Formulas for really good Erotica

[nikisixx]

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[Brutal_One]

You pose an interesting idea. I too have a math’s bent. I can liken in maths the difference between differentiation which has rules that are very logical for solving - I.e. scientific versus integration solving where you need insights so very much more of an art.

The advent and rise of AI and machine learning is going to be increasingly a real thing.

Although there is the expression “an infinite amount of monkey’s in a room with a typewriter could come up with the works of Shakespeare” it is still the case that great writers through the ages have that something special that goes beyond formulaic writing.

Mind you computers are already world beating go and chess players so with enough ‘data’ and machine learning who can say.

What I can’t really foresee without real AI though is inspiration. Inspiration and imagination is very human and I can’t see that boiling down to a set of equations.

I will probably be proven wrong however sadly. I think the main thing is I don’t see it stifling human creativity though from a writing perspective.

To your point:-

1) no

2) no

3) yes, but what EB said.

Brutal One

 

[AlinaX]

Story structure is well understood, but I find it interesting how explicit sex quickly disrupts conventional stories - it doesn't advance plot, and a different head-space is needed. On the other hand, a reader wanting explicit sex will often find story to be a burden. Erotic stories, which combine both, walk a narrow line. The explicit sex needs to be the story.

 

[ElectricBlue]

1. No.
2. No.
3. Yes. Erotica has to give time for arousal. Otherwise you're just mowing the lawn with a two-stroke.

The formula to writing good erotica, I think, is not to use a formula. I pride myself on the number of comments I get along the lines of, "Wow, your writing is a long way away from the norm around here." So my formula, I guess, is not to write like everyone else.

 

[KeithD]

The formula to writing good erotica, I think, is not to use a formula.

Bingo.

 

[Jada59]

Bingo.

Agree.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Fucken' Keith-fucking KeithD. The only reason I entertain this GD site, and put up with his political myopia...

He happens to be right on many OTHER occasions as far as writing stories goes.

 

[sirhugs]

1...

The formula to writing good erotica, I think, is not to use a formula. I...

perzactly

 

[nikisixx]

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[TxRad]

Formulas, we don't need no sticking formulas.

As I was told by a very good writer here on Lit way back when, the first thing you need is a good hooker. Not the prostitute type but something to draw the reader in. Then you have to have a good story to hold them. From scores and comments over the years, a slow buildup works well as long as you make it worth while at the end.

Writing is showing the reader the people and events that you want them to see. Emotions are good as long as you keep them consistent. Everyone has them so make your reader relate. Conversation is another thing. Make it natural; and real. Ot as real as your characters need it to be.

Be a story teller. The arcs will follow.

 

[lovecraft68]

I'll echo others with saying there shouldn't be as formula or pattern to follow for your stories, just write your story

But I'll go further and say that there are things each category's readership looks for and if you give them that you'll do well...on the other hand there is a varied readership here and each category has factions and sub-kinks within the kink and...no formula will appeal to everyone.

Best to write what you want and let the readership for it find you

 

[SimonDoom]

I'd say, No, there is no general formula that applies to all stories and all authors, but that, Yes, if you studied most authors' stories carefully you would find that their stories tended to follow certain patterns.

I don't know if "formula" is the right word for it, but I'd say that when I write I am definitely writing with certain elements and principles in mind.

First, when I write an erotic story, it has to be a story, and the story has to be erotic.

So, for example, a story about a happily married couple waking up one pleasant morning and having sex isn't much of a story, even though it might be arousing if the sex was described well. I almost certainly would not write a story like that. There must be some need or conflict or movement or growth that makes it a story.

The story has to be, at its essence, erotic. I don't write stories with sex. I write stories about sex, or, at least, eroticism. So I wouldn't write a story about a bank robbery that happened to have sex. But I might write a story about an attempt to rob a sex toy store at night but the burglars get carried away playing with the toys at the store.

Second, I like to write stories with a fairly tight erotic focus. I usually make that focus pretty clear early on. It usually is connected with a need or a conflict a character has.

So, for example, Mary is a young and upstanding teacher at a religious school. She has a sterling reputation as a good member of the church and community. But she's also a closet exhibitionist with a burning desire to get nude in public. Her erotic desire presents a conflict, and whatever adventures befall her in my story will resolve that conflict. In my stories I usually resolve conflicts happily, because I find that more erotic than tragedy. So in my story Mary probably would end up, after some adventures, as a happy nudist, as opposed to being locked away in a jail someplace.

