because it would be self-evident who said what, and it should be possible to deduce the identity of the parties to the transaction just by what they were doing. I've never managed that yet....

You know all of my thoughts on this (as well as my thoughts on love and yaoi) but I will state them again for the record.

I don't enjoy writing sex scenes. I find it stressful and it makes those little lines above my nose. I don't find it hot and I'm unable to think of anything clever. Yet I've always gotten positive feedback on my sex scenes (I have no idea why.) I told you I've re-read that scene in my rodeo AU fic and scratched my head thinking, "I don't get the big deal."

I've included sex scenes because I felt I had to. My first fic was a multi-chap S/X "how they fell in love story" -- sex was relative to their interests. It took me so long to write that fic, though, that I skipped the sex scenes on the last 2 chapters. I actually got a couple of comments of the "Thank you for not including the obligatory conclusion chapter sex scene." I don't think it hurt the story for lack of it.

That said, I am in the midst of a Giles/Xander, Wes/Angel renaissance right now, and since I have been reading those characters fuck every way from Sunday since 2003, the porn is shiny and new. (Although I will admit to a giggle at post-Chosen Giles being quite the machine.) Stories that go from one sex scene right into another? Meh. Over it.

I received the same amount of feedback (I can't think of way to say goodly or a lot without sounding pretentious but that's what I mean) to an S/X ficlet with a sex scene as I did for an S/A story that was post-coital with no descriptions of nekkid bits. That might just be the difference between Spangel and Spander, that might just be my particular friends list (circa 2005) or it might just be me. I don't know.

But I no longer feel the need to slap sex in a fic just so people will read it. (That would, assume, of course, that I actually wrote a fic.)

So to assume up my feelings on writing/reading sex scenes in fic, and I can only leave you with this:

I like simple pleasures, like butter in my ass, lollipops in my mouth. That's just me. That's just something that I enjoy.

This is for posterity, baby. State away. :)

I used to feel the same way about writing sex scenes. I agonized. I sweated (and not in a glorious Spike just claimed me while Angel took him from behind kinda way). It felt weird to write sex scenes and I was always on the verge of a laugh and turning the whole thing into some "he slid his fingers in to that velvet hilt like the short dagger Frodo always wore at this side." Somewhere along the way, that stopped being the case. I can't point to a specific moment or anything, but by the time I had moved on to SPN fandom I didn't feel self-conscious about writing sex scenes anymore.

Re: Giles the studmuffin
Ahahahahahhahahahh, YES! I love all those fics where a 45+ year old man has zero refractory period. Or gets drunk out of his mind and can still perform. World of no, my peeps.

I think it's because you're a good writer no matter what you're writing. /unified theory of the universe

Butter in your ass, huh? Is that like Fur in my Cap (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lww9Wqq_Cao)? [I dare you not to get this chorus stuck in your head.]

However, in defense of Giles the Machine, for a 45+ man, "quickie" has no meaning. It's not so much that he's at it again as that he's at it *still.*

BTW, thanks to a flist reference, I have a 2008 mini-series called "The Invisibles" starring ASH and Warren Clarke as retired burglars. I shall report back.

However, in defense of Giles the Machine, for a 45+ man, "quickie" has no meaning. It's not so much that he's at it again as that he's at it *still.*

*fans face*

Yuh huh. *nods frantically*

The more I've gotten into writing, the more I judge the literary merits of the scene LOL. Do the descriptions ring true? Does the scene further the plot/characterisation? If not, or if I'm not in the mood to read in-depth --> skip

YES!

Just like that Woolsey/Caldwell story that we wrote. I really feel like the sex there was necessary to communicate important information about the characters (and hopefully was also hot to boot! LOL). If I feel like the porny times are pastede on yo! then, blergh. Boring.

Also, *hugs you half to death*. Love you, sweetie.

I *love* that story. I love character grace-notes in the sex scene and I think that makes it hotter/more intimate (or something).

*clings* I'm OK. Catching up with a couple of friends tomorrow, so hopefully I'll get to relax and drink some whiskey.

I hope the whiskey was good, dear heart.

