Bitchin' Blog Posts
Talking About the R Word
by Candy | by Candy | September 14, 2005 | Wednesday at 5:34 pm | 248 CommentsYeah, that’s right. Rape. I can’t believe this blog has existed so long without us taking a long, hard (huh huh, long and hard) look at the presence of rape in romance.
First of all, I’d like to state
three things up front:
1. Rapist heroes are a big part of the reason why I disliked romance novels as long as I did. Heroes were rewarded for being assholes of the first order, and oftentimes their behavior to the heroine was completely indistinguishable from a villain’s, except romance novel villains tend to be jaw-droppingly ugly. From bad teeth to ugly noses to hunched backs, romance novel villains are dead easy to spot, which is in keeping with many fairy tale tropes that equate outer with inner beauty—but that’s an entirely different topic.
2. I still think romances with rapist heroes have a place in the genre. They’re not romantic to me, but legions of women found them romantic, and legions of women still do.
3. Rapist heroes are not nearly as common as they used to be. Between 1972 and about 1988, you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting a rapist hero in the face. Starting in about the mid-80s, though, the tides started turning, and by the mid-90s, rapist heroes were mostly a thing of the past, although forced seductions still popped their heads up here and there. (There are readers who maintain there’s no difference between forced seduction and rape, of course.) Despite the recent dearth of rapes in romance, some romances with rapist heroes are still considered classics of the genre, and seem to be experiencing healthy sales. For example, Whitney, My Love and The Flame and the Flower have been continuously in print since their first release (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, though) and are generally reviewed positively by genre romance critics.
Why is rape, one of the most profound and traumatic violations anyone can experience, so prevalent for the first several years in romance novels? And why was it presented as something heroes were allowed to do and get away with, oftentimes without so much as an apology?
Assorted explanations have been floated around. One of them deals with sexual mores. The Flame and the Flower, which kick-started the historical romance genre as we know it, was published in 1972, which in terms of sexual mores had more in common with 1952 than 1992. Several people have suggested that the fictional rape scenario allowed the heroines to enjoy sexual pleasure while still maintaining their moral purity. Nice girls don’t seek sexual pleasure. But if the sexual pleasure was forced on them…well, that’s a different matter, isn’t it?
There’s a kernel of truth in that, but I think there’s more to it.
There’s the fact that domination fantasies in general, and rape fantasies in particular, can be very potent, and these books seem to tap into something primal for a lot of women. Check out this post, for example. But keep in mind that not all women are as conflicted about their domination fantasies as this woman appears to be, and not all women with domination fantasies came from repressive or abusive households. The seeds of turn-ons, kinks and fetishes are oftentimes buried deeply, and the roots can be tangled.
So, OK, so this explanation could be classified as an instance of “This turns them on for whatever reason. More power to them. Fantasize away, just make sure to play safe.”
I still think there’s more to it than that. In my opinion, there are at least three other powerful fantasies at work here other than those of domination:
The first is the fantasy of taming the brutal man. On one hand, EWWWWW HE RAPED HER, how can she want him if she’s even close to being sane?
Darlings, this is fiction. In the fiction, the impossible happens. The classic heroic rapist, unlike a real-life rapist, is tamed by the love of a good woman, and is ecstatic at the very idea of spending forever with the heroine in happily-wedded bliss by the end of the book. He’s completely reformed, and even if most of the classic heroes don’t grovel, their asshole behavior is at least held in abeyance for the last five pages of the book as they explain in tiresome detail to the heroines what was really going through their minds at assorted points in the book and the exact moment they fell in love with them.
(By the way, it’s really important, the Exact Moment. If you don’t get to hear about it from the horse’s mouth, then you get to watch the Dawning of the Realization of Lurve. It’s one of those ridiculous romance novel things that you go along with.)
The temporary cessation of cockheaded behavior holds the promise of future behavior that, while not completely bereft of shitmonkey moments, is at least a reasonable approximation of what a decent human being should act like.
The heroic rapist also rapes for reasons entirely different from the usual real-life rapist, which brings me to the second fantasy: The heroine represents the ideal of the irresistible woman. Many of the rapist heroes in romance novels do what they do because they simply can’t help themselves, I mean, look, the heroine is sooooo beautiful and radiant and desirable and WHOOPS, impaled her unwilling body on his chubby pickle once again. Poor hero. His mind was addled by her blazing beauty.
OK, you can see that I’m less than enamored with this particular fantasy. Frankly, it’s far too similar to the “but she was asking for it, she was wearing a short skirt!” defense for my comfort. But regardless, I can see how this fantasy can hold powerful appeal. This woman, her love sauce is something powerful. Men want her, and women want to be her—that is, unless she’s the sexually-liberated former mistress of the hero, in which case it’s a good bet that she’ll give Courtney Love a run for the money in the “insane, homicidal crack whore” department.
In keeping with the irresistible woman fantasy, the rapist hero is often an obsessed hero. He can’t function with his formerly delicious mistress. No whore can do. He can slake his lust on one, and only one model of female pulchritude. And the most embarrassing thing is, she often makes him spooge prematurely, even though all she does is move her body with shy, clumsy inexperience in a dance as old as time. If she runs away, he will hunt her down to the ends of the earth. He becomes insanely and irrationally jealous when other men pay attention to her.
