Violence in books

[Kyriakos]

What is your view of it?
Personally i sometimes have violent passages in my stories, but the actual violence is alluded to, or is very sketchy.
I have written two stories were a person dies. The one had just one casualty, the other has ten people who were murdered by one of the antagonists in the story.
Actually having a death in a story is very serious business, and it needs a lot of work to support its weight. I dislike deaths which are obviously there so as to supposedly shock- in which they fail.

In both stories death was instrumental. In one the protagonist/narrator is certain that the other person commited suicide, but then again he is surrounded by policemen and giving a plea.
In the other story the murderer is free, and is a sort of plague of a city which he wants to take back for his own country (although obviously this will not happen, so he resorts to terrorising the population).

And you? Do you read stories that have violence/death? And if so what are you looking for in it? :)

[Dark Muse]

Considering some of my favorite genres include, dystopia, horror, and historical fiction to say the least I am quite acquainted with violence and death in my reading, and I do not have any qualms with it as well I think it can often serve as a very imperative role considering the nature of the story.

Though of course like anything it can be over done, and misused and so forth, but I am not one to be the least bit squeamish about such things, and I do not find the use of violence/death to be offensive.

As far as what I am looking for in regards to its presence within the books I read, that really depends upon the story and what I might be reading that particular book for. As considering the genres I mentioned above which I frequently read the presence of violence and death is quite crucial in the devolvement of the story.

All in all though I think that the presence of violence within fiction can serve a few rather important roles to the individual. For one thing I think everyone to some degree or another has something of a morbid curiosity if you will. Exposure to violence within books allows the reader to be transported out of their comfort zone from a safe distance and see a glimpse of another world and feel the titillation of the danger.

It can also allow us to act out our own fantasies, living vicariously through others. It can be a way to release our own pent up aggressions by experiencing it through a character in a book with whom the reader might identify, or by simply loosing themselves within a story.

In addition the presence of violence and death brings realism to a story and perhaps stirs up feelings, experiences, etc.. which the reader can personal relate with on some level.

And well it plain and simple can make things more interesting and exciting. Honestly for me I think to read a story that was completely devoid of any suggestion or allusion to violence of death would be boring in many cases. I am not one for all fluff and sunshine and perfect utopias

Violence/death creates tension, stimulates interest, and further captivates the reader.

[MaineTim]

I also seem to have a preference for distopian fiction, and in general don't have any objection to violence in the fiction I read, as long as it's integral to the story. The book I'm reading at the moment, "Black Rain", is filled with graphic descriptions of the effects of the atomic blast that aren't pleasant to read, but are essential to a true telling of the story.

I don't mind simulated violence in films either, though again it should serve some purpose. Slasher movies, for example, don't offend me, but they do bore me. :) I'm less likely to watch actual violence on film, if I can help it. I would have no interest in things like "Faces of Death" or the like. Not squeemish about it, I don't think, but I wouldn't seek it out in that way.

[Heteronym]

I don't give much thought to it. I don't need to actively search for violence in literature because it just seems to naturally find its way into it :smile5:

Literature is a pretty violent thing: I remember when I read the Homeric poems how the graphic violence caught me by surprise. I never imagined poems written millennia ago, held in such high regard by academia, would so matter-of-factly describe spears going through people's heads, brains splashed, limbs severed, heads decapitated :ack2:

[Kyriakos]

I also remember the 9nth chapter of the Odyssey, with the abrupt and very well-written in my view turn of mood of Polyphemus, who suddently stops talking to Odysseus, picks up two of his men and crashes their heads into the ground, so as to eat them.
There is something charming in such archaic violence depiction. It is so empty of anything leading up to it, that it seems pure to me.

[LMK]

If it is integral to the story then I don’t give much thought to it either. However, I have been put off some authors to drone on with details until it becomes sensational and that’s when I lose interest.

[Virgil]

Whenever you are dealing with extremes of emotion, violence, love, anger, whatever, you have to have the right touch or it comes across as corny. It's not the violence that hurts a work, but the raw emotion that's connected to it. This goes for poems, fiction, essays, whatever.

[YORK]

I've never been particularly bothered by violence in literature. I read McCarthy's 'Blood Meridian' (possibly the most graphically violent novel I've read, barring the work of Marquis de Sade which I've dipped in and out of) straight through first time and, apart from a few passages, I didn't really flinch. I think that was because in that case the disturbing description was part and parcel of that novel. It had to be there to justify the story, the historical setting and solidify some of the characterisation.

I'm rereading Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History' at the moment and think this passage is quite pertinent to this debate. As one of his students finishes a reading of Klytemnestra's famous speech in 'Agamemmnon', the teacher Julian begins a discussion:


'What a beautiful passage', he said. 'I never tire of it. But how is it that such a ghastly thing, a queen stabbing her husband in his bath, is so lovely to us?'

'It's the meter', said Francis. 'Iambic trimeter. Those really hideous parts of the Inferno, for instance, Pier de Medicina with his nose hacked off and talking through a blood slit in his windpipe -'

'I can think of worse than that,' Charles said.

'So can I. But that passage is lovely and it's because of the terza rima. The music of it. The trimeter tolls through the speech of Klytemnestra's like a bell.'

'But iambic trimeter is fairly common in Greek lyric, isn't it?' said Julian. 'Why is this particular section so breathtaking? Why do we not find ourselves attracted to some calmer or more pleasing one?'

'Aristotle says in Poetics,' said Henry, 'that objects such as corpses, painful to view in themselves, can become delightful to contemplate in a work of art.'

'And I believe Aristotle is correct. After all, what are the scenes in poetry graven on our memories, the ones that we love the most? Precisely these. The murder of Agamemnon and the wrath of Achilles. Dido on the funeral pyre. The daggers of the traitors and Caesar's blood.'

'Death is the mother of beauty,' said Henry.

'And what is beauty?'

'Terror.'

'Well said,' said Julian. 'Beauty is rarely soft or consolatory. Quite the contrary. Genuine beauty is always quite alarming.'