Opposite gender POV: why?

[cymbidia]

Before i ask my question, please allow me to admit my bias (i think of it as a little quirk) right upfront: i like the gender of the writer to be the same as the main character in the story. This is limited only to erotica, btw; all other genres are exempt. If you're a man, i'd like the story from a man's perspective and spoken through a male character. The reverse is true for women.

Perhaps it's a lack of imagination on my part because i'm *not* a real writer or because, in the case of my stories, it would involve more than just a gender switch, but i cannot conceive of trying to tell my tales from the man's POV. Therefore, (confession time) EVERY time i begin a story written by a man but containing a woman protagonist, i am a bit less inclined toward it from the first word.

May i ask, then, WHY do you write these stories? Do you feel so confident of the opposite gender's feelings/reactions/etc that you know you can do so successfully? Conversely, do you write them because YOU know what others of your gender want to read and so you give it to them?

I'm genuinely curious.

 

[Weird Harold]

May i ask, then, WHY do you write these stories? Do you feel so confident of the opposite gender's feelings/reactions/etc that you know you can do so successfully? Conversely, do you write them because YOU know what others of your gender want to read and so you give it to them?

The only story I've written from a female POV needed to be told from that perspective because of the concept I hade for the story. (see Schoolgirl Blackmail)

One reviewer described the story as a "male fantasy" although it was NOT intended as such.

When a story requires that I get inside the mind of a female character, I usually use third person omniscient POV. However, in the case above, in order to hide the true nature of the "innocent schoolgirl" I had to tell the story from her POV, because that's how she sees herself.

 

[KillerMuffin]

Why? Cause it's a gay male story and there aren't any women in it. Wanna see?

Some authors cannot write well enough to write from the opposite gender's POV. Some authors cannot even write from the POV of someone who isn't like they are. If you read different stories from the same author (not naming names) you will notice the protagonists are all the same. Actually, one prime example of this is Nora Hess. I read all of her books and keep one or two around. It's my "If she can do it, I can certainly do it!" inspiration.

With erotica it's especially difficult. I don't know what a man does or feels when he gets a blow job, other than what I've observed. Smart lit writers will utilize the services of an editor of the sex of the main character's POV to make sure it's correct.

*glances at WH and wonders if he does gay male stories...*

 

[PAUL C]

gender pov

I write from just about every pov. From straight man to lebian woman, gay men included. I also write in the first person and the second person and in the present and past tence, (as one reader helpfully pointed out sometimes in the same sentence).

Sometimes it is what I feel the story requires, sometimes just for the fun of it. I do find it interesting to try to place myself in someone else's shoes.

In my current story I am writing about a couple getting married with each one's perspective on that with the father and grandfather of the man narrating a story of their involvment in the Spanish Civil war as a vivid contrast.

 

[Closet Desire]

variety...creativity...perceptions...

Writing as an omnipotent narrator (most popular fiction) is a real trial as the author must try to breathe life into each of the characters' points of view. I would never kid myself into thinking I can write a woman's point-of-view as well as a woman could do it...but fortunately I have Closet Desirable close at hand to say "that's rubbish...this is what a woman would really think!"

As for writing solely from the opposite gender's point of view, why not? It takes a lot of effort, but can often be very rewarding. Sometimes the knack is to give qualities to the character that you can make believable based on your own limited perceptions. It can work.

There will always be those who say you cannot write about what you don't know, but there will always be others who enjoy a good story no matter what it took to write it.

 

[Ulyssa]

Why opposite POV?

In erotica more than anywhere else there is a feeling of the freedom to experiment. I think our brains just give us permission. After all we've got all that adrenaline and those endorphines kicking around upstairs clouding our judgement.

I invite anyone--but especially you, my dear Cym, to read this and see whether or not I may have succeeded from the male point of view--Lyss.

http://whiteshadow.pornopartners.com/erotic/silvermask.html



[Edited by Ulyssa on 05-16-2001 at 05:26 AM]

 

[Mr_Neb]

An excellent question. I write many of my stories from the woman's POV. I don't think there is an easy answer as tp why. I agree that it can be confusing to the reader which is why I usually include the "A Ms. Neb Story" at the beginning. For readers that don't look to close, it helps with the consistency. For those that do look close, I'm not being deceptive. I have also written stories as "Ojo de Ella" (loosly translated as "from her eye")

Usually, in my stories, I want the emotions and feelings of the main female character to be the most vivid and powerful. I want the reader to feel as if that character is personally connected with him or her in some way. I think the first person is the best way to transfer that kind of power and imagery. I think it draws the reader into the story more as a vicarious particpant as compared to a detached observer in a narrative. Of course, in a narrative, the reader is much more able to identify with the character of their choice.

