Are books getting too graphic?

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ElaineA

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Haha, well, I guess I mean it's theoretically larger, because it's not a narrative type and defined by setting elements, SFF ends up dominating. Write a crime novel... but it has clones, now it's SFF. Write a romance... but it has magic, now it's SFF. Write a thriller... but it has telepathy, now it's SFF.

I think fantasy in particular, dominates SFF by default for an extension of the same reason. Typically, if your SF has fantastical elements, it will get slotted in with fantasy. A lot of spec fic books (with light spec fic elements) are really fantasy by default.

I don't have any stats though!

I question this. Write a romance and drop in magic and it stays in Romance, PNR (paranormal romance) or fairy tale. Write a romance with space pirates and it's still considered Romance. SF Romance. Now, if what you're saying is that the particular elements that make up SFF are so vast they bleed into other genres, I guess that's true, but the same goes for elements of romance (for example, since sex is what the OP is about), but it doesn't mean you can consider the book with an element here or there part of the "genre". That's a pretty specific term.

A SFF reader who theoretically might have picked up the first romance novel I finished would have been sorely disappointed, even though it had SFF elements. In no way would it have fit within the SFF genre.
 

Dave.C.Robinson

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I question this. Write a romance and drop in magic and it stays in Romance, PNR (paranormal romance) or fairy tale. Write a romance with space pirates and it's still considered Romance. SF Romance. Now, if what you're saying is that the particular elements that make up SFF are so vast they bleed into other genres, I guess that's true, but the same goes for elements of romance (for example, since sex is what the OP is about), but it doesn't mean you can consider the book with an element here or there part of the "genre". That's a pretty specific term.

A SFF reader who theoretically might have picked up the first romance novel I finished would have been sorely disappointed, even though it had SFF elements. In no way would it have fit within the SFF genre.

This.

Romance is the all-consuming monster of genres; it takes other genres and folds them into subgenres of itself on a regular basis. As long as the romantic relationship is the core of the story, romance is the overriding genre determinant. It's also by far the biggest kid on the block when it comes to sales.

Back when I was in the retail trade in the late 80's/early 90's paperback romances accounted for something over 50% of sales. That's not 50% of fiction sales, that was all sales including all genres/categories and formats.
 

ElaineA

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To be clear, I think the point of "elements of" does not define genre is true of most genres. If you take IT and change the date to 2280, it's still horror.

Romance is the all-consuming monster of genres; it takes other genres and folds them into subgenres of itself on a regular basis.

That's 'cuz of the cootie factor. Historically, SFF didn't exactly welcome kisses and the sloppy stuff, so we had to co-opt your goodies for ourselves. :wag:
 

lizmonster

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That's 'cuz of the cootie factor. Historically, SFF didn't exactly welcome kisses and the sloppy stuff, so we had to co-opt your goodies for ourselves. :wag:

Actually, romance and sex have always been common elements in SFF. But whatever you do, don't emphasize the romance when you're talking about the book. And whatever you do, don't put anything romantic on the cover, or use the word "romance" in the blurb.

I'm not entirely sure why SFF is so determinedly allergic to the association, but there you are.
 

Dave.C.Robinson

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To be clear, I think the point of "elements of" does not define genre is true of most genres. If you take IT and change the date to 2280, it's still horror.



That's 'cuz of the cootie factor. Historically, SFF didn't exactly welcome kisses and the sloppy stuff, so we had to co-opt your goodies for ourselves. :wag:

It's not just the "cootie factor;" it's also the fact that even a small segment of romance has traditionally been a much bigger market than SFF.
 

Jason

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I guess if I were to further specify the nature of my original question it'd probably go something like this.

There's nothing new under the sun, I get that. Sex has been around forever in literature. It does seem to me that within the last 20-30 years though, that sexual scenes have become more commonplace throughout. It's not a complaint mind you, just an observation. Is this unique to me and my recent foray into more recent works like Game of Thrones (which apparently introduced GrimDark)? When I compare that to the SF predecessors of LOTR, the Shannara Series, and the Chronicles of Narnia, the number of sexual scenes seemed both far more prevalent and more graphic.

