Why Bother with Porn?

[dr_mabeuse]

You're good enough to have stuff posted on Lit, which means you have a modicum of talent and ability as a writer. You can write a sentence and a paragraph, do dialogue, know a plot when you trip over one, recognize a story when you see one.

You could be writing mysteries or science fiction or humor, horror or romance or adventure, but instead you're writing porn. How come? Why do you put so much energy and effort into something that will probably never make you any money and that you'll probably be too embarrassed to ever even admit to writing under your real name?

I have my own reasons. I'm curious about yours.

 

[starrkers]

Because it's fun.

 

[cloudy]

You're good enough to have stuff posted on Lit, which means you have a modicum of talent and ability as a writer. You can write a sentence and a paragraph, do dialogue, know a plot when you trip over one, recognize a story when you see one.

You could be writing mysteries or science fiction or humor, horror or romance or adventure, but instead you're writing porn. How come? Why do you put so much energy and effort into something that will probably never make you any money and that you'll probably be too embarrassed to ever even admit to writing under your real name?

I have my own reasons. I'm curious about yours.

You know, Zoot...I've quit writing porn. If I have to write a sex scene, it has turned into the most difficult part to write - I agonize over it for days. I. Just. Don't. Want. To. Write. It.

The rest of the story pours out of me like a floodgate has been opened, but not that.

That's why I haven't posted anything on lit in so long, and the last two I did had zero sex in them.

 

[drksideofthemoon]

Lately my work has had very little erotic content. I'm not interested in being E-Published or going after a mainstream publisher. I write for a hobby...I don't want to make writing work.

 

[rgraham666]

It's a bad substitute for getting laid.

 

[glynndah]

It's a naughty little secret.

 

[Just-Legal]

I do write other stuff. Porn is just something simple (to me) to fall back on.

My distinct lack of a muse (and increase in actual physical sex - woohoo!) has put a slight dampner on my productivity though *g*

 

[Guest]

I have a few reasons, actually.

As glynndah said, it feels naughty. Fun. Flirty. It's a dirty little secret.

I've also explored a few personal fantasies through writing. I was able to tell my husband about some things I wanted to try in an indirect way (he did get the message.)

But I also enjoy knowing, via reader feedback, that others are touched by my words.

And that's a lovely feeling of power.

 

[Darkniciad]

It's just who I am. Even when I write something with no sex in it at all, there are doses of suggestion - usually large doses.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

You're good enough to have stuff posted on Lit, which means you have a modicum of talent and ability as a writer. You can write a sentence and a paragraph, do dialogue, know a plot when you trip over one, recognize a story when you see one.

You could be writing mysteries or science fiction or humor, horror or romance or adventure, but instead you're writing porn. How come? Why do you put so much energy and effort into something that will probably never make you any money and that you'll probably be too embarrassed to ever even admit to writing under your real name?

I have my own reasons. I'm curious about yours.

Actually, Dr. M, I gave up writing porn. What I discovered is STORY. After I do the initial draft, I look at every scene and ask, "Does this really need to be here?"

Most of the sex it turns out isn't needed at all. As time goes on, my stories have less and less sex and more plot, characterizations and thoughtfulness in them. Works for me. And to be honest, my ablilities have improved many time over since I started doing this.

But that's not to say there isn't sex in some of my stories. But only when it is needed and moves the story along toward the ending.

 

[Foxee Browne]

Because it's fun.

ditto!

 

[Nasha]

I ask myself this question a lot. It's perplexing to me because, with rare exception, I don't read it just for the sake of reading it (though I enjoy discussing writing with other writers, and read other people's work to that end).

Initially, what I wrote stemmed directly from my personal sexual fantasies, and I discovered that building an actual story around the scenes and feelings from the fantasies, there were emotional and...other rewards that exceeded the original fantasies. And all of that is largely to do with being able to have sexual and emotional adventures that can't be had in real life (I tend to write pretty far-fetched stuff).

Since starting that first story three or so years ago, though, it's become less and less about the actual fucking (I'm with Cloudy--I dread and procrastinate on the sex scenes these days).

I guess what excites me more, in writing porn, is thinking about this area of human interaction that's so high-stakes, emotionally, psychologically, physically. It's pretty much the nexus of human drama, for dozens of biological and sociological reasons. So, even though I can see my writing having less and less explicit sex, I have a hard time imagining writing stuff that doesn't revolve around aspects of sexuality.

I also have a huge bug up my ass about how sex & sexuality tend to be portrayed in our culture, and kind of get off on spinning things my way.

 

[S-Des]

Partially because it places no restrictions on me. I enjoy being challenged to describe the sex act in a way that doesn't cause people to say, "No fucking way!" yet still make it exciting. My stuff probably wouldn't be considered real porn for the most part (although the sex scenes are very explicit), I don't write stroke pieces. But I like to write what I feel, including the erotic side of me. I don't need to be published...like Darkside, I have enough jobs, this one's for fun.

I also started reading erotic stories on Lit, years ago. I never thought I'd try writing one until I did. It's very cool to have my stories here, next to the ones I enjoyed over the years. I told a musician friend about my writing and he asked me where he could see it. I told him Lit, and he laughed, explaining it was the most popular reading site in his college dorm. If you just want to write for fun, this is a very good place to have good traffic and decent feedback.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

I wonder if Dr. M is leading us down a path that we are not fully aware of. He asked about writing PORN. How many here write porn and how many write erotica. I don't really see them as the same. The difference as I see that in porn there are gratuatous sex scenes that don't serve any purpose other than to get the reader wanking, while erotica the sexual stimulation is one of the elements of the story itself.