At least that's one man's opinion.

Mr. Neb

 

[peterpan]

I guess I write selfishly. I don't get anything out of imagining another man's orgasm. In fact it would make me a little queezy. Mine don't call for documenting and I get nothing out of describing them to myself.

I write what turns me on, which is imagining a woman's pleasure.

 

[Sonia_de_Beaumanoir]

it's a self-challenge

In my "Delivery" story, I deliberately gave myself the challenge of writing from the viewpoint of both sexes. There are 4 characters, two men and two women, so I wrote 4 chapters with each being first-person from one of the character's viewpoint.

I got a fair number of votes on the various chapters, and some nice feedback, but no one mentioned if the male character chapters were better or worse than the female's.

So in the sense of pandering to a wider audience, my author page URL is: http://www.literotica.com/stories/memberpage.php?uid=14305

I would welcome any comments.

 

[Mickie]

Cym,

Try it some time. Most of my life has been spent trying to understand the female mind (so I can stand to live with one). I consider it a challange to write from the female pov. I don't think I 'know it all'. I don't have any idea sometimes and constantly seek information from friends, relatives, and my annoyed other half. I also have a daughter, who is not above telling me why I drive her insane, or how she feels when her friends do something right or wrong, or just that she feels sad sometimes for no apparent reason. Everything I've ever been told is filed somewhere in the complex thing I call a brain, and the end result is a pretty good understanding of female thought processes. To tell the truth, it isn't so different from the male thought process, except in the actions it generates.

The more you try to understand the opposite sex, the more you tend to understand your own sex. In a lot of ways it interacts. As for physical feelings and lusts, I ask a LOT of questions. My wife likes it when I ask in the middle of something -- "How do you feel?" She thinks I'm being considerate and sensitive. I call it research. She calls it making love.

Mickie

 

[SpectreT]

I couldn't tell ya. I just had a story that wouldn't stay put in my head for more than a few minutes, so I posted it. Based on thespark.com's gender test, I'm a woman, empirical evidence to the contrary, but I can't even pretend to know what truly motivates a woman. I'm just trying to get a few cocks hard and pussies wet with the stuff that lives in my imagination.

Except for the things i find in there that disturb even me. Them I try to keep far away from everyone.

 

[alexander tzara]

I just fooled the gender test at http://www.thespark.com/gendertest too. LOL

When I was around 16 I decided I wanted to write a novel. I wasn't totally sure what about. Around about the same time I read an article in my Mum's Cosmopolitan about how with Molly Bloom from the novel 'Ulysses', James Joyce had created a truly convincing female character. The last chapter of the book is a stream of consciousness soliloquy where Molly reveals her deepest sexual thoughts and desires. James Joyce managed to write such a convincing woman (certainly for the time: the 1920s) because his girlfriend, Nora Barnacle, was so honest and open with him and he asked her about everything.

I was impressed by this idea that he had created a convincing woman. It seemed like an interesting challenge. The most difficult challenge for any actor is to convincingly look and act like the opposite gender in a play. I reckoned it would be almost as difficult to think like the opposite gender in a story. I wanted to attempt inventing a modern-day Molly Bloom type character, which is eventually where Rachel Picabia came from. Miss Babylon 1995: CH 1, CH 2, CH 3 (posted as Roger Simian)

So, anyway - I started reading lots of books like 'Understanding Women' and kind of got hooked on doing the research. That led me eventually to reading the Hite Report and Nancy Friday's books about women's fantasies, as well as lots of books about feminism etcetera. I still haven't written my novel 16 years on from reading that article but I think I've learned a lot, and it's certainly helped me in my relationships.

When I started trying to write erotica a few years ago I found it much more exciting trying to write from a female perspective. I must've done a fairly convincing job 'cause the female editor of a British erotic magazine published my lesbian story, 'I Dream Of Maria, Down In The Sand', and wrote to me thinking I was a woman (I used the name R. A. Picabia). For a couple of months I even had Literoticans fooled with the Rachel Picabia character on the board (although Deborah says it was obvious I was a dood 'cause I talked too much - LOL).

