recklessness in writing

[cacian]

How reckless can one go in writing without feeling guilty?
For example killing characters in stories is reckless if taken to real life.
How guilty do you feel everytime you write or is it all a smooth ride?

[hillwalker]

I see you have failed to keep your New Year's resolution to try and stop asking such strange questions.


How reckless can one go in writing without feeling guilty? For example killing characters in stories is reckless if taken to real life.

H

[YesNo]

Killing characters does not bother me so much as love and eroticism which I find more interesting, but more difficult to do well.

[cacian]

I see you have failed to keep your New Year's resolution to try and stop asking such strange questions.



H

I have failed none where I have taken to none. The only resolution I made is that of writing faster and sharper. Might that be your resolution?
The question still stand therein.

[cacian]

Killing characters does not bother me so much as love and eroticism which I find more interesting, but more difficult to do well.

Hi YesNo and happy new year to you.
Eroticism I could not take to only because it does not apply to my real life. Killing characters is another.
Love is more interesting I guess. What do you find interesting about the two concepts love and eroticism?

[YesNo]

I suppose I link love and eroticism because of the book I'm reading at the moment by Young and Alexander called "The Chemistry Between Us". They reduce love to molecular activity and reorganization of a person's brain. This is reductionistic if one claims that is all love is, but then literature would be one way to explore what else there is to love but molecular eroticism.

[Steven Hunley]

I suppose I link love and eroticism because of the book I'm reading at the moment by Young and Alexander called "The Chemistry Between Us". They reduce love to molecular activity and reorganization of a person's brain. This is reductionistic if one claims that is all love is, but then literature would be one way to explore what else there is to love but molecular eroticism.

The challenge in eroticism and love in writing, it to find an approach that works, when both subjects have been done to death. It's the avoidance of clichés and doing something new. Killing off a character is sometimes necessary. I just read the Sea Wolf, and Wolf Larson was killed off in a manner new to me, one piece at a time, where all his faculties are broken down in order.

Eroticism is especially challenging, as it's been all done before, and unfortunately, by too many authors that use it as their entire theme, and are attempting to entertain and titillate and that's it. It's hard to find anything fresh coming out of the oven of eroticism.

Love, with all it's variations, has been done too, but isn't so limited a subject, so there's more open ground. I mean, there's love of family and state, parental love, self-love and romantic love and more. Maybe because eroticism can be text-book in it's approach, after all, it can be reduced to so much physical stuff, you have the feeling that you're reading a book on car repair. There's the steps, one, two, three, and when the love engine is warmed up motor hums properly and the body's in gear, you take off with a mad dash to orgasm.

Love isn't so formulaic as that.

[islandclimber]

Eroticism and love through the words of Georges Bataille, there is a rather provocative experience.

[WolfLarsen]

How reckless can one go in writing without feeling guilty?
For example killing characters in stories is reckless if taken to real life.
How guilty do you feel everytime you write or is it all a smooth ride?

I think a writer should be as reckless as possible! Why the hell should writing be a smooth ride?

And feeling guilty? Just throw your imagination on the page – what the hell is there to feel guilty about?

As long as you're not supporting some fascist disgusting ideology with your writing than I don't see why you should feel guilty about it.

[YesNo]

Love, eroticism and killing people off have all been done in the past.

The OP wants to know how reckless one can go without feeling guilty. I suspect writing about eroticism would lead to more guilt than killing people off. Also writing about about love would lead to more guilt than writing about "deep", depressing topics.

[cacian]

Eroticism and love through the words of Georges Bataille, there is a rather provocative experience.

Erotica and love? I am not sure they would go hand in hand. It all depends on what you think love is.

[Delta40]

Once again the OP offers her own subjective view as fact regarding recklessness.

Feelings of guilt enter the frame when they are relevant to the work and not for any other reason. It's part of the creative process. Other than that, why on earth would I feel guilty? Having said that, there is no accounting for the diversity of writers and how they are driven.

[cacian]

Love, eroticism and killing people off have all been done in the past.

The OP wants to know how reckless one can go without feeling guilty. I suspect writing about eroticism would lead to more guilt than killing people off. Also writing about about love would lead to more guilt than writing about "deep", depressing topics.