*hugs*

A lot of times when I'm reading a long fic I will read the first sex scene or two, then skim the rest of them. I'm not really a PWP reader, I like the long plotty stories, but if I'm reading a long story I like to have the sex included, although I'm just as happy usually with the R-rated sex as the NC-17 sex, because as you said, how many times can you read the old 1 finger, 2 finger, 3 finger, thrust, thrust, perfect orgasm (simultaneously)? I really love running across 'unperfect' sex that *fits the characters* rather than a virgin feeling no pain and 'screaming' as they come, or giving a perfect blowjob the first time. Sometimes the sex scenes are the weakest part of a story, up until then I've been reading about Rodney and John, or Harry and Draco, but for the sex aliens take over their bodies! It just ruins it, which is why skimming is good, I'll know the facts (ok, the Johnbot just blowed Rodneybot and then screwed his brains out, check) and can get back to the good parts. (And I really just said the sex wasn't the good part!!) I'd much rather have a fade-to-black, ... part than bad sex. Which is not that a lot of it isn't good, just same old/same old. OMG, I read too much porn...

Christina

I really love running across 'unperfect' sex that *fits the characters* rather than a virgin feeling no pain and 'screaming' as they come, or giving a perfect blowjob the first time.

Oh gods yes. I love the awkward, fumbling towards a thing relationships, the ones where things are a just a little bit raw and strange and scary. Simultaneous o's? Not so much LOL

I know what you mean about a story being perfectly serviceable and then all of a sudden it's like the pod people overtook the characters. I generally feel that way when a sex scene is way too heavy with implausible IMHO dialogue.

(Found my way here from your later follow-up post which was linked to metafandom.)

This, this, this. For a few months now I've had the strangest urge to try my hand at writing sex which is awkward/difficult/embarrassing/acciddental, and I know people aren't going to be so strong on it when I do, and while I'm writing I keep having these moments where I hesitate to let things in the scene be as awkward or messy as I feel like they want to be, just because it's sort of venturing into the territory of "this is sex, but it doesn't really turn me on." I've been trying to suck it up and fight back that squeamishness, because that's often how sex is, in the real world, and I'd like to see what it would be like to stay faithful to that. I'm glad I'm not alone!

/Spilling my guts

am also a huge fan of awkward or bad sex in fic. Sex is not perfect. Most of us don't come at the same time as our partners (although I have it on good authority from a friend that that does indeed happen for some people); most of us don't have eighty three orgasms in a ten minute period on a regular basis. I'll go out on a limb and say that most people on average don't have spectacularly good sex the first time they have sex with a new partner period. And I love when a writer isn't so invested in OTPness that they can allow the sex scenes between the characters they've paired to not be the mechanism by which their perfection for each other is revealed. You know what I mean? Isn't sexual compatability kind of a really shitty basis for soul mates anyways? I'd much rather know that I belong with the other half of my OTP because ze's always got my back or ze thinks of me as family or ze can always make me laugh rather than ze makes moonbeams shoot out of my hooha with the force of my undulating pleasure. But perhaps that's just me. :)

I think you should write it. Everytime someone posts something about awkward sex, people start crawling out of the woodwork to say that they enjoy reading it. Trufax.

I checked "yes" on that last question because although the way I feel about the sex scenes I write hasn't really changed (except, perhaps, to become more comfortably familiar with practice), my sense of what readers expect from me has changed. At first I figured I'd get fewer readers on my non-sex stories, but I contrarily put them out anyway. But that didn't happen at all; obviously I have no idea what people want. So what I write is essentially much the same, but I no longer feel slightly guilty about writing whatever I feel like and disregarding my readers.

Here's what I think about sex scenes: I think that sex as an act is pretty simple, no matter how many tantric bells and whistles (figurative or literal) the participants add in. Sexuality, on the other hand, is as unique as a fingerprint, and even more telling. So while the blocking of any two sex scenes might be pretty similar, the way they're written should not be, because the way each scene feels to its respective participants should not be the same either. Every sexual encounter has its own dizzying array of motivations behind it, free associations to sensory stimuli from past history and idiosyncratc quirks, jumbles of thoughts and emotions and fears and hopes, and all of that made exponentially more complex and interactive and rich by reflecting those things between the participants and thereby intertwining their reactions. So basically, the sex you have with one person at one particular time is never going to be exactly the same as the sex you have with any other person, or even with that same person at any other time---and the particular "fingerprint" of that encounter is a reflection of who you both are at that particular time, both together and separately. So it is in life, so must it be, I think, in art.

What this means to me in terms of stories I write and stories I read is that I want each sex scene to be so particular to the moment and the characters that it could not possibly work for another set of characters or a different situation. I want it to be as informative and resonant as the dialogue and the action in the story. I want it, in fact, to be so much a part of everything else that's happening that it doesn't feel like a separate thing at all.

