erotica is probably the most rigid.... uh, the most strict... um, inflexible ... man, these adjectives are treacherous... Well, anyway, the genre with the most clearly defined rules.
Even more so than, say, regency romance? Or is it really an offshoot of that?
"Gerald, she's magnificent" is indeed a shorthand way of saying, "Gerald, she is on display and is dehumanized, but not so dehumanized that she can't hear and be witness to her own humiliation."
Well, and also, "She is magnificent for offering herself up to us for our amusement" as it is always the subjugation that is being praised. Though on that note, see an anon comment above (that I had forgotteen to unscreen) that talks about natural talent. And in that sense they are trying not only to be Sade but also Reage, as O spends an inordinate amount of time thinking about her state, which speaks to "hear and bear witness to her own humiliation."
The funny thing about Sade is that no one has gone as far as he did. People want to be him but pulled back a notch or twelve and who can blame them? And while the pain and humiliation and head games and violence seem to have been assimilated into a lot of modern erotica, the obsession with bodily functions, not so much.
Anne Rice, I mean, those books. There are things that I like about them, and the second one is a lot better than the first (though the third is a disaster other than the relatively short period where Laurent and Tristan are ponies) but the universe is so weird that you can't even get your footing in it, and then she yanks you out of one country and into another, and there are far too many points of view, and Beauty herself is a really boring object of desire which really isn't a very subversive way to write her, now is it?
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branchandroot
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Date: 2004-10-04 06:35 am (UTC)Even more so than, say, regency romance? Or is it really an offshoot of that?
"Gerald, she's magnificent" is indeed a shorthand way of saying, "Gerald, she is on display and is dehumanized, but not so dehumanized that she can't hear and be witness to her own humiliation."
Well, and also, "She is magnificent for offering herself up to us for our amusement" as it is always the subjugation that is being praised. Though on that note, see an anon comment above (that I had forgotteen to unscreen) that talks about natural talent. And in that sense they are trying not only to be Sade but also Reage, as O spends an inordinate amount of time thinking about her state, which speaks to "hear and bear witness to her own humiliation."
The funny thing about Sade is that no one has gone as far as he did. People want to be him but pulled back a notch or twelve and who can blame them? And while the pain and humiliation and head games and violence seem to have been assimilated into a lot of modern erotica, the obsession with bodily functions, not so much.
Anne Rice, I mean, those books. There are things that I like about them, and the second one is a lot better than the first (though the third is a disaster other than the relatively short period where Laurent and Tristan are ponies) but the universe is so weird that you can't even get your footing in it, and then she yanks you out of one country and into another, and there are far too many points of view, and Beauty herself is a really boring object of desire which really isn't a very subversive way to write her, now is it?