by Lori Perkins
Another factor that seemed to be important to serious BDSM readers was that the characters had to be open and willing to try the “lifestyle.” In other words, the character has to want to do it from the very beginning and not be forced or coerced into doing it. I found that most serious BDSM readers didn’t think this happened in Fifty Shades. In fact, I heard from more than one reader that the only issue they had with Fifty Shades was the fact that Anastasia was not interested in BDSM and Christian was. As a novice reading the book, this aspect of Fifty Shades was not a problem for me. I’ll even admit openly that I found it compelling and intriguing. I was reading Fifty Shades for escapism and entertainment. And I could understand why it would not be a problem for all the mainstream readers who were captured by the story line. In the same respect, the more research I did, the more I could understand how it would frustrate serious BDSM readers.
In a general sense, I learned that most BDSM readers aren’t fond of weak, lackluster sub characters in non-erotic scenes. Like most readers in any genre, they hate dumb characters altogether. And many considered Anastasia to be both dumb and weak. They don’t mind gentle, sensitive characters. And they don’t mind quirky fundamental flaws. But weakness and being a submissive in a BDSM novel do not go hand in hand. More than that, being Dominant doesn’t necessarily mean a character is stronger in an emotional sense in non-erotic scenes than a submissive character. I’ve heard some say they prefer it when the Dom has certain vulnerabilities in non-erotic scenes.
This is where I learned that the complicated balancing act between what happens during erotic D/s scenes and non-erotic scenes begins. The Dom character can be emotionally vulnerable, with more than one hidden insecurity, and carrying a great deal of baggage. The mask of dominance and the desire to inflict pain he or she possesses, and the need to control everyone and every single situation, could be nothing more than a façade to keep the world from knowing the harsh truth—that the character has deep insecurities. But he or she can’t be too aggressive in non-erotic scenes. And he or she definitely cannot be a sexist or misogynist. On the other hand, if the sub character comes off as weak and pathetic in non-erotic scenes it can be just as obnoxious as having the Dom be too aggressive.
This balance-of-power aspect in BDSM books can be deceiving for readers and writers who aren’t familiar with BDSM erotica. It was for me in the beginning. New readers often have the preconceived notion that the Dom character will be controlling in all aspects of the relationship and that the sub will always be nothing more than a doormat who carries with him or her psychological issues from the past that have made him or her a sub. Those readers familiar with BDSM find this mindset condescending at best and insulting at worst. Some would even go on to say that those into the “lifestyle” in real life don’t have any baggage; they just like BDSM. Period.
No one could argue the point that in a D/s situation during a BDSM scene the sub releases all power to the Dom, allowing the Dom full control. If the sub is inexperienced, it’s the Dom’s job to use good judgment and keep things from getting out of hand. The stronger the Dom is, and the more the sub trusts the Dom, the more intense the scene will be. By relinquishing all power to the Dom the sub finally experiences the emotional intensity that can’t be found anywhere else. But all that should end as soon as they both get off.
The separation between what happens to the characters during the D/s scenes and what happens while they are functioning in non-D/s scenes becomes a crucial element in the plot and in the depth of the characters’ relationship. In my book I decided to make the Dom an aggressive, controlling individual who came close to being a narcissistic sociopath. He didn’t cross the line, but he always seemed to be on the verge. The reason he didn’t cross the line is because the sub in my book wouldn’t let him. My sub wouldn’t be controlled outside the sex scenes.
The sub in my book was the gentle, sensitive type who tended to trust people more than he should have. He also had a secret yearning for the “lifestyle” and didn’t have to be talked into doing BDSM. It would have been simple to make him a doormat in all aspects of his life. But that’s not how it works with most subs in real life. I gave my sub an inner strength that some might even say meant he had a stronger personality than the Dom. He also had a way of taking control of the relationship without trying too hard when they weren’t involved in the BDSM scenes. And when faced with situations that didn’t involve the erotic BDSM aspects of their relationship, my sub made it clear from the beginning that my Dom would not control him in every aspect of the relationship. I ultimately found this brought the story to another level, even though it wasn’t exactly what I read in Fifty Shades.
What did all my research with BDSM mean for Fifty Shades? The basics I loved most in Fifty Shades, and what millions of other readers seemed to love, too, weren’t elements that worked well with people who are serious readers of BDSM. It took me a while to figure that out and to fully comprehend why they didn’t work. But I think it’s vitally important to understand that this is not in any way a bad thing. Writers in any subgenre are always trying to attract a new audience that isn’t familiar with that subgenre. No one can say that Fifty Shades didn’t break that proverbial glass ceiling for BDSM writers by introducing BDSM into the mainstream. It’s opened doors for other BDSM writers that have been nailed shut for years. It shows that writing BDSM fiction covers a great deal of territory and sometimes books focus on one element over others. And I would venture to guess that if Fifty Shades had followed more of the guidelines that serious BDSM readers and writers follow, it might not have become as popular in the mainstream as it is now.
RYAN FIELD is a gay fiction writer who has worked in many areas of publishing for the past twenty years. He’s the author of the bestselling Virgin Billionaire series and the short gender-bending story “Down the Basement,” which was included in the Lambda Award–winning anthology Best Gay Erotica 2009. You can check out his website at www.ryan-field.blogspot.com.
