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This week: Sex Edited by: Robert Waltz  
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Anybody who believes that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach flunked geography.
-Robert Byrne
An intellectual is a person who's found one thing that's more interesting than sex.
-Aldous Huxley
A dirty book is rarely dusty.
-Anonymous |
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I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that most of us are familiar with the idea that sexual intercourse exists. We know about it, some of us might actually have engaged in it, and it's a natural part of life for most Earthlings.
But it seems that when it comes to including it in stories, people shy away.
Granted, there's a line which, when crossed, can turn classic fantasy literature into, well, the other kind of fantasy, and that's not what this newsletter's about. After all, most of us also enjoy eating, but few of us want to read something like "He pierced the perfectly charred surface of the steak with the shiny, sharp fork, releasing its juices and savory aroma, then drew the knife across its flank, revealing the tender, pink flesh inside..."
Actually, never mind. Now I'm hungry.
Anyway, the point is, most fantasy literature seems to treat sex the same way it treats body waste elimination; that is to say, not at all. And yet babies continue to be born, kingdoms rise and fall over spurned love, and no one dies of constipation.
I say there's a balance to be struck between the illusion of chaste celibacy and the depiction of graphic sexuality. And I know that different people have different ideas on where that balance point is, but I think it does everyone a disservice if you pretend that sex never happens, and an even greater disservice if it's only the antagonists who revel in it. And this is even more true for the classically chaste "young adult" market - never made sense to me, because that demographic is definitely doing it more than the "old fart" demographic.
The best authors, over the years, have been the ones that hint at sexual attraction, make it appear realistic, without going into graphic detail. And it also provides all kinds of plot and character motivation that might not exist otherwise.
So my challenge for you: Next time you're writing, think about sex. |
And some fantasy to get you going:
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Last time, in "Religion" , I talked about religion in a fantasy context.
Steev the Friction Wizurd  : If animals had a phonetic language, then they would have a religion.
One of the cultural arts that develop from having a language is the art of the explanation, which is also the origin of the art of the story. In fact, in the beginning, explanations and stories were the same thing. You can still see traces of that in the stories we call "fables", such as Aesop's Fables.
The spouse says, "Where were you all day?" and the answer is a story or explanation. The child says "Why are lions so ferocious?" and the answer is a story or explanation.
Stories and explanations were answers to questions and religion represents an attempt to organize the answers-explanations-stories into a coherent whole.
Show me a species with a language and I will show you a religion.
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So, will the robots we make create their own language? And will they worship us as their creators, or decide to usurp us? Hey, that's what science fiction is for.
Mummsy  : I loved the process creating the religions and their backstories in my YA trilogy - the sense that religion shapes culture & culture shapes religion really came through as I considered both the culture and the story that I was trying to tell.
Yes, the complexity is what makes these things interesting.
drifter46: Which just goes to show you that even then religion was designed to manipulate and control. Interesting none the less.
Of course, some people benefit from manipulation and control...
brom21  : This was very fascinating. I think I should point out that those old world humans were experiencing existence for the first time. We may think our selves wiser and them dimwitted bit would we really have done anything differently? People in a lot of third world countries still worship multiple deities. We’ve grown up with science so we know that stars are not gods in the sky. The debate over what came first, monotheism or polytheism, is ancient. Thanks for the stimulating article.
I don't think we're any wiser or smarter; we definitely have more knowledge, which is a different issue, but it's what we, or our ancestors, did with the knowledge that matters. And they were just as clever as we are.
L. Stephen O'Neill : I ran across an extra-ordinary author that did a pretty good job with making a religion a part of her story. In "the Curse of Chalion" Lois McMaster Bujold tells a story about a man who experiences real interaction with gods and a curse that plagues the royal family of his country. The man is pretty much an agnostic until he is swept up into events that surround the royals and gods too. I would recommend Bujold if you haven't tried her work before, and "the Curse of Chalion" isn't a bad place to start if you like fantasy.
Bujold is one of my favorite authors, and I especially like her Vorkosigan books.
Elfin Dragon-finally published : Creating gods & religion also worked for Robert Heinlein in "Job a Comedy of Justice" and Douglas Adams his two books, "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" & "Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul". All three books have elements of different religions and gods appearing in very creative ways. Also....a series dealing with both political and religious overtones with gods is A Requiem for Homo Sapiens is a trilogy of science fiction novels written by David Zindell that is made up of "The Broken God" (1992), "The Wild" (1995), and "War in Heaven" (1998). This trilogy is a sequel to the standalone novel called "Neverness" (1988).
Good recommendations. And of course, there's Neil Gaiman.
And that's it for me for this month! Until next time,
DREAM ON!!! |
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Fantasy: July 29, 2015 Issue [#7129]
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