Anyway - if you've never tried it, you should. Try submitting your story under a fake name and see if people are convinced by it before you come clean. It's an interesting challenge and it can free up untapped parts of your creativity - you can actually find hidden aspects of yourself. I don't know if you've heard of Carl Jung's theory about anima (the female archetype that men have in their subconscious) and animus (the male archetype that women have) but I kind of think of Rachel Picabia as being my anima.

 

[*Lazer*]

So help me God Roger if Felix starts talking about that again I am going to bite your neck..

 

[RisiaSkye]

Why?

I've written a couple of stories that at least temporarily take on a male POV, for several reasons. In "Rainy Saturday Night" it's essential to maintain the mystery of the female lead's motivations. For that reason, it needs to male protagonist.

In other cases, I like the challenge. I enjoy trying to imagine the other side. The female response comes easily. And, I enjoy the writing process more...it's more enjoyable (and even erotic) to imagine the other side, to adopt a voice which is foreign to me, in order to describe what may be a fairly familiar scene. And I think that the "other" gender perspective contributes interesting things. What do guys feel when they get head? I don't know, but it's fun to imagine and attempt the description. And, it makes me think differently about the whole process. Of course, that's just me.

Risia

 

[Amazement]

I write what turns me on, which is imagining a woman's pleasure.

Well said, I'm new at writing erotica, so I may not know what I'm talking about, but instead of trying to write the opposite sex's POV, why not just write from your own and try your damnest to explain what they're feeling? It's an eternal curse that men never fully understand women and vice versa, so why fight it? But if you still feel the urge to try, just remember, the worst that will happen is you'll get it wrong.

 

[KillerMuffin]

Well Amazement, primarily cause there aren't any women protagonists in gay male stories. Why write? Cause I adore the genre, love gay men, and I wanna see if I can do it. Kinda like climbing Mount Everest just because it's there. Some of us are freaks like that.

 

[Amazement]

Kinda like climbing Mount Everest just because it's there. Some of us are freaks like that.

I noticed.

 

[Guest]

It's just writing

Truthfully, I never give the gender of the main character all that much thought anymore. I have a story and I tell it from the protagonist's POV, whatever gender that protagonist may be. The only concession I make is that I have never written a female (erotica) protagonist in first person. It's always 3rd person limited omniscience. I haven't even made that concession consciously. The female-protagonist stories I've written have just seemed more conducive to that particular POV.

I think that my willingness to write from the opposite gender's POV comes from the fact that my primary genre in my mainstream writing is drama. The POV character there is (almost) always the person speaking at the moment. If you can't write both genders there, you're screwed.

I also think that a good deal of my comfort in writing females as POV characters is that the sex is usually only part of the story for me, and I tend to describe it more metaphorically than physically.

Since my pseudonyms "darkness" and "darkness_descending" are often regarded as gender neutral, I tend to get a fair amount of mail from female readers who either assume I am a woman or can't tell whether or not I'm a woman. I have always taken that to be a sign that my female characters are fairly believable (within the context of the story, at least.)

And I have to agree (inversely) with KM. There aren't any male protagonists in lesbian love stories. Besides, I was once told by a drunken lesbian friend that straight men are just "really ugly lesbians." She was kidding--I think--but if she's right, then I should be able to identify with lesbians.

 

[CreamyLady]

Re: It's just writing

Besides, I was once told by a drunken lesbian friend that straight men are just "really ugly lesbians." She was kidding--I think--but if she's right, then I should be able to identify with lesbians.

Why does this make me think of the "political lesbian/physical lesbian" debates from consciousness raising in the 1970's? The consensus at the end of the meetings was that a lesbian was a woman who loved women, politically or physically, and the best of all possible outcomes was both.

It didn't leave much scope for the truly straight among us.

I have difficulty writing from the male POV, and it shows. I always have, and I don't expect it to get any easier. I really don't understand men, how they feel, react, or think.

I'll have more opportunity for research in the future. In the meantime, delving my own gender psyche is adventure enough. It's amazing what one can unearth.

 

[NCmVoyeur]

My first two stories were written from the female's perspective. The first was a roleplay scenario that I'd done already from the male POV, and the idea of writing it from the female perspective was just oh-so-intriguing. The result was my first story--"Atonement." I've had at least one woman claim she thought I was female until reading my bio, so I guess the experiment worked.

Around about the same time I read an article in my Mum's Cosmopolitan about how with Molly Bloom from the novel 'Ulysses', James Joyce had created a truly convincing female character. The last chapter of the book is a stream of consciousness soliloquy where Molly reveals her deepest sexual thoughts and desires.

