Re: Explicit sex depiction in horror/weird fiction/scifi
Posted by:
Dale Nelson (IP Logged)
Date: 24 October, 2020 01:44PM
Minicthulhu, in the way you have framed it, this is a worthy topic for discussion.
My reflections would begin by distinguishing between between legitimate literary treatments of the erotic, and pornography. The former would always recognize that we are dealing with human beings, which, as such, require some respect even in fiction and poetry. Conversely, pornography really does tend to the dehumanization of human beings, by (for example) the isolating of only those things that conduce to the immediate sexual arousal of the reader. So as I'm defining it for the purpose of this present discussion, legitimate literary treatment always deals with the erotic as an aspect of the human; pornography isn't interested in any aspect of human beings' reality except what it can use to give the reader a cheap turn-on.
In ancient literature, the Biblical Song of Songs is an example of the legitimate literary treatment of the erotic. And, whatever the symbolic implications might be, on the literal level is is about two lovers, their desire for each other, and, if you like, what they do in bed. Jewish tradition has been that the books shouldn't be read by someone under thirty. I don't think that is necessarily simple prudery or hypocrisy, but rather a recognition that a mature person, probably a married person who is sexually experienced, will be the best reader of the poetic drama (if that's what it is) here.
In modern fantasy, Richard Adams's The Girl in a Swing is a fine novel of the supernatural with an erotic theme. It might be something to discuss here sometime.
My sense is that very little of the sexual content of modern fantasy, sf, and, perhaps especially, horror is good reading. It's cheap. It cheapens the imagination of readers. It's exploitative. The willing reader becomes an accomplice. He becomes a pimp to his imagination, bringing the whoredom of trash together with it.