. . . If anonymous blogging is already writing for the drawer and this blog is a space for my most personal and difficult thoughts, then where do I write down the things that I can’t even say here? One solution is personal friendships. I have a friend that frequently sends me emails with pieces of writing and a subject line like, “I can’t blog this”. Sometimes he is correct. For social reasons or political ones or just “good taste”, he really can’t. Sometimes I convince him that he is wrong because I know his subject line is a challenge to both of us, of course he “can” blog it, but will he?

Me? I don’t even commit these dirtiest of thoughts to words in a publishable way. I may talk about them with friends or even allude to them on Twitter but the simple act of stringing words into sentences and sentences into paragraphs seems very risky and final to me. If I write and I don’t publish, I am admitting that the thoughts are unpublishable. And if I don’t publish the unpublishable, what am I doing here?

Link

At the how to write erotica panel at Bluestockings the other night, two interesting resources were mentioned for writers interested in writing erotica.

Rachel recommended the Erotica Readers & Writers Association.

Michelle Herrera Mulligan mentioned taking this course, Silk Sheets: Writing Erotica, at the New School, and found it incredibly helpful:

Erotic writing has taken its place beside more conventional literary genres, and the explosion of contemporary sex writing has led to great opportunities in this field. This course, designed for beginners as well as experienced writers, shows you how to write erotica that is as highly literate as it is provocative. Focus is on the short story, but we also consider the world of erotic poetry. We explore the parameters of contemporary erotic fiction by studying writers as diverse as Nicholson Baker, James Baldwin, Patrick Califa, Charles Bukowski, Mary Gaitskill, Henry Miller, Susanna Moore, Anais Nin, Diana di Prima, Michelle Tea, and William Vollman. Each class includes writing exercises designed to explore plot, timing, character, and locale in the erotic story and develop the ability to write sensual descriptive passages. We read the poetry of Pablo Neruda, Mary Oliver, and other stellar poets and write some erotic poetry. Our reading list includes selections from Best American Erotica. Specific assignments are given and individual projects of your choice are also encouraged. (3 credits)

The instructor, Tsaurah Litzky, was incredibly informative and had lots of great resources. Michelle also mentioned how everyone who was in the class with her has since been published.

Jane Smiley on her novel about 10 days of swimming, eating and screwing

by Joey Rubin

Jane Smiley’s latest novel, Ten Days in the Hills, is creating waves in the world of literary criticism the way Britney’s shaved head seems to be doing everywhere else. The cause? Graphic sex, of course. John Updike wrote that Smiley has “set a new mark for explicitness in a work of non-pornographic intent.” And New York Times book critic Michiko Kakutani found the “pages and pages of R-rated (sometimes X-rated) accounts of sexual shenanigans” too much to bear.

Smiley, the author of eleven other novels, including the 1992 Pulitzer Prize-winner A Thousand Acres, tells the story of ten people waiting out the beginning of the Iraq War in two mansions in the Hollywood Hills. The characters — which include a famous aging director named Max, his legendarily beautiful ex-wife Zoe, and their children, friends and lovers — sit around talking about the war, worrying about the world, watching movies and screwing.

But according to Smiley, all the sex is just a way of talking about love. “My theory of love includes a lot of sex. And yes, it’s pleasurable and enjoyable and interesting and deeply communicative sex.” Nerve spoke to Smiley about what it means to “make love” in a novel, and why she’s glad she’s not Angelina Jolie. — Joey Rubin

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…Which to me is just dumb-ass. Why, I wonder, does sex remain a bad thing when we have television commercials, golden-lit and Vaseline-washed, of silver-haired couples holding hands with the spark-spark glimmer of erotic light in their eyes? How can fucking continue to be a verboten topic in mainstream media when everything—everything—from Dr. Ruth to Dr. Phil to Oprah to Good Housekeeping is telling we should have it?

As confusing as I continue to find this pink ghetto of writing, I am yet more confused by the reaction of sex-positive publications. Last fall, I was published in UK’s Scarlet Magazine, which is a magazine that best might be described as “Sex In The City on Spanish fly and after viewing ‘Dirt-Pipe Milkshakes 2’.” Recently, an editor contacted me to ask if I’d like to submit some stuff for their “Cliterature” sections.

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Call for submissions: Best Sex Writing 2008
To be edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel
Publication date: November 2007
Deadline for submissions: May 1, 2007

Email: bestsexwriting2008@gmail.com

Editor Rachel Kramer Bussel is looking for personal essays and reportage for inclusion in the 2008 edition of Best Sex Writing, which will hit stores in November 2007. Seeking articles from across the sexual spectrum, covering alternative sexuality, reproductive rights and sexuality, sex work, sex and aging, sex and parenting, BDSM, polyamory, gender roles, sex and race, sex and disability, etc. These topics are just starting points; any writings covering the topic of sex will be considered. Personal essays will also be considered.

Previous editions of the annual series have featured authors such as Susannah Breslin, Susie Bright, Stephen Elliott, Tristan Taormino, Virginia Vitzhum, and others. See Best Sex Writing 2005 and 2006 for examples of the types of writing being sought. I’m especially looking for reported pieces that are political, timely, intelligent, surprising, and insightful about sex in American culture (and its many subcultures). (more…)