Hi YesNo can I ask how you would approach erotica and why would one feel guilty about it? Sorry I have thought about it and cannot see it.

[cacian]

Eroticism and love through the words of Georges Bataille, there is a rather provocative experience.

Provocative ?
I would have thought it to be complicated and rather dimunitive to love. I tend to associate erotica with lust. Love is a feeling.

[cacian]

I think a writer should be as reckless as possible! Why the hell should writing be a smooth ride?

And feeling guilty? Just throw your imagination on the page – what the hell is there to feel guilty about?

As long as you're not supporting some fascist disgusting ideology with your writing than I don't see why you should feel guilty about it.

A smooth ride because I tend to compare writing to driving. I myself enjoy smooth driving to reckless one. Of course others will might differ.

[islandclimber]

Provocative ?
I would have thought it to be complicated and rather dimunitive to love. I tend to associate erotica with lust. Love is a feeling.

I don't think Story of the Eye could be called anything less than provocative... Disturbing, provocative, complicated... I certainly did not suggest it was erotica; it contains eroticism, yes, but it is not erotica. It is more so a dialectic of sorts on the interaction between love and lust, eroticism and sadism, tenderness and brutality, and the grey areas between. A work of literature that highlights the problems that arise when one can't separate love from lust, erotic from sadistic, tender from brutal. It poses the question: can we ever separate these pairs while giving free reign to our passions?

[cacian]

I don't think Story of the Eye could be called anything less than provocative... Disturbing, provocative, complicated... I certainly did not suggest it was erotica;
the word 'disturbing' did it for me or shall I say disturving.

it contains eroticism, yes, but it is not erotica. It is more so a dialectic of sorts on the interaction between love and lust, eroticism and sadism, tenderness and brutality, and the grey areas between.
I am interested in the grey areas in between they are what hold this perfusion of love and erotica.

A work of literature that highlights the problems that arise when one can't separate love from lust, erotic from sadistic, tender from brutal. It poses the question: can we ever separate these pairs while giving free reign to our passions?
And to answer the question it would be a definit yes of course it is possible. What is not realistic however is to suggest or think one could not.

[YesNo]

Hi YesNo can I ask how you would approach erotica and why would one feel guilty about it? Sorry I have thought about it and cannot see it.

I suppose I wouldn't mind letting my mother read a story where I killed off one of the characters. However, if I showed her a story of some sort of sexual fetish, she might start to wonder about me and that would lead to the guilt. Writing anonymously for anonymous readers, I don't think it would involve any guilt. I could replace "mother" with "employer" or some other person close to me to get the same effect.

I'll have to read some of Georges Bataille that islandclimber mentioned.

[cacian]

I suppose I wouldn't mind letting my mother read a story where I killed off one of the characters.
Oh I see. I never thought about it that way. I never imagined any of my family members to read my work certainly not my mother but then one never knows. At this stage I am thinking the way I write makes it fine for all to read.


However, if I showed her a story of some sort of sexual fetish, she might start to wonder about me and that would lead to the guilt.
Very true and so what do you suggest? Write about it without making it obvious haha. That would not be possible I guess.


Writing anonymously for anonymous readers, I don't think it would involve any guilt. I could replace "mother" with "employer" or some other person close to me to get the same effect.
A lot of hard work I have to admit. A writer is best when there are no worries whatsoever or guilt. Writing freely and without constraints is what it is all about. I guess I limit my topics in order to be able to do so.


I'll have to read some of Georges Bataille that islandclimber mentioned.
I might have a look too.

[islandclimber]

To be clear Story of the Eye is incredibly disturbing. A lot of this has to with it not really being a narrative in a traditional sense; also, with its complete lack of character development, they are flat characters, impossible to connect with in any meaningful way. So at first glance this book can come across as disgusting pornography, yet it would be an error to see it as only such.