CATHERINE HILLER
Was It Good for You?
SO, WAS IT?
There’s not much point discussing whether Fifty Shades of Grey, which has sold 40 million copies and climbing, is a good book. Reviewers and critics have been merciless in their assessment, deriding the story as implausible, the characters as one-dimensional, and the style as laughable. At the age of twenty-one, the beautiful heroine, Anastasia Steele, has never dated, has never even been attracted to anyone, has never felt the faintest frisson of sexuality—until she meets billionaire Christian Grey, described as “heart-stoppingly beautiful,” a man who likes to take control. The first time she’s in bed with him, she comes three times. Ana is young and pliant, up to a point; Christian is psychologically wounded, which has left him with a need to control women and a fondness for inflicting pain. He does not like to be touched, she does not want to be beaten—and they are in love. Will he let her stroke him? Will she let him beat her? These are the book’s great questions. Ana proclaims, “I know it will take an eternity to expunge the feel of his arms around me and his wonderful fragrance from my brain.”
Sentences like this haven’t slowed sales one click. Some claim that the Fifty Shades phenomenon is partly explained by the growing popularity of electronic reading devices. Without a cover to reveal what we are reading on our Kindles or Nooks, we are free to pursue sexually explicit books in virtual anonymity. But the new electronic secrecy could lead us to read classic (and classy) erotica, books like Fanny Hill, Story of O, and The Image. Instead, we are sinking deep (or sinking shallow) into the Fifty Shades trilogy. Why is that?
For one thing, in erotic fiction, as in all genres, there is a need for contemporary material. Fiction helps tell us how people live; contemporary fiction tells us how we live now, which is why, despite the great writers of the past, we always need new authors. Today’s writers chronicle our society, our anxieties, our joys. Story of O is still a highly charged book, but it was written before AIDS, and condoms were not a part o
f the picture. They’re certainly part of the scene today, and part of Fifty Shades. Condoms are probably mentioned fifty times in the first book alone! The book’s very zeitgeist is contemporary, with an unabashed worship of wealth. Christian’s Red Room of Pain is notable for its luxury as well as its bondage devices. Readers of the Fifty Shades trilogy are titillated by scenes of dominance and submission and fabulous wealth. They read on to learn just how much the lovers will submit to each other. Then they recommend the book to their friends.
Why is that? Not for the plot, not for the characters, not for the style: women read Fifty Shades of Grey for that timeless erotic situation—the man urging the woman to go further; the woman slowly submitting—in a contemporary setting. And people also read it for the sex scenes. So, it is valid to ask (indeed, absurd not to ask): How good are those sex scenes?
A good sex scene contains enough erotic detail and pacing and originality to get us excited, which is sufficient for pornography but not for fiction. Beyond being arousing, the sex scenes in mainstream novels and short stories must offer more.
Here it must be acknowledged that the line between pornography and mainstream fiction is sometimes difficult to draw. Women often need story and setting and emotion to get excited, so those elements are featured in pornographic novels for women, making them more like non-erotic fiction. And non-erotic fiction for women is often sexually explicit, because many serious women writers are bold about sex.
How do we even judge sex scenes in fiction? Novelist and critic Elizabeth Benedict offers some guidelines. Her lively, well-informed book, The Joy of Writing Sex, published in 2002, examines the question of what makes a good sex scene, and Benedict offers instructive criteria.
Let us use these to evaluate a single representative erotic encounter in E. L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey.
First, the scene. At three pages, it’s shorter than most of the sex scenes in the book, but just as explicit. It occurs about halfway through the book (starting on page 273 in my paperback edition). Grey is in Anastasia’s apartment. They are alone; her roommate, Kate, is conveniently away. On the threat of being punished, Grey warns Ana not to roll her eyes at him, but she rolls her eyes saucily anyway. “Come here,” he says. “I told you what I’d do. I’m a man of my word. I’m going to spank you, and then I’m going to fuck you very quick and very hard. Looks like we’ll need that condom after all.” He makes a grab, “tipping me across his lap … very slowly he pulls down my sweatpants. Oh, how demeaning is this? Demeaning and scary and hot.” Grey proceeds to give her a spanking, alternating his blows with fondling and caressing. “My body is singing, singing from his merciless assault.” Then he takes her from behind, slamming against her sore backside. After they come, he breathes, “Oh, baby. Welcome to my world.”
According to Elizabeth Benedict, a good sex scene:
1) is not always about good sex but is always an example of good writing;
2) should always connect to the larger concerns of the work;
3) is driven by the needs, impulses, and histories of the characters;
4) depends upon the relationship the characters have with each other.
So how does this scene rate?
1) E. L. James is not a graceful writer nor a keen observer nor an original thinker. The scene includes the lines: “My insides practically contort with potent, needy, liquid, desire” and, “The feeling is beyond exquisite, raw, and debasing and mind-blowing.” Although these pages are not always clumsy, no one would claim they were “an example of good writing.”