This is to digress a bit off-topic, but Alexander's comment stirred the question. Is anyone aware of any stories on Literotica (or any other 'erotica' forum for that matter) written using a genuinely stream-of-consciousness technique? I've attempted one ("Six Miles on I-95"), and I'm curious as to how another writer, esp. a female writer, may have utilized the technique.

Has anyone come across one?

 

[alexander tzara]

This is to digress a bit off-topic, but Alexander's comment stirred the question. Is anyone aware of any stories on Literotica (or any other 'erotica' forum for that matter) written using a genuinely stream-of-consciousness technique? I've attempted one ("Six Miles on I-95"), and I'm curious as to how another writer, esp. a female writer, may have utilized the technique.

Has anyone come across one?

I don't remember reading any on Lit but here's a little bit from the Molly Bloom chapter of James Joyce's 'Ulysses'. It's written in an experimental style - the whole chapter is one long sentence, no punctuation - and you have to imagine Molly's Irish accent:


"he was looking at me I had that white blouse on open at the front to encourage him as much as I could without too openly they were just beginning to plump I said I was tired we lay over the firtree cove a wild place I suppose it must be the highest rock in existence the galleries and casemates and those frightful rocks and Saint Michaels cave with the icicles or whatever they call them hanging down and ladders all the mud plotching my boots Im sure thats the way down the monkeys go under the sea to Africa when they die the ships out far like chips that was the Malta boat passing yes the sea and the sky you could do what you liked lie there for ever he caressed them outside they love doing that its the roundness there I was leaning over him with my white ricestraw hat to take the newness out of it the left side of my face the best my blouse open for his last day transparent kind of shirt he had I could see his chest pink he wanted to touch mine with his for a moment but I wouldn't let him he was awfully put out first for fear you never know consumption or leave me with a child embarazada that old servant Ines told me that one drop even if it got into you at all after I tried with the Banana but I was afraid it might break and get lost up in me somewhere yes because they once took something down out of a woman that was up there for years covered with limesalts theyre all mad to get in there where they come out of youd think they could never get far enough up and then theyre done with you in a way till the next time yes because theres a wonderful feeling there all the time so tender how did we finish it off O yes I pulled him off into my handkerchief pretending not to be excited but I opened my legs I wouldn't let him touch me inside my petticoat I had a skirt opening up the side I tortured the life out of him first tickling him I loved rousing that dog in the hotel rrrsssst awokwokawok his eyes shut and a bird flying below us he was shy all the same I liked him like that morning I made him blush a little when I got over him that way when I unbuttoned him and took his out and drew back the skin it had a kind of eye in it theyre all Buttons men down the middle on the wrong side of them Molly darling he called me what was his name Jack Joe Harry Mulvey was it yes I think a lieutenant he was rather fair he had a laughing kind of voice so I went around to the whatyoucallit everything was whatyoucallit moustache had he he said hed come back Lord its just like yesterday to me and if I was married hed do it to me and I promised him yes faithfully....."

 

[NCmVoyeur]

Stream of Consciousness Narratives

Joyce has some wonderful prose (though, admittedly, it can be a challenge to read).

I utilized the style he used in the earlier chapters (the Dedalus/Bloom narratives of "Telemachus" through "Hades") which is more in the nature of thought fragments and mental images. I find the run-on sentence style less appealing.

 

[CreamyLady]

Joyce should be read aloud, as should Dylan Thomas.

 

[p_p_man]

Opposite Sex Stories

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=11802

I wrote "A Story Of An Orgasm" just to see If I could write in a different gender. Although I'm not entirely happy with it I don't think it's a disaster.

I kept it short deliberately. To write anything longer from the viewpoint of the opposite sex would cause too much of a strain on my imagination/knowledge and I would lose it the more I wrote.

 

[aldenbradley]

I do it for two reasons:

1.) The gal who wanted to relate the story told it to me that way. I just dressed it up for her, which led to

2.) A cool challenge to explore the reactions/emotions/excitement/stimulation of the distaff side. I want to write about strong, sexually liberated women who are unashamed and confident; go-for-it women who know what they want and are willing to ask for it.

These aren't Doms, mind you, but forward and engaged women, with bodies AND minds. They're secure in their own identities and relationships, willing to step out of the box and enjoy themselves. They don't have to demean to achieve satisfaction. They are equal partners with their men, and are, therefore, free to make their own choices.

IMHO, the best way to explore the existence and rationale of these kinds of women is to write about them from their POV.

Oh, yeah. And, it's fun.

Alden Bradley