It holds value as a Transgressive piece, what it is transgressing is open to interpretation but I might suggest its characters are rebelling against a stifled living, a controlled living, a way of living that insists upon any normative values at all. They might rebel in a rather disturbing fashion but the transgressive literary merit of the work through its pornographic juxtaposition of Eros and Thanatos is certainly fascinating. And in the above-mentioned rebellion, I think one has to understand they are beyond even ideas of rebellion. For example, imagine a talented jazz musician improvising, no longer considering the concepts of note and time signature, an instantaneous playing. The characters of Story of the Eye are aiming for this instantaneousness, this automatism only generalized to the entirety of life. So there are no longer boundaries between normal and abnormal, which makes this novella not about disgusting sexual experimentation but about the possibility that if there are no concepts, then anything normal can be sexual and the converse as well, anything sexual can be normal.

Certainly, at the very least one can understand its value in terms of postmodern transgression theory in literature. Burroughs, Selby jr., Pynchon, Ballard, Ackers, and others are indebted to it in some way. That being said, it is not for the faint of heart and will likely be the most disturbing thing you have ever read.

[cacian]

I have just looked up the book and skimmed some of its interpretations. The characters I would not personally call flat but rather unrealistic. First there is the mentally ill sixteen year old and then there is the English aristocrat who happens to be an emigrant or abroad.
How often does one come across such a concept of characters together as a pair?
Secondly there is also the age gap to take into account. These two characters are being referred to as a couple. I am not sure this is realistic because:
a) a mentally ill with an aristocrat abroad is literally an impossible union or a rarity. There is nothing to bound these two characters together and even if it did whatever happens between them is considered tricky because one of them is mentally ill.
and
b) The aristocrat is first described as a voyeur and then he is suddenly an exhibitionist. There is a dogma here or a confusion in the sense that sexually one can either be one or the other.
I have not read it but one think that actually stood out in this book is the title.
Do you know what the title actually mean?

[islandclimber]

I have just looked up the book and skimmed some of its interpretations. The characters I would not personally call flat but rather unrealistic. First there is the mentally ill sixteen year old and then there is the English aristocrat who happens to be an emigrant or abroad.
How often does one come across such a concept of characters together as a pair?
Secondly there is also the age gap to take into account. These two characters are being referred to as a couple. I am not sure this is realistic because:
a) a mentally ill with an aristocrat abroad is literally an impossible union or a rarity. There is nothing to bound these two characters together and even if it did whatever happens between them is considered tricky because one of them is mentally ill.
and
b) The aristocrat is first described as a voyeur and then he is suddenly an exhibitionist. There is a dogma here or a confusion in the sense that sexually one can either be one or the other.
I have not read it but one think that actually stood out in this book is the title.
Do you know what the title actually mean?

Unrealistic? You haven't even read the book. And you just said that you had "skimmed" some interpretations... How on earth could you possibly determine that the characters are unrealistic? Besides this, the narrator and Simone don't meet the English emigré aristocrat (Sir Edmund) until they reach Spain, where they flee to, after the mentally ill 16 year old's death (Marcelle). Nowhere are Marcele and Sir Edmund a couple, they do not even meet, so it is obvious that you barely skimmed these summaries.

Besides, in that era older gentlemen often took very young mistresses. Not to mention excursions with prostitutes, some of whom, would surely have had mental illnesses. The aristocrat is also a depraved sadist and a mentally ill young girl would have been an easy target, one also easy to dispose of later. This is only to counter your point a. As none of this even happened in the book I am not sure why we are discussing it.

As for point b)... There is no reason at all one could not have both of these paraphilias. Likely one would be dominant, but both could easily be present, it is not a paradox. Yet, you reveal your lack of knowledge of this text again. Sir Edmund is never represented as an exhibitionist in the text, only as voyeuristic. The young couple (the narrator and Simone) are exhibitionists which reveals why they connect with this wealthy English voyeur.

The title has to do with Simone's sexual obsession with ovular objects. The metaphor of the eye is central to the text. Bataille presents a metonymic chain of signifiers around the repeated ritual of vaginally ingesting ovular objects. This leads up to the most disturbing vignette of the novella, with a human eye.

Please don't try to criticize a work you have not read. It just makes you sound absurd.