I don't think there's any particular story arc that an erotic story should follow other than that -- the story can take all kinds of twists and turns along the way. But for me, the basic elements of character-need-conflict-resolution-growth-movement, centered around some erotic desire or situation, are what make a good erotic story.

 

[SimonDoom]

As such, the question posed was in this context. Not saying that people didn't understand. I am sure most did, however, I also don't think it is a banal point. Just as with emotional patterns, I am merely suggesting that there may be relevant "erotic arcs" that are in parallel
and coincident with the "emotional arcs" observed non-erotic fiction.

The question is then not to use a formula, but it is simply asking... even if I want to be creative, original, different, (or whatever), are there known, identifiable elements that make the erotica "better"? That was my point. Nothing more.

Yes and no, I think.

Yes, I think erotic stories tend to follow certain basic patterns. My erotic stories tend to be either "man in a hole" stories, i.e., a character is presented with a sexual predicament or challenge, or romance stories, where two characters meet, face a challenge, and come together in the process of facing the challenge.

BTB stories, which I don't write, tend to follow clear patterns. They're revenge stories, i.e., fall and rise stories. Man is cheated on and hurt (fall), then he gets his revenge on cheating wife and triumphs (rise).

But I'm not sure how helpful knowing these patterns is for writing the story. It's more of an interesting thing to observe after the fact.

 

[NotWise]

For context, I am thinking of some recent work on "emotional arcs". In such work, successful stories in non-erotic genres are shown to follow similar emotional arcs. See for example works such as this preprint that describes a formula for "emotional arcs" as derived from a machine learning algorithm that analyzed a large collection of fiction text:
"The emotional arcs of stories are dominated by six basic shapes"; https://arxiv.org/abs/1606.07772 (this is a really cool article!!, even if you just look at the images/figures).

To the best of my knowledge, Kurt Vonnegut originated the idea that stories could be classified into a small number of emotional arcs. You can see part of his talk, including his discussion of story arcs here.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Hmmm... erotica is just like any other story. It has to have a beginning, a middle, and an end. With some sex tossed in there someplace. Where and what kind of sex is up to you, the author. Also the description of that sex is also up to you. You can have sweet romantic sex using euphemisms or you can have hard driving sex using all the raunchy words in the book(whose book is up to you too).

But it still must tell a story.

 

[ElectricBlue]

For example, many successful fictional stories (such as Harry Potter) are shown to have similar "emotional patters", that occur at a more or less similar temporal point
in the story (we often talk about Acts 1-2-3, or hooks, or other devices). In other contexts, as I mentioned, others have used a different language to describe this (i.e., the "15 beats" of Snyder, Aristotle's "Poetics", or the actions of the story from Propp's 19th-century Russian fairy tail [3]).

The point is that if one takes the major works of Western literature and compares them to current best-sellers, then one finds such patterns. This then is more than mere curiosity or anecdotal. It might suggest the expectations we have as readers for what constitutes good story-telling. I should add that it is also consistent with what past great literary scholars and thinkers have deduced, however just more algorithmic.

That's highly constructivist, though, as if authors consciously and actively determine the pacing and construction of a story. Some do, most certainly, and when I read their work, I've often spotted a distinct shift between spontaneity and the bits they've done to death. Too much polish might make it shine, but it doesn't always get you a jewel.

If somebody found a pattern in my work, it would be there subconsciously - I start, keep going, and stop, without a thought in the world for construction of any sort. My best content is always when I'm on a stream of consciousness roll - that's the lyrical stuff that flows. Trying to break it down into a schema would be interesting, but someone else would have to do it.

 

[nikisixx]

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[HeyAll]

In my opinion, contrast and taboo make an erotic story hot.

 

[KeithD]

I think we generally do fall into set formulas when we compose, but if I intentionally did so or relied on AI or even committee assist, I would lose interest in doing it at all.

 

[yowser]

An interesting question

I wonder if there aren't some interesting computational studies done in other creative media (music is the one I am thinking of) that might be suggestive.

