Published authors who have influenced your erotica

[AchtungNight]

My top three are:

- Stephen King. He can do long detailed plots very well, and easily weave in comedy and tragedy both. Horror and fantasy too. He also has the honor of being the first writer I've read with sex scenes in his books (I was eight years old when I first read The Stand).

- Eric Lustbader. He was the first author I read with detailed erotic scenes in his novels. The Ninja and its sequels, Black Heart, and Sirens were the first novels that drove me to masturbation. Lustbader also introduced me to the concept of bisexuality in literature. I thank him for that. He's doing the Jason Bourne series these days.

- Garth Ennis. He's a comic writer, author of Preacher, the Punisher, and many other great books. Garth is quite skilled at weaving together sex and story. His readers know well that no perversion is off limits to him, and he's great at violence too. Garth's most recent work is illustrative of his genius. In "Dear Billy" we have a WW2 nurse who was brutally raped and assaulted by Japanese soldiers. They left her to die, but she survived. Now she is working in a hospital on the Pacific front, and a large number of Japanese POWs under her care are winding up dead... Meanwhile she carries on a passionate affair with a British pilot (Billy). Garth displays his character's personalities very well in his original prose.

 

[sr71plt]

Good question. I look forward to the responses.

For me, I'm afraid I can't answer that very well. I hadn't read erotica since high school--when I had a couple of books stashed away the author of which I probably never knew, but some of the scenes of which still stick in my head (and one scene being replayed in my "Blue Roses Tattoo."). But I went a good twenty years not reading erotica (although acting it out). Then I was writing a scene in a mainstream detective novel three years ago and the scene ran off into steamy sex (which is pretty much the first scene in my House on Park novella, an early version of which is posted here)--and then I took off there on my own--just from my own experiences until I got rolling on it.

I do remember reading the Story of O, in high school, though, and that must have had some influence. (And I never did think Robinson Caruso was just about two guys trying to stay alive on a deserted island).

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Hmmmmm....probably none in the realm of erotica.

But general influences are e.e.cummings, Tolstoy, Mark Twain, John Le Carre, Joel Chandler Harris, Bradford Torrey, and Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Ray Bradbury, Richard Brautigan, Rumer Godden, Lord Dunsany, Lord Burton, Elanor Farjeon-- all of them prose poets.

Dorothy Sayers for elegant sentence construction in the service of the tale, Margerie Allingham for her go-for-broke getting the story told, Gore Vidal for the way he puts conversation right into the action. Neal Stphenson for authorial asides, neil graham for chracters in the midst of fantasy, Terry Pratchett for his world-building and his ability to craft brand new archetypes that you've known forever.

Elmore Leonard for... well, everything!

William Burroughs for spookiness and butt sex, Pat Califia for realistic safe sex that melts your brainz and for BDSM 101 that melts your brainz.

Anne Rce-- oh excuse me, Anne Rampling for over-the-top-till-it's-funny fantasy-world sex.

Patrick O'Brian for my wooden ship fetish.

De Sade, Masoch, Regiere for how not to do it.

 

[trysail]

Anne Rice



ETA: Sorry, Stella— I didn't intend to post on top of yours above. 'fraid we were responding simultaneously.

 

[slyc_willie]

I've had a few fantasy writers inspire me occasionally. David Eddings, Orson Scott Card, and Poul Andersen have all had their moments. Robert E. Howard included a lot of sexual references and nuances, of course, though he shied from direct description of sexual acts. The graphic novellas based on his work, however, were positively dripping with sexuality (Belit, for instance -- one hot number, that one).

Dean Koontz included a fair amount of sexuality in some of his older novels (haven't read anything of his since the early nineties, so i can't speak for his more recent stuff). The one that always grabs me -- for several reasons -- is what I consider his best work: Night Chills. Just a few tweaks, and it might be considered eXcessica-level erotic in places.

 

[slyc_willie]

Elmore Leonard for... well, everything!

Definitely.

 

[TE999]

My early influences were pulp authors such as Robert E. Howard, Friz Lieber and H.P. Lovecraft...plus sci-fi greats like Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Robert A. Heinlein, C.L. Moore, Theodore Sturgeon...et. al.

Erotic fiction such as the 'Tropic' series by Henry Miller, 'Fanny Hill', 'The Story of O', 'Flossie', 'Lolita', 'Delta of Venus' 'The Perfumed Garden'...the classics...were enjoyable as well.

An odd mixture I will admit...but exposure to the diverse subjects and writing styles have served me reasonably well in my own literary efforts.

 

[_Lynn_]

All this makes me feel stupid.
My parents didn't allow anything even close to erotic in the books I read.
Christian school until I was a teen . . . married at 17 with a child . . . life . . . I have no idea who most of these authors listed here are.