I have seen sexual themes explored in other genres as well. That said, there are of course many classics I've not explored yet, so cannot speak to how graphic, explicit, or frequent sexual scenes are in older publications where I've not read them yet. I'm also primarily a SFF reader, so that has been my primary genre of more recent exploration. That said, I'll also note that it would equally be naive to suggest or imply that sexual themes haven't been explored in other genres throughout history. Toward that end, I am wondering if people reading in other genres outside the rather wide swath we now categorize as SFF are seeing more scenes (and more graphic scenes) becoming commonplace? It seems like some of you have already gotten the gist of the original theme/purpose here in your answers, because you also started getting into your explanations as to why things are getting more descriptive and frequent in other genres:

I honestly believe that sex is just a lot less taboo than it was 20 years ago, especially in young adult fiction (I've noticed less romanticisation of sex, too. A lot of sex...is just sex, now.)

Of course, that's not to say sexual content is prevalent everywhere - I've read a lot of books recently which contain no sex at all, or at least the skip-to-morning-after kind of sex scene. Writers seem to have more freedom to write about sex and a lot of them are choosing to.

I'd argue that books aren't so much getting more graphic as that graphic works are becoming better known as they are getting adapted into other mediums some of which have become more graphic over the last couple of decades.

Take Game of Thrones: For a book published over 20 years ago, A Game of Thrones isn't too graphic at all; having said that, the television adaptation is definitely too graphic for even an HBO show from 1996. It's the greater spread and acceptance of graphic material in the wider public consciousness due to the widening range available on other media that's made things more noticeable, not that books themselves have become more graphic.

I feel like the proliferation of graphic content speaks to the lessening of taboos in certain cases. There is a long and colorful history of things being omitted from manuscripts during publication (abortions, homosexuality, etc.), or being kept "vague" because the book would have no hope of being published if they were outright about it. I think it's great that certain themes are allowed to be explored more fully these days. It helps break stigma in some cases. Just looking at the other side of the coin.

This leads to a sort of follow-up series of corollary questions that may well be worth adding to the discussion. Specifically:

  • If so, would your impressions be that this is due to a greater socialization and societal acceptance of sexual diversity (one would hope)?
  • If not, what genres are you not seeing these sorts of themes, and why has that not been explored (in your own opinion)?
  • For those of us who have read across time periods within a genre or within the parameters of a cultural space recently (having read both the earlier and later work within the last 12 months), such as one where you could compare something like the LOTR or Shannara to Game of Thrones, are things more explicit and frequent, about the same, or have there been other changes you've noticed over time?


The reason that I've added the cultural element here is to recognize that various cultures both historically and even between each other have varying degrees of sexual permissiveness. Of course, that leads to it's own set of rabbit holes to explore, such as:

Are some cultural barriers also present in how these themes are explored? (Say more explicit and such in France or Italy versus the UK or the US? Heck, we could even go to African versus Asian differences toward sexual themes. Occidental versus Oriental? Again, just randomly picking countries here to illustrate culturally different regions is all :) )

Again, I'd naturally exclude erotica and genres that are skewed toward the explicit and intentional nature of sexuality in a very descriptive manner as a sidebar to the main story line. I know that the Game of Thrones has earlier been suggested as introducing grim dark, which is fine on the face of it, but as the same poster also said that the sexual scenes were not all that graphic - re-read Book 3, and consider what's presented there from the perspective of how prevalent and detailed the sexual scenes are:

Not wanting to reveal those scenes here for obvious reasons (spoiler alerts notwithstanding, but also the presence of underage children possibly perusing in here for a read of what is said).

Digging the input people have shared thus far - love to read the thoughts and perspectives everyone has contributed, so thanks to all! :)

Keep the conversation going...
 

Harlequin

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My contention is that romance is still defined by it's structure (HEA, no incest, no cheating, maximum word count, etc). Fantasy romance is a thing, AFAIK. I've got one cp who writes fantasy romance and another who writes post apoc romance. Both get shelved under multiple categories online. I don't know how a trade publisher would do it.

But either way, spec fic is only defined by setting elements. Maybe those aren't sufficient to get a book shelved under sff. However, nothing else defines sff. It isn't categorised based in narrative structure because it can have any narrative structure.


Fairytales and pnr come under the fantasy umbrella, however doubtful I am about seeing them there.