[cacian]

QUOTE=islandclimber;1197134]Unrealistic? You haven't even read the book. And you just said that you had "skimmed" some interpretations... How on earth could you possibly determine that the characters are unrealistic? Besides this, the narrator and Simone don't meet the English emigré aristocrat (Sir Edmund) until they reach Spain, where they flee to, after the mentally ill 16 year old's death (Marcelle). Nowhere are Marcele and Sir Edmund a couple, they do not even meet, so it is obvious that you barely skimmed these summaries.
Oops my apologies indeed I have misread it. I understood Marcelle and Sir Edmund to have been a pair.


Besides, in that era older gentlemen often took very young mistresses. Not to mention excursions with prostitutes, some of whom, would surely have had mental illnesses. The aristocrat is also a depraved sadist and a mentally ill young girl would have been an easy target, one also easy to dispose of later. This is only to counter your point a. As none of this even happened in the book I am not sure why we are discussing it.

Older gentleman and younger mistresses remain to be proven. I have not myself witnessed it and so to say it does happen everyday is perhaps exaggerated. I think one have to be careful about making such clichés found in books and films as de facto.


QUOTE]As for point b)... There is no reason at all one could not have both of these paraphilias. Likely one would be dominant, but both could easily be present, it is not a paradox. Yet, you reveal your lack of knowledge of this text again. Sir Edmund is never represented as an exhibitionist in the text, only as voyeuristic. Simone and the narrator first consummate their lust on a beach near their home, and involve Marcelle within their activity. The couple are exhibitionists, The young couple (the narrator and Simone) are exhibitionists which reveals why they connect with this wealthy English voyeur.
Very true I have just reread it and yes you are right Sir Edmund is just a voyeur. I think I will definitely pass in reading the whole thing. There is sex and then there is family and mentally ill.
I just could not connect.


The title has to do with Simone's sexual obsession with ovular objects. The metaphor of the eye is central to the text. Bataille presents a metonymic chain of signifiers around the repeated ritual of vaginally ingesting ovular objects. This leads up to the most disturbing vignette of the novella, with a human eye.

Wow I must admit this is totally new to me. It is strange to link a human eye to a sexual organ.


Please don't try to criticize a work you have not read. It just makes you sound absurd.
I did skim throught it quickly and I did miss many of the points you have raised.

[Delta40]

Omg Cacian. What would I do for a laugh on Sunday nights if it wasn't for you? :goof:

[cacian]

@ islandclimber

May I ask you what you mean By transgressive in this paragraph:


It holds value as a Transgressive piece, what it is transgressing is open to interpretation but I might suggest its characters are rebelling against a stifled living, a controlled living, a way of living that insists upon any normative values at all. They might rebel in a rather disturbing fashion but the transgressive literary merit of the work through its pornographic juxtaposition of Eros and Thanatos is certainly fascinating.

[cacian]

Omg Cacian. What would I do for a laugh on Sunday nights if it wasn't for you? :goof:

Haha I know. I did misread it.:blush: Sunday nights? It is barely morning here in London.

[islandclimber]

Cacian. When Pablo Picasso was 63 he began a relationship with 23 year old Francoise Gilot. This was only 70 years ago.

Much worse, all through Africa and the Middle East adolescent girls are to this day often made brides of much older men. Just research this.

I'm glad you are choosing to avoid this book, I don't think it would suit your temperament.


Omg Cacian. What would I do for a laugh on Sunday nights if it wasn't for you? :goof:

:lol:

[islandclimber]

@ islandclimber

May I ask you what you mean By transgressive in this paragraph:

Transgressive fiction. It focuses on the idea of being confined by societal norms and values, and the desire to rebel against and break free of these things. The characters often seem sociopathic, mentally-ill, nihilistic, as they are rebelling against the basic norms and values of society. Often this is expressed in this literature through subjects such as sex, pedophilia, necrophilia, bestiality, coprophilia, incest, violence, torture, sadism, drugs, crime for the sake of crime. It's an interesting form for social commentary.

[Delta40]

Haha I know. I did misread it.:blush: Sunday nights? It is barely morning here in London.

We're a little more advanced here....Goodnight!