 

[DeeZire]

Stacy Richter - not only is she on the leading edge of short fiction, with two collections out - one on Scribner - she's also from my town!

 

[TE999]

All this makes me feel stupid.
My parents didn't allow anything even close to erotic in the books I read.
Christian school until I was a teen . . . married at 17 with a child . . . life . . . I have no idea who most of these authors listed here are.

You are doing quite well as an author for someone lacking in influences.

More often than not, writers are born, not made. Some just become aware of their talents at various points in their lives.

 

[slyc_willie]

A somewhat more recent author was a former stripper from New Orleans, going by the pen name of Poppy Z. Brite. Not sure if her name was in anyway sarcastic or ironic, considering she wrote some very dark and erotic (and often morbid) stuff. She had an incredible knack for being verbose in a way that seemed neither grandiose nor amateurish, and she loved to tie in themes of color.

One of her most obvious devices was a theme of rampant bisexuality throughout all of her novels. I found that both arousing and refreshing.

She also wrote one of the few vampire-themed novels I really enjoyed, Lost Souls. Birdland was interesting as well, especially with its tie-in with Janis Joplin and other 60s and earlier folk singers.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

TE999

I read something like that last night...the article author said that 1% of the people who write are 'writers.' It struck me as true.

 

[Scotsman69]

Strange nobody's mentioned DH Lawrence. For folk of my generation, the 'Lady Chatterley' obscenity trial was the opening of a new door into erotica.

 

[Guest]

I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but when I was 13 I stumbled onto my older sister's stash of "The Man from O.R.G.Y." books by "Ted Marx." Heady stroke stuff indeed for a severely repressed adolescent. Plus, they had girls with boobs on the covers! (Remember that this was in the late 60's; I found my dad's stash of Playboys when I was 14. "Oh, so that's what they have down there! ...Weird.")

In retrospect, the writing of the series was atrocious and the plots laughable, so I wouldn't say that they influenced my writing as such, but as the twig is bent...

Otherwise, I think you can find subtle influences from Robert Heinlein and Roger Zelazny in my writing, even though I don't write science fiction. My stories don't have overwhelming amounts of sex; it's more about the characters.

 

[impressive]

I can't say with any certainty that ANY published author influenced my erotica. Unpublished? ABSOLUTELY. They're all here, too, or once were.

 

[christabelll]

Anais Nin, Henry Miller, Robert Heinlein were early Eye openers

Story of O was the earliest written stimulus that I encountered

Jaquelyn Frank has written some of the steamiest and poetic sex I have ever had the pleasure to read in a novel

Laurell K. Hamilton is a master at Erotic Horror (HP Lovecraft and Poe not withstanding)

Favorites if nothing else.


But I can say that my writing reflects greatly the influence of all my favorite authors in that they encourage me to write ---- and try to write well

 

[Stella_Omega]

Strange nobody's mentioned DH Lawrence. For folk of my generation, the 'Lady Chatterley' obscenity trial was the opening of a new door into erotica.

Doesn't seem strange to me at all... I've rarely read an author so lauded for his insight, that was more wooden and withdrawn from his characters. I ought to add him to my list of "how not to do it" authors.

 

[oggbashan]

Rudyard Kipling's short stories; Somerset Maugham; P G Wodehouse; Thorne Smith, particularly his Night Life of the Gods, Turnabout and Rain in the Doorway; Thomas Love Peacock's Headlong Hall; Geoffrey Chaucer; Anais Nin; Jonathan Swift; Daniel Defoe; - that is a very small part of the list of authors that have influenced me.

Og

 

[lesbiaphrodite]

Nin

Miller

Hemingway

Williams, Tennessee

 

[Salvor-Hardon]

Dr. Seuss

Shel Silverstein

C.S. Lewis

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby

And while it sounds facetious they taught me the power of words; that no matter how fantastical, someone likes it; that reality is only mildly related to literature and that women in spandex body suits and boots are always a great read.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Dr. Seuss

Shel Silverstein

C.S. Lewis

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby

And while it sounds facetious they taught me the power of words; that no matter how fantastical, someone likes it; that reality is only mildly related to literature and that women in spandex body suits and boots are always a great read.

Ahhhh what great influences! (And yes, spandex body suits and boots... archetypally hot!)

I've been entirely too influenced by porn, I'm afraid.

Although S. King was an influence, always was a fan, and read him voraciously. Also read Anne Rice, although she wasn't really an influence per se.

I was also influenced, I'm sure, by romance novels, which my mother bought and kept in under the bed boxes (no pun intended?) all over the house. I read about lots manhoods and velvet sheaths... until I found my dad's porn collection. Then I just sort of... melded the two...