Agrees romance outsells everything else -- we see hat clearly from the indie market -- but I'm doubtful that it can be the broadest category in abstract terms, because of the requirements of its narrative structure.
 

cornflake

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When I compare that to the SF predecessors of LOTR, the Shannara Series, and the Chronicles of Narnia, the number of sexual scenes seemed both far more prevalent and more graphic.

The first was written like 80 or so years ago, the second .. does Brooks do that? The third is Christian, so....

Also, I'd say those are more fantasy, and fantasy and SF is often more into worldbuilding, but different authors are different. S. King has produced how much horror with not a lot of graphic sex, while some other horror authors pack it in.
 

Jason

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The first was written like 80 or so years ago, the second .. does Brooks do that? The third is Christian, so....

Also, I'd say those are more fantasy, and fantasy and SF is often more into worldbuilding, but different authors are different. S. King has produced how much horror with not a lot of graphic sex, while some other horror authors pack it in.

Kushiel's Dart

Not recent, and all about sex. A society built on BDSM in fact.

Hmmm...I must be completely doing a horrible job of trying to get a discussion going here because the discussion seems to have centered around my apparently apples to oranges comparisons, that a few here don't seem to be too fond of, so I'll make one final attempt here to explain the goal of this.

Step 1 - Pick a book, any book you like, in any genre you like from more than 50 years ago. Read it.
Step 2 - Pick another book, any other book you like, from the same genre from a more recent era - say, 30 years ago or less. Read it.
Step 3 - Analyze the prevalence of sexual themes either in their frequency, explicitness and detail of exploration.
Step 4 - Share your thoughts on the changing mores over time.

*****

Step 5 - A corollary would be to pick books from different cultures or geographic parts of the globe from in the same era, explore differences, and share your thoughts here.

*****
The goal here is not to critique the thoughts others have had by saying things like "Well, you're comparison is really apples to oranges because the genres are not identical in the time space continuum according to my world view." Rather, the goal here is to explore sexual themes as you have seen them change either over time, either within a genre or between cultures.

If this doesn't work at identifying the goals and purposes behind creating this Round Table discussion, so be it. I am not going to engage in further discussion about whether my comparisons between LOTR and GOT are valid or not...
 
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mpack

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There's nothing new under the sun, I get that. Sex has been around forever in literature. It does seem to me that within the last 20-30 years though, that sexual scenes have become more commonplace throughout. It's not a complaint mind you, just an observation. Is this unique to me and my recent foray into more recent works like Game of Thrones (which apparently introduced GrimDark)? When I compare that to the SF predecessors of LOTR, the Shannara Series, and the Chronicles of Narnia, the number of sexual scenes seemed both far more prevalent and more graphic.

To the highlighted question: yes, I believe to some extent this is an artefact of your reading choices. Consider this specific example from your earlier post.

That said, when I compare GOT to LOTR, or even the Shannara series, it’s pretty much night and day difference in terms of sexual explicitness and frequency of sexual scenarios. Lots of forced sex too...I was a bit taken aback at first as it was not what I was expecting in this genre.

Lord Foul's Bane was published the same year as Sword of Shannara. The first novella in King's Gunslinger cycle was published the next year. Both have scenes of sexual violence that wouldn't fit the tone of the Shannara series, but they are Sword's contemporaries.

Just choosing one or two books from any given era can lead to all sorts of unwarranted conclusions. If we took de Sade's work as our example, a lot of contemporary fiction would appear tame and mild by comparison.
 

cornflake

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I don't think they really are changing -- I think what you're noticing is a result of the specific things you're picking, hence my reply.

If anyone picks random titles there's going to be some dichotomy but .... Fanny Hill, D.H. Lawrence, Song of Fucking Solomon, Bret Easton Ellis, In Cold Blood, half the romance published in the world, all the '50s pulp...

We're, at least I wasn't, trying to discount your particular thoughts, just saying I think any book-to-book comparison isn't really showing anything, because I don't think there's been any real sea change.
 

BethS

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I’ve been on my reading and writing binge for almost 18 months now. In this process I’ve read a lot of classics (say more than 25 years old), and am starting to get into more current stuff. The Game of Thrones series is one and another titled Norwegian Wood I’ve noticed are very graphic and matter of fact in their narratives when it comes to sex.

Can you define "graphic"? I wouldn't have described the sex in GoT as being particularly graphic. There are a lot of references to sex (and rape), but not so many actual scenes played out on the page. And even those are not particularly explicit.

I can remember reading a series by Mercedes Lackey published in the 80s or 90s that contained a sex scene and a rape scene. Which was fairly unusual for the time and the genre (fantasy).

And a few months ago I read a fantasy series by Sarah Maas that had quite a bit of fairly explicit sex in it. But that's more the exception than the rule, I think.
 
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Jason

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Book 3 had a pretty graphic explanation that comes to mind between two characters when reunited for the first time in ages. If you've read the series, then you probably know the scene in the tent with Jamie and...(I'll leave the rest unsaid for both spoiler and g-ratings as appropriate for something that young eyes might see)
 

Polenth

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People aren't pointing out that the comparisons are different to be mean, but because comparing unlike things means you can't really draw a useful conclusion. If I take the modern cozy mystery genre and compare it to hardboiled crime books of the past, I'll find out that there's far less graphic sex and violence in modern mystery books. But it's a faulty premise, because I chose a sub-genre known for being more graphic for the past comparison and a sub-genre known for not being graphic for the present. I could make any hypothesis seem likely simply be picking my examples carefully.

Given that the main reason people ask things like this is that they're worried that they have to write a mandatory amount of graphic content, it's important to note that it isn't a requirement and not all books have it in any era. It's useful to know that it's a range from nothing graphic at all to very graphic. An average across all books isn't very useful.
 

Fuchsia Groan

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Looking at literary fiction specifically, I would say there was a sea change in terms of graphic content between the 19th century and the mid-20th century, but absolutely not between, say, the 1960s and now. When I was growing up, my parents had books like The Story of O, Tropic of Cancer, Fear of Flying, and Kinflicks on the shelves. All stocked in most stores. I remember my dad being shocked because my 10-year-old classmate was reading Fear of Flying. And, let me tell you, The Story of O makes Fifty Shades of Grey look tame.

In YA in the 1980s, we had Judy Blume's Forever, which was famously explicit about sex—in a sort of boring, educational way, but that didn't stop all the other girls from borrowing my copy. Nowadays, it might be easier to find that level of graphic content, but it's far, far from universal; many YA authors still follow the "fade to black" principle for sex scenes and leave most stuff to the imagination.

If anything, modern YA may be more conscientious about getting into the consequences of sexual activity, the power differentials involved, and so forth. I remember reading Norma Klein's Love Is One of the Choices (early '80s), in which a senior in high school has an affair with her teacher (fairly graphically described) and ends up married with his kid. Nowadays, I can't imagine an editor being okay with that plot line. In the '70s-'80s, before the advent of Sweet Valley High and other series books, YA was a bit Wild West, I think, and graphic content in books for older teens was definitely an option, just as it was in adult mainstream/literary novels.

Honestly, the counterculture novels my dad bought in the '60s-'70s were probably more graphic than anything I'd pick up now. (Also more misogynist—which is not to say that the two go together.) In those pre-online-porn days, a lot of mainstream fiction aimed at titillation. As a huge fan of Watership Down, I remember reading Richard Adams' fantasy Maia (1984) and being more than a little shocked by all the sex stuff going down there... with an underage heroine, let me add.
 

Jan74

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I don't think books are any more graphic then before, however I would argue that there are more books to choose from that may have more graphic elements in them. When I was a youth my options to read were: go to the library (which was limited in choice), buy a book from local bookstore (again limited in choice) and swap with friends. Now we have the internet to order books from or download, in my 44yrs I've never seen such a wide swath of selection, maybe this is due to self publishing? It doesn't matter why, but it's awesome and I love that I now have such a wide choice of books and I'm not limited to what my library can obtain or what the bookstores carry.

Speaking of libraries, and librarians....I love my local library and I have a stack of 4 books I just took out yesterday, even though I have an e-reader, I still love holding a book and I can spend all day plucking books off the shelves in a library and the librarians are awesome and do their very best to obtain books I want to read, sometimes though I have to download to e-reader since the book isn't in hard form.
 
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