2) The book is about control. Christian Grey is looking for a good submissive. In allowing him to spank her, Anastasia finds unexpected “radiance” when she gives him the control he craves. The scene not only connects with “the larger concerns of the work,” it embodies them.
3) For weeks Christian has been exploring Anastasia’s sexuality and urging her into greater and greater submission. His deprived early childhood and his adolescent introduction to sex by an older “Mrs. Robinson” have shaped his psyche, and he has a great drive to dominate women. His need to spank Ana comes from a deep place, as does her excitement at being spanked. The scene is certainly driven by the characters.
4) Sex can make lovers grow closer, and in this scene it does. Grey has been begging Ana to sign a contract making their relationship explicit, but she keeps postponing it. By letting him spank her, she is showing her love for him, just as he shows his for her by the gift of an Audi. Spanking Ana, and knowing she enjoys it, Grey exultantly cries, “Welcome to my world.” The scene utterly depends upon “the relationship the characters have with each other.”
So in three out of four of Benedict’s criteria, the sex scene discussed here succeeds. It feels essential to the growing closeness of these two rather improbable characters and leads us to the next stage of Ana’s submission. Perhaps the secret to the success of Fifty Shades of Grey is simple. Whatever else E. L. James does or doesn’t do, she knows how to write a good sex scene.
Anyway, it was good for me.
CATHERINE HILLER is the author of five novels, most recently Cybill in Between (Ravenous Romance) and The Adventures of Sid Sawyer (Armadillo Central). She has also written a book of erotic short stories, Skin (Carroll & Graf), which was praised by John Updike. She has a PhD in English from Brown.
JOY DANIELS
The Story Is in the Sex
ON THE SURFACE, Fifty Shades of Grey is about the struggle between Ana’s desire for emotional intimacy (“more”) with Christian, and his desire for the security and distant that he gets from dominating his partners. Ana sees Christian’s need for control as being the opposite of her desire for love. He is “in the dark”; she wants to bring him “into the light.” To Ana, “dark” means sad, angry, controlling, emotionally distant, while “light” represents love, happiness, and interdependency. But Ana is in for a big surprise: Christian isn’t the only one with a dark side. Ana, who is so innocent at the beginning of the story that she has never even masturbated, is completely unaware of her sexual self. She insists that she isn’t submissive and doesn’t enjoy sexual bondage or pain, but her thoughts and reactions during sex tell us a different story. The battle between “light” and “dark” takes place within Ana herself as she is forced to confront and finally embrace the “dark, carnal place” within her own psyche.
Although Ana and Christian spend a lot of time talking about sex, including contracts, hard and soft limits, and “debasement,” they don’t get physical until chapter 8. Because Ana is a virgin who has never had an orgasm, this is her introduction to sexual pleasure of any kind. In spite of Christian’s claim that he doesn’t “make love” but “fucks hard,” he takes things pretty slow with Ana. Sure, it’s hot, but compared to what they’ve discussed so far, it’s pretty tame. Christian even follows the stepwise progression that we all know from the baseball metaphor. They’ve already kissed, in the elevator, so he started out with a single. He fondles her breasts (second base), stimulates her clitoris (third base), and they have intercourse (score for Christian!). Hell, the first time they do it is in the missionary position, which is about as “vanilla” as one can get. The second time he takes her from behind, which is a little more adventurous but hardly the kink he threatened (promised?) earlier. He then surprises them both by sleeping with her, something he has never done with any of his previous partners.
Ana clearly enjoys sex with Christian (who wouldn’t?) but has trouble letting go and giving herself over to what she feels. She tries to keep her breathing “under control,” but the sensations Christian provokes are “disordered, chaotic.” Her thoughts continue on a similar path through the early scenes (chapters 8 through 12). Her words give the impression that she is not acting but reacting, not experiencing but observing something happening outside herself. Everything is described in the third person, like someone else is in control: “my breasts press into his hands” (instead of “I press my breasts into his hands”), “my body resonates
,” “my body writhes.”
The next day Christian ups the ante sexually, introducing Ana to light bondage with the infamous gray silk tie. When he brings her to orgasm while her hands are bound, she is not only out of control physically, but emotionally and mentally as well, losing “all sense of self” and “all cogent thought.” Christian restrains Ana again after she sends him an email saying, “Okay, I’ve seen enough.” This time he not only binds her hands but also loops the tie through her bedpost so she can’t even touch him. Here, Ana seems to be losing the struggle for control for her own body: “I fight my body as it tries to arch in response,” “My hips flex automatically,” “my body bucks beneath his expert fingers,” “I’m helpless, lost in an erotic torment.”
What Ana Really Wants
For the first third of the book, Ana is relatively passive in the sexual scenes. Not because she’s supposed to be submissive (she’s not very good at that), but because she’s just too inexperienced to know what she wants. In fact, she’s so sexually clueless that she can’t even recognize that the sensations and emotions she feels during sex are reflections of her own sexual needs, not just reactions provoked by Christian’s expertise. But this starts to change in chapter 14. While Ana’s not yet fully aware of what she wants, her subconscious starts to make its desires known—like a taste for “kinky fuckery” like bondage and submission, in spite of what she claims.