It seems to me (speaking as a listener, and untrained in musical production of any sort) that there are some background musical theory 'givens': certain note intervals provide pleasing feelings, any music effort has to start somewhere and move to an ending, preferably satisfying. There are predictable (depending on the genre) rhythm changes, controlled variation in volume, and while lots of repetition (also common in erotica) enough variation to provide tension and interest.

I am unfamiliar with this sort of analysis, and like erotica with all its 'categories' a lot of music enjoyment will vary from a cultural standpoint, but there may be some interesting parallels.

But tension, progression, riffs that appeal but are not repetitive, in music and erotica, all seem fair game for study. And most erotica does seem to end with a crescendo.

 

[nikisixx]

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[nikisixx]

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[legerdemer]

Interesting discussin

I was waiting to see AI analysis of writing, and thanks for the link. I’ll definitely read it.

I see your point. In some cases (perhaps not what you had in mind) some authors (myself, for example, when I was still writing here) might look at very popular stories/authors and, comparing to their own less popular work, wonder whether certain underlying elements tip a story into emotionally connecting with readers at an instinctual level (gah, sounds like a lot of $2 words). I confess to wondering about that — not assuming there is a formula per se, but something.

Some authors have a finger on the pulse of readers (wherever that pulse may be beating). Others, less so. In the former category, a few may be doing it consciously, but I’d venture most aren’t. They thrum to the prevailing beat.

Like Zeb’s av is doing to the music I’m playing, which really makes me wonder. LOL

OK. I understand what you are saying. And maybe it is done unconsciously. Given this case, I would only admire and give sincere congratulation!!

Perhaps there are those in this camp that have pure innate genius with a second sense for the ebbs and flows of keeping readers captivated emotionally (and I would argue, sexually). Then, what can I say?? For all of you, I SALUTE YOU!! -- Really -- I mean it, without being facetious. For other mere mortals (such as myself), the question was simply a question of how to learn/capture a mere percentage of this "intuition" by learning and studying other great works....that is all.

I don't subscribe to the style of some present-day artist's way of teaching. The common mantra that "anything you paint is art". ·"Just paint!" or "Just write!" No, no and no! ....For everything that is sacred, ... For fucks sake, let's just stop this nonsense!. Anything you paint (or write, or whatever!) without some amount of formal training (or some amount of thinking and HARD WORK) is normally utter GARBAGE, pure and simple!!. There is nothing helpful, nor didactic in such vacuous epistemology.

I believe that anything....and I MEAN anything - can be taught and subsequently learned.

To TEACH something is to UNDERSTAND the dynamics. A grandmaster knows such dynamics. She (or he) knows the subtle elements that make it art. Anything else is a cop-out.... don't doubt it. A truly great painter can tell you why particular lighting or color makes a difference. A truly master pianist can tell you why the subtle touch or attack of the key makes a difference in a particular work. A true master writer can describe the craft of character in great detail.

I would be cautious - very cautious indeed - of those that subscribe to the idea that you are either born with it or not. Or worse, that there is no known path towards such knowledge. At the very least, I would question their motives for such an argument.

So, my thread - quite frankly- is about that. Nothing more. It is an observation that story-telling ...in it's highest and most successful form has patterns. It is unquestionable and has been described and debated since Aristotle (even though some would like to ascribe this to their favorite pundits and/or modern authors). Now with big data, NLP, and machine learning, we have a way of simply "narrowing the domain of parameters" to quantify some of these concepts.


Also as a final note ....with respect to "patterns" (of which there has been such a visceral objection here), I would only add that if my stories have as much success as those of J.K. Rowling, I wouldn't care if people criticize me as a "constructivist".

Food for intellectual thought for those with a minimally open-mind.....nothing more.

 

[karaline]

I kind of do have a formula, its not conscious, but all my stories basically follow the same arc. Man and woman meet, they can't stand each other/can't get it on because there is some obstacle in the way (when not explicit, like in my non-con/reluctance stuff, its usually a class or cultural obstacle). They over come said obstacle, they live happily ever after (except i'm more of a happy for now kind of a girl -much to the chagrin of my readers) so i'm probably looking at the rags to riches, or Cinderella arcs.

I have one exception to this, (sort of an Oedipus) and i still get a comment or email every few months, either complaining about the ending, or asking me when I am going to finish the story.

 

[nikisixx]

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