OK, I’ve just described just about every romance novel hero in existence. What makes the rapist hero different is how the very fact that she makes him lose control, he, a man who has bedded women without count, makes him lose control even more. He desires her, and hates her for desiring her, and he punishes her accordingly. By the end of the book, though, he has submitted to the fact that he doesn’t just want her, he needs her, the way Ozzy Osborne needs Vicodin and red wine.
The more unkind critic would note that his dick has made judgment, and his dick apparently knows better than any other organ of his when he’s found his soulmate.
The less unkind critic would point out that many women secretly want to drive a handsome man crazy for love of their irresistible little selves, even though such behavior in real life would probably result in panicked calls to the police and restraining orders.
The heroine being mistreated also taps into our martyr fantasies. You know: “Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I’m going to the garden to eat wormmmmms.” Self-pity feels good, y’all, and so is the knowledge that HA HA THEY’LL BE SO SORRY WHEN THEY FIND OUT HOW WRONGFULLY MISTREATED I’VE BEEN. The heroine is misunderstood and treated unjustly, sometimes to brutal extremes, but we, the readers, know that she’s pure and angelic and all that is wonderful about womanhood. She martyrs herself and either refuses to defend herself because dammit, her innocence and inherent goodness is evident to all, or she cocks up the explanation so badly that she creates another big old mess, which is good for at least another 150 pages of conflict in the book.
(That sort of heroine, more often than not, makes me want to hit somebody. Preferably the heroine. Or the hero. Or tie the both of them, dump ‘em in a sack and drown them like unwanted kittens—except I’d never drown kittens, but I feel no such restraint with annoying heroines.)
What gets to me is when the heroine is martyred over and over and over again, mistreated and abused by the hero, but there’s no pay-off. No grovel, no apology, no nothing. For many people, though, the hero finally sorting out the assorted misunderstandings is reward enough, even if he doesn’t fall down on his knees, sobbing out apologies incoherently while offering to castrate himself. At least he now realizes how totally awesome the heroine is and how many worms she’s had to eat: long slim slimy ones, short fat fuzzy ones, and yes, even the dreaded ooey gooey ooey ones.
And moving away from fantasy-land, there’s the fact that many women hold on to relatively rigid views of what should constitute ideal male and female behavior. I’ve read lamentations on assorted romance reading boards about how heroines nowadays are far too mannish, and how heroes are impotent weaklings. These readers invariably long for old-fashioned romances, when the men were men. This attitude was summed up by a reader on some board somewhere who pointed out that there’s no point to the rapist hero apologizing or groveling for his behavior—doing so would make him a pussy.
To be honest, this worldview is so different from mine that it irks me, because I think it takes a real pair of balls to look over bad behavior unflinchingly, apologize sincerely and hold fast to the resolution to not repeat the mistake. The assumption that the ability to apologize for mistakes = pussywhipped drives me nuts, as do assorted stereotypical views of what’s gender-appropriate. But I can definitely see how someone who takes the opposite view would eat rapist heroes up with a spoon.
Hey, want to know something scary? Despite how long this article already is (1,589 words and counting!), I’ve only covered rapist heroes. I haven’t even begun to dissect the implications of other types of rape in romance novels. As Robin said in an e-mail to me:
(…) [W]hat does it mean when the heroine is vulnerable to rape by someone other than the hero? What about a book like Brenda Joyce’s The Conqueror, where the hero (if he must be called that) marries the heroine off to another man and then comes and rapes her on her wedding night, after having sent the groom away? Or what about rapes that are really meant to be angry expressions of power, like what Geoffrey did to Anne in To Love and To Cherish (or even what Sebastien did to Rachel in [To Have and to Hold], although I think it was more complicated there). Like I said, I have NEVER seen so much rape as there is in Romance.
Yup. Damn straight. For a genre that’s supposedly escapist fiction by women for women—how often have you heard the refrain “If I wanted realism/blood/death/unhappiness, I’ll turn on the news, not read a romance novel”?—rape is writ large on the genre’s landscape.
What does that say about the books, and about us? Hell if I know. Feel free to hash it out in the comments.
Filed: Ranty McRant
Candy said on 09.16.05 at 10:48 PM • [link]
The holy trinity. Haaa. Replace Ivory with Loretta Chase, and you’d have MY holy trinity right there. Wait, I need to squeeze Jennifer Crusie in there somehow.
Curses. Holy Quaternary doesn’t have quite the same ring.
And you’ve just named two of my favorite romance novels of all time, LFL. Woohoo.
Only With Your Love and why the forced seduction works for me:
1. There’s guilt, but there’s also desire, and the sense of violation Celia feels is not quite as intense as other romance heroines feel after. Interesting point re: subliminal recognition of the twin, by the way.
2. They’ve both just gone through a pretty traumatic fight, which can sometimes lead to people humping someone they might not have.
