I have a question for you guys

SaraP said:

I was reading this thread and my work antennas got up. Being a doula, I talk often of sexuality, not only in my trainings/meetings, but also with my clients.

While I was reading I was thinking of how those characters would behave in labor. Knowing how much environmental conditions are important in labor and how many times that correlates to a woman's behaviour in sex, I was surprised to see that was never mentioned.

So my question is: when writing a character, do you think about how her environment affects her ability to surrender to sex (besides whatever she and/or her partner are doing)? Would this even make sense in writing erotica?

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I do wonder over the notion of surrendering to sex. Surrender requires yielding and submission. It makes implications that the person would resist or not care to pursue the sexual act. How does her environment affect her ability to enjoy the act to the fullest? How does it affect her desire to pursue it to begin with, to entertain a physical act of her own volition, willingly, and with a likeminded partner? Why do I so often find this notion of surrender in sexual acts attributed to women in erotica?

I think that environment plays a major factor in how my characters approach anything, from sex to making breakfast. It not only makes sense, but is essential.

I can only speak for my own writing, of course, but my characters tend to be younger and lovelier than I am (or ever was!), and therefore enjoy sex in full light more often than I personally like to. This is mostly so I can allow the POV character to describe not only what s/he feels but what s/he sees, for the reader's benefit.

I rarely use sounds exterior to the lovemaking as part of the scene, although I sometimes have them turn on a radio or play a CD. It gets a one-sentence mention, no more, and serves more as the character considerately setting the mood than setting it for the reader.

In real life sex, though, I suspect a great many people prefer dim lighting or darkness, as I do, so they can concentrate on sensation without the distraction of visual cues or fretting about how they appear to their lover. A fair number of women seem to like certain kinds of music and find it adds to the seductive mood they need for an orgasm to occur, but for me, it's like writing: once I get going, no matter what music is playing, I don't even hear it, nor notice when it ends unless it was masking some other sound.

Maryn, who may not be typical in oh so many ways

SaraP said:

When we talk of this in labor, the things we usually work on the most are limiting light and sound, both of which stimulate the cortex. How important are these for your characters? How do light and sound promote/inhibit the character's response? And again, do these even matter in this genre?

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I think that light and sound can be used to enhance or inhibit any experience. Does it matter to this genre? Certainly, in as much as it matters to any genre. Do all authors choose to use them in any given scene? No, they do not.

Writing the physical details and sensory responses in sex can be just as involved or less so of writing the physical details and sensory responses of something as simple as eating a piece of pie.

When writing anything, it is a good idea to cover the subject of all of the senses involved. When writing about sex, an author can choose to point out how the increasing arousal and inundation of sensory input hinders things like cognitive thinking, reservation, and response to visual stimuli. He or she could point out how some people get very quiet, how difficult it is to focus on words, and on how even if you hear them you do not necessarily understand, or how those you do understand temporarily pierce that haze and spur on an even greater degree of excitement.

Do I personally sit and think about the biological processes involved in just how a body is gathering data and having it filtered through the neuropathways and translated into experience? No; I do not. What I choose to include in my descriptions of anything, be it dialogue, adventure, or the act of sex itself, depends on what I choose to evoke.

As always, these are just my opinions.

I really don't think about the physiological processes going on when I'm writing a sex scene. As both Maryn and Marcus do, I try and bring in other senses to add depth to a scene.

Sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. Usually those are the things you concentrate on to draw the reader into the scene. Set the scene but leave it in the background as the people involved should be focused on each other. Sure, the phone ringing or all the other minutia of life can interrupt and ruin the mood. If you need an excuse to break up the action and stretch out the tension, go for it.

But once the real action starts, don't pull the reader out of the scene with a picturesque description of the view outside the window. They won't thank you for it. LOL

I think it starts with character development. How my characters react to arrousal, intimacy, conversation or a clown popping out of the closet, all go back to how I made the character. One might feel self conscious about their body, another might love showing their stuff. Some might prefer mood music while another might like music to cover the sounds they make that embarrass them.

Writing erotic romance and erotica is about the fantasy and romance. Reality isn't a pre-requisite. Real life barges in on my characters if the plot works that way, but only then. =o)

I have to agree with others that focusing on light or sound once things get going is going to be distracting - and unrealistic, too, for me at least. If the sex is any good I'm going to have no idea what music is playing (just won't hear it at all), or notice the "scenery" unless something in it changes drastically.

Funny. I really like bringing more reality-grounded elements into my fantasy. Make it visceral and tangible. My readers might not like it much, but I have had steamy scenes get broken up by the ever-present events that seem to scatter themselves through real life. Nothing quite breaks the mood like a kid shrieking on the outside of the apartment door you're banging away on. xD

Maryn said:

I can only speak for my own writing, of course, but my characters tend to be younger and lovelier than I am (or ever was!), and therefore enjoy sex in full light more often than I personally like to. This is mostly so I can allow the POV character to describe not only what s/he feels but what s/he sees, for the reader's benefit.

I rarely use sounds exterior to the lovemaking as part of the scene, although I sometimes have them turn on a radio or play a CD. It gets a one-sentence mention, no more, and serves more as the character considerately setting the mood than setting it for the reader.

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Just so you don't include the sounds of turtlesex.

o.k. here goes, deffinately Location, location,location. although some might....most would never give head or screw on the cross town bus. but could be sedused in a dimly lit corner of the resturant, In her apartment where she feels safe and in control, the room looses meaning. unless its unlike her to get naked on the dining room table. you dont have to say "the leather of the couch squeeked and made her giggle like a school girl seeing her first naked man" unless you are building her as being giddy and liking the feel of leather on her backside. but the two really dont go together, in my opinon. BUt if she has a leather fetish or the leather of the couch smells like her crotch because she never wears clothes at home then you need the description. I hope that helped and did not just further confuse.

I would have thought the idea of surrendering to sex was similar to surrendering to getting drunk or stoned - you have to be confident that you won't be harmed while in the resulting vulnerable state before you take steps to put yourself there.

As far as surroundings, normally putting the couple in a bed behind a locked door is enough to make it reasonable that they will both be relaxed. In situations where that's not possible I might use more description - they might have soft furs and a warm fire, or pleasant warm weather if they are outdoors, or there might be a bath with pleasantly scented soap. In a risky situation like having sex under the stairs of a public place I'll have the characters be looking around nervously and considering possible consequences of getting caught, but overwhelmed by their lust.

SaraP said:

So my question is: when writing a character, do you think about how her environment affects her ability to surrender to sex (besides whatever she and/or her partner are doing)?

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My wife refuses to have sex:
- on our front lawn
- while skydiving
- in a dumpster
- at the Burger King drive-up
- while being held captive by a Mexican drug cartel

In fact, she's pretty much limited to a bed in a closed room, or any reasonable horizontal surface in our own house.

My characters more or less follow suit. However, if a female character did prefer to surrender to sex in a dumpster, that would tell me something about her.