 

[S-Des]

I wonder if Dr. M is leading us down a path that we are not fully aware of. He asked about writing PORN. How many here write porn and how many write erotica. I don't really see them as the same. The difference as I see that in porn there are gratuatous sex scenes that don't serve any purpose other than to get the reader wanking, while erotica the sexual stimulation is one of the elements of the story itself.

That's what I was getting at. When Aurora first got published, she let me know about a short story contest that was just about sex. It didn't interest me at all, because that's not what I write. When I write, it's all about the drama (hence the LW stories). The sex makes the drama more intense because getting to see someone's wife (or husband) cheat on the other wratchets up the emotion of the reader (hopefully). I can't say if my stuff is good or not, that's for others to judge, but everything I've written is long on content, short on the sex. But it is explicit enough that it could only be on a porn site. I don't know if I could write the kind of sex scenes you see in a Romance novel. That is hot, without being explicit. That may be beyond my grasp as a writer.

 

[Nasha]

I wonder if Dr. M is leading us down a path that we are not fully aware of. He asked about writing PORN. How many here write porn and how many write erotica. I don't really see them as the same. The difference as I see that in porn there are gratuatous sex scenes that don't serve any purpose other than to get the reader wanking, while erotica the sexual stimulation is one of the elements of the story itself.

The whole porn/erotica dichotomy's a tough one for me. I do think it's useful to have different words for a depiction of sex that's all about the sucking and fucking, where the "story," if one exists, is just an accessory thrown on as an afterthought, versus an actual story with a substantive plot and characters that exceed the dimensions of their bras and genitals.

But for most of what I write, I don't feel like either term is a good fit. I tend to have massively drawn out (if not masterfully constructed) plots and characters, disqualifying me from the porn category as it is often defined, but frequently have extremely graphic and raunchy sex, and more and more getting away from melodramatic romance, making my writing inappropriate for the erotica label, in the way it's often applied.

I expect most people would put my stuff in the erotica category, rather than the porn category, but I tend to call what I write porn, because shying away from the porn label always feels a bit like I'm ashamed that I write about cocks and assholes and cunts (the naughty bits, not the characters).

 

[Seattle Zack]

A good question doc, and one I've also tried not to think about too much. I try to write detective novels, and I struggle and give up halfway through. I write action adventure shit that some editor wants to submit to an anthology, and I cringe. But I get going on a full-blown BDSM scene, and the writing is effortless. Even though it's under a nom de plume. Go figure.

--Zack

 

[slyc_willie]

I wonder if Dr. M is leading us down a path that we are not fully aware of. He asked about writing PORN. How many here write porn and how many write erotica. I don't really see them as the same. The difference as I see that in porn there are gratuatous sex scenes that don't serve any purpose other than to get the reader wanking, while erotica the sexual stimulation is one of the elements of the story itself.

I write both, and I like writing both. I like the idea that some people out there get turned on by my vivid descriptions of sex and are whacking off while sitting at their computer desk.

I also like the idea that people read some of my stories and see the real STORY behind them. I am both a porn writer and an erotica writer.

At the same time, I've been published as a more-or-less science fiction short story author. Eh. I got some money from it, but so what? That's not why I write. I write because people like what they've seen from me. Maybe not everyone, but then, I don't try to please everyone.

"The Rolling Stones didn't write music that everyone liked. They left that to the Bee-Gees." -- Mike Myers, Wayne's World.

If money and critical acclaim was all that I was after, I wouldn't be on Lit. If friendship, appreciation, honest criticism and a sense of being accepted was what I was after, I'd be here.

And what do you know? Here I am.

 

[Xelebes]

My works, at best, are wank. Might as well write something to wank about.

 

[Vermilion]

I only started writing seriously (as in finisighing my stories) last July, so I'm very much at the beginning of honing my skills, srill. What I get from writing porn/erotica (I refuse to get into semantics here) is motication... not for me, but for the prohression of the story. A story need some kind of crisis to work towards in order to keep the readers' interest and for me, currently, that crisis is nearly always sex, because I find it easy. As my writing (hopefully) improves I am tempted to attempt somethong harder, ie- a story w/o sex... I'll let you know how that goes...
x
V

ps- plz ignore typos. Cat is blocking my view of the keyboard and my touch typing is a little unreliable...

 

[An Awful Cad]

Public Servant

It only seems fair: I like to read it, so I try to give something back.

Hopefully I can create through my writing the same sense of shock, awe, lust, horror and illicit thrill that I (occasionally) get from from reading dirty stories.

From my perspective, we can all use more good smut. It's a safe, harmless and only marginally addictive source of cheap thrills. So I consider creating it a public service, really.

Plus I only turn out about 5,000 words a year. It's tough to make any kind of income off of that sort of output.

 

[elsol]

I write stories... someone else labels them porn, erotica, or *gasp* good stories.

Someday, I'll read one of my stories and say "You know, if I took the sex out; this would be a commercial quality product that I would have paid money to read."

Then I'll be done with porn.

 

[Liar]

Because my porn gets read.

My non porn short fiction ideas are gathering dust in a forgotten folder on my hard drive. I you can find me an outlet for them that comes anywhere near the porn story scene in terms of readership and directness, I might give them a go.

 

[Nasha]

I have my own reasons.

Do tell, do tell.

 

[amicus]

Yes, do tell, indeed, as Dr. Sig, insists that the libido is the root of all.


amicus....