Ravenscroft
Banned
I got dragged into BDSM by a lover. Okay, it's not that I was unwilling, but it's really not my "cup of tea": it's like a mashup of theatre (which I like doing) & sex (which I like doing), so occasionally amusing but nowhere near central to my life.
So I don't really see the supposed connection between Leather & polyamory, aside from the tenuous "sex positive" thread.
Meanwhile, my/our attempts at formulating "responsible nonmonogamy" had a strong parallel to involvement in the science-fiction fan community. Sf/f (a.k.a. "speculative fiction" is THE literature of "what if," of spinning out crazy visions & then making them seem reasonable. As I later said on a couple of panels, the future -- especially the far-flung stuff we read about -- holds nothing but change, & strict monogamy is NOT going to suit all situations, all cultures.
This doesn't work the way you might think. I was a Heinlein fanatic from an early age & have literally read ALL of his published works, yet as much as SiaSL fascinated me in 1973, the nonmonogamy depicted made absolutely no impression on me. I grew up in a sprawling family that was barely two generations off the farm & in "family" included plenty of folks not related to us by blood OR marriage. It's as if RAH took that & sprinkled in a sexual element... & even in my adolescent glee to find ANYTHING remotely sexual in books, that one got a rousing "eh" from me. (For a clear depiction of nonmonogamy, Friday is a much better example, as well as the Lazarus Long saga.)
When I found this undated blogpost, Five of the Best Science Fiction Stories Featuring Polyamory, I figured I had a pretty good idea what I was in for... but there's a couple of surprises. It's not a long piece, so ought to be read, but I'll put the list here.
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Another blogpost from 2010 -- this one actually at the site of Tor Books -- points up something interesting that I'd not considered. Namel, though there's been a rise of credible homosexual characters in fiction -- & I add on TV & in film -- there has been almost total silence on bisexuality & nonmonogamy. (Queering SF: Where's the Polyamory?, Brit Mandelo)
The post provoked a LOT of comments, so if you trawl through you'll see plenty of other "poly-themed" novels nominated.
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Over the years, I've seen attempts at "poly fiction," including unpublished short stories & novel proposals.
For the most part, it's well-intended suckage. They seem to fall into categories (which overlap somewhat).
So I don't really see the supposed connection between Leather & polyamory, aside from the tenuous "sex positive" thread.
Meanwhile, my/our attempts at formulating "responsible nonmonogamy" had a strong parallel to involvement in the science-fiction fan community. Sf/f (a.k.a. "speculative fiction" is THE literature of "what if," of spinning out crazy visions & then making them seem reasonable. As I later said on a couple of panels, the future -- especially the far-flung stuff we read about -- holds nothing but change, & strict monogamy is NOT going to suit all situations, all cultures.
This doesn't work the way you might think. I was a Heinlein fanatic from an early age & have literally read ALL of his published works, yet as much as SiaSL fascinated me in 1973, the nonmonogamy depicted made absolutely no impression on me. I grew up in a sprawling family that was barely two generations off the farm & in "family" included plenty of folks not related to us by blood OR marriage. It's as if RAH took that & sprinkled in a sexual element... & even in my adolescent glee to find ANYTHING remotely sexual in books, that one got a rousing "eh" from me. (For a clear depiction of nonmonogamy, Friday is a much better example, as well as the Lazarus Long saga.)
When I found this undated blogpost, Five of the Best Science Fiction Stories Featuring Polyamory, I figured I had a pretty good idea what I was in for... but there's a couple of surprises. It's not a long piece, so ought to be read, but I'll put the list here.
- Stranger in a Strange Land
- Woman on the Edge of Time, Marge Piercy
- The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, Becky Chambers
- Dawn, Octavia Butler
- The Fifth Season, N K Jemisin
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Another blogpost from 2010 -- this one actually at the site of Tor Books -- points up something interesting that I'd not considered. Namel, though there's been a rise of credible homosexual characters in fiction -- & I add on TV & in film -- there has been almost total silence on bisexuality & nonmonogamy. (Queering SF: Where's the Polyamory?, Brit Mandelo)
To the previous list, Mandelo would add Palimpsest (Catherynne Valente), the "Anita Blake" books by Laurell Hamilton, & unnamed works by Elizabeth Bear.The original Twitter discussion was about love triangles in YA fiction (love ‘em or hate ‘em?), which spurred me to think about the trope as a whole: why does it have to be combative? So many books use the triangle to push plot but would never consider letting the three characters in question come together. YA is a genre that frequently explores the development and discovery of a lead character’s sexuality; I would expect a bit more relationship variety.
The post provoked a LOT of comments, so if you trawl through you'll see plenty of other "poly-themed" novels nominated.
________________
Over the years, I've seen attempts at "poly fiction," including unpublished short stories & novel proposals.
For the most part, it's well-intended suckage. They seem to fall into categories (which overlap somewhat).
- tittilation -- basic exploitation fiction, meant to make a buck spinning out tales of wild orgies (explicit or implied) with an incidental plot grafted on, like porn films of the 1970s/1980s that actually hired writers & set dressers in order to have some "socially redeeming value" & become more like European erotica, thus avoiding outright censorship.
- cashing in -- intended for hope-starved polyfolk & wannabees who'd leap at anything vaguely resembling their cherished ideals. At one point, Ryam Nearing was hitting up the PEPtalk (later Loving More) subscribers to raise $35,000 (not tax deductible) so that she could take a year off & write "a poly-friendly script" for ST:TNG.
- plot fodder -- take a list of characters, have them screwing each other at random, & have this as a handy deus ex machina to get out of any corners you happen to write yourself into, or at least distract the reader/viewer long enough to launch the next big spectacle. I've only seen a few episodes of Game of Thrones, so I might be wrong but that's kinda what I saw.
- polemic -- if there's an opposite extreme, that would be the well-intentioned pro-poly writers -- often with very little experience with writing OR nonmonogamy -- who intend to Make A Difference In The World. It's usually a romp through a "perfect" world where everyone's free to do whatever with whoever, a massive slice of life with plot elements hung on it at random. They don't see where they're proposing to write propaganda.