3. Justin’s motivation for seducing her, which seemed to be a sort of twisted competition with his brother, was pretty convincing for me. Yeah, it’s fucked up, but I love this book because it’s so fucked up.
4. Justin pretty much treats Celia like a queen once he makes peace with how he feels about his brother and realizes he loves her. Kleypas does a wonderful job of showing how very essential Celia is to Justin.
I love Uncommon Vows for a few big reasons:
1. Adrian is obsessed, and he knows his obsession is unhealthy—in other words, his behavior is at odd with his morals, which makes his behavior change convincing.
2. Meriel resists, and resists consistently and convincingly. I liked that about her; she doesn’t swoon into her captor’s arms at the first punishing kiss or any of that nonsense.
3. The reason why Adrian changes his behavior is huge and very believable. Also, mucho excellent grovelling.
Robin said on 09.16.05 at 10:49 PM • [link]
“She then proceeds to weave a hilarious fantasy that she is terrified slave girl and the hero her ruthless owner. Of course, the hero has no idea he’s supposed to be being ruthless. Classic stuff.”
These are the moments in SEP that suck me in. Then there are the ones like that scene in IHTBY that spit me back out, bruised and angry. I seem to keep coming back for more, though.
“Second of all, I’m thinking Dreyer is overstating the influence of romance novels (and perhaps fiction in general) on our psyche. Her example of Tarantino movie clips in Sesame Street is telling. Sesame Street is a CHILDREN’S program. There’s a protective attitude that we take towards children’s entertainment that we shouldn’t (in my opinion) exert on entertainment meant for adults.”
Exactly. Especially since it’s women writing these books for other women. If, for example, men were exclusively writing Romance novels and all the women in these books were being raped by the heroes, and only women were reading them, I’d be more likely to look at the relationship between book and reader. And what about all the other forms of media that are using various tropes and themes and devices? I absolutely believe that certain values are transmitted and perpetuated almost unconsciously along and across cultural currents, but I don’t buy into the one-to-one book-to-reader equation of influence.
Do I wish Romance authors would be more AWARE of the tropes they use and what purpose they serve in their books? Hell, yes, but mostly because I think it makes the genre less likely to be dismissed as trash or porn and because I like well-crafted and thoughtful books, even if I’m uncomfortable with the subject matter. But at it’s very worst, IMO, Romance just participates in a much larger cultural regurgitation of some atittudes and tropes and themes that make up our social discourse on gender and sexuality, from academic treatises, to literary and popular fiction, to films, to dating shows, to playground talk during recess.
I don’t think that lets us off the hook from talking about it, but it should definitely make us think twice about blaming Romance for domestic violence or other degredations of women.
Victoria Dahl said on 09.16.05 at 11:08 PM • [link]
Off topic:
Robin, I haven’t read IHTBY. I just discovered SEP at the Reno conference and I’m having a great time so far. The characters are so different.
The helpless slave girl thing was just so unexpected and so fucking funny! My dh did a valiant job of ignoring my hysterics. He knows that if he meets my eye or acknowledges my laughter that I will read him the “funny” parts. He is a smart man, even if his sense of humor isn’t as well developed as mine. (More discriminating, he says. Ha! He doesn’t even laugh at the lonely hearts ads!)
Speaking of. . . Is it Friday???
Kerry said on 09.16.05 at 11:32 PM • [link]
Wow - I’m almost embarrassed to post after all these amazing comments! I just wanted to answer Candy’s question to the best of my ability. I read a lot of Louis L’Amour westerns and Robert Ludlum novels around the same time I read my copy of The Flame and The Flower into the ground. None of them featured rape fantasies. I think the Conan series got pretty close (or all the way) IIRC, but I’m not convinced those were intended for a strictly male audience.
To the extent that the by-and-for men novels I read (the “male romances”, as Elaine Viets called them on The Lipstick Chronicles) had sex, they were of the “he’s the best lover in the universe” type, often with the “able to awaken the ice maiden’s hot core of passion” thrown in.
But don’t ask me to quote anything.
Vis-a-vis The Flame and The Flower—I believe I’m remembering correctly that Brandon (wasn’t that his name?) was not only not repentant about the initial rape, he was perfectly willing to resort to marital rape to regain his conjugal privileges. Am I getting that right?
LFL said on 09.16.05 at 11:58 PM • [link]
OT post:
“You might want to try Ain’t She Sweet, if you haven’t read it.”
Is that the one with the heroine who was a terror in high school? The one recently discussed on AAR (before Match Me If You Can)?
Yes.
I have that on my list. I loved Fancy Pants, and have been looking for another book like that one. It’s weird, too, because I’m sure I read SEP say that she considered FP a more traditional Romance than her later ones, but I think it’s entirely the other way around.
I liked Fancy Pants very much also. It’s probably my second favorite SEP after Ain’t She Sweet, of the ones I’ve read. I haven’t read It Had to be You or Breathing Room.
Re. Sandra Brown,
“Not everything of hers works for me, but she’s written some books that I really enjoyed.”
Which ones, LFL. This is the only one I’ve attempted, and it was recommended to me b/c of the rape stuff.
I have a lