Emotional Attachment & Smutty Fic

[ithildin]

We discussed this on IM last night, and thought it was worth throwing out for conversation.  My musing is such: I've bought and read some of those 'erotica anthologies', and for the most part, they bore me to tears. So I've been wondering if there's a component of having an attachment to a character that adds to the enjoyment of such fic. As in: I find I enjoy 'adult' fanfic with a character I know and care about more than the 'professional' sorts of stories found in published anthologies. With many of those, it's virtually nameless and faceless and I just don't care enough about the participants for the story to be satisfying on any level.  Obviously, there are exceptions. but generally speaking that seems to be the pattern.

Thoughts?

And here's hoping the other participants of last night's conversation share their thoughts.

Comments

[mischief5.livejournal.com]

I found this on Wikipedia:

"Erotica (from the Greek language Eros - "love") — are works of art, including literature, photography, film, sculpture and painting, that deal substantively with erotically stimulating or arousing descriptions. Erotica is rather a modern word used to describe the portrayal of human sensuality and sexuality with high-art aspirations, differentiating such work from commercial pornography. Erotica portraying homosexual people is referred to as homoeroticism. (Otherwise known in fandom as slash. *grin*)

"While pornography popularly focuses on unadorned and unemotional lusts and the explicit depiction of sexual acts, erotica tends to define material with a higher emotional content, the development of place, character and story line, or of an overall artistic theme. However, such distinctions are necessarily subjective and may say more about the critic's own tastes on erotic material than the artistic and other attributes of the material itself.

"The division between erotica and pornography is an aesthetic division, usually dependent on moral philosophy, religious dogma, or personal outlook. At present, many legal jurisdictions maintain laws regulating the availability of expressions deemed pornographic (although that term almost never appears in legal texts), arguably to maintain a level of comfort or safety for a majority of citizens.

"It is a notable trait of the strength of the human reproductive drive relative to the psyche as a whole, that unambiguous reference to sexuality, framed in a manner which the perceiver thereof finds acceptable, tends to initiate an involuntary reaction of sexual arousal, possibly building increased sexual desire, which may lead to creating or taking advantage of opportunity to engage in sexual activity. This can be true of erotica just as well as other, both more and less refined references to sex. Depictions of the human body which merely fail to conceal or disguise the secondary sexual characteristics of its particular gender may be all that is necessary to trigger arousal in a person who is attracted to that gender. For this reason, erotica is too broadly described merely in terms of the effect that it engenders in its audience, as all sexually related matter has the potential to create such an effect."

Or in the words of Gloria Leonard, "The difference between pornography and erotica is lighting."

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

LOL!

Oh, and I've got more odd questions, but I saved them for your list instead [beam] Now if I can combine this one with the email one, that would be cool! [snickers madly]

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know... if Highlander came back in 20 years like BSG did, would you prefer erotica with the original Methos and cylons, or the new Duncan and cylons? Err.. never mind. [g]

[mischief5.livejournal.com]

You are so weird. And I love you for it. Cylons. Puleeze.