Edited 2010-02-05 06:55 (UTC)

Here's what I think about sex scenes: I think that sex as an act is pretty simple, no matter how many tantric bells and whistles (figurative or literal) the participants add in. Sexuality, on the other hand, is as unique as a fingerprint, and even more telling. So while the blocking of any two sex scenes might be pretty similar, the way they're written should not be, because the way each scene feels to its respective participants should not be the same either.

And this is why you were always the wise you. :)

I mean really there's only what? Four stories we can possibly tell: we're born, we fuck, we fight, we die. Something like that. So yeah. There's very little in the way of originality in terms of blocking left to us. But the why, oh the why. That's always gotta be different. I really like the way you put this.

What this means to me in terms of stories I write and stories I read is that I want each sex scene to be so particular to the moment and the characters that it could not possibly work for another set of characters or a different situation. I want it to be as informative and resonant as the dialogue and the action in the story. I want it, in fact, to be so much a part of everything else that's happening that it doesn't feel like a separate thing at all.

And the bar has been set, ladies and gentlemen. :)

This is not to say that I clear this bar myself every time, just that I think that's where we should be aiming, and it's certainly what I'm striving for every time I write a sex scene.

Well, I started out very firmly on the gen side of the fence -- not that I necessarily avoided writing about relationships, but I think the first time that I attempted to write anything explicit was for one of the Porn Battles a couple of years ago. (The big irony here is that I've actually written AND SOLD original porn ... I just haven't written it in a fandom.) I tend to skim or skip the sex scenes unless they're intrinsically tied up with plot (but I've also been known to skip any chunk of fic which is not really engaging my interest).

I ticked "yes" to the question that asks about changing attitudes, though, because I do think I'm less likely to skip sex scenes now than I was ten years ago -- some of this is because I'd like to gain better tools to write them, and some of it is because I've just read enough explicit fic by this point that I'm starting to, hmm, perceive more characterization in the sex scenes than I used to, I guess? I don't find written sex arousing, but for a long time I'd dismissed most sex scenes as "hmm, nothing much happening here, when does the plot start again?" and as I've read more NC-17 fic, I've become less likely to dismiss it out-of-hand.

The big irony here is that I've actually written AND SOLD original porn ... I just haven't written it in a fandom.

*grins*

That's why I kept this discussion strictly to fanfic because I think that on both the reading the writing sides a lot of us approach profic and fanfic differently (not everyone obviously!).

some of this is because I'd like to gain better tools to write them

Yes! I just finished having the "good writers are good readers" discussion with my comp students, and I definitely agree with you that the more sex scenes I read in fandom, the more comfortable I felt about trying to writing them myself.

Clarifying my answers.

How often do you skip or skim over sex scenes in fanfic?

I skip them when I'm not strongly invested in the pairing (or at least one character).

As a fanfic reader, are the presence of sex scenes (mild or graphic) important to you in terms of how much you enjoy the story?

Not in the slightest. By themselves, presence or absence of sex scenes means nothing to me; I like (or dislike) all ratings equally.

As a fanfic writer, do you feel that your readers expect your stories to include sex scenes?

I rather doubt it, but you never know.

Have you ever included a sex scene in a fanfic you're writing because you think it's expected of you from your readership?

No, and I never would. I write fic because I enjoy it - the writing and the fic both; unlike what I do in RL, this is where I write exactly what and how I want.

Do you think that stories with sex scenes (on average) get more attention than stories without them?

Yes.

Has the way you feel about sex scenes (either as a reader or writer of fanfic) changed over the course of your fannish involvement?

No, not really, unless you count getting used to something that was once new? But I wasn't particularly surprised to discover it, considering the same kind of stuff had played out in my head almost as long as I could remember, sex scenes and other scenes alike.

Thank you so much for going into greater details about your answers than the poll allows. I find this such a fascinating topic. :)

Have you ever included a sex scene in a fanfic you're writing because you think it's expected of you from your readership?

I picked yes, but I wanted to clarify because I've never taken that decision when a story was already written or fleshed out, either in actual words or just in my head; I've never got to the end of a story, thought, "I should shoehorn a sex scene in there", and actually shoehorned a sex scene in there. I've got more feedback on higher rated stories than otherwise, though, and I can't say it hasn't affected the way I plan out stories to some extent.

*nods*

That's a good and important distinction. It's not necessarily for me either, that I've decided to insert a sex scene where I had really not intended one, but that the subtle pressure to include them has informed the trajectory of some of my stories from the very beginning.

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Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things that may be

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Ooh this is a nice distraction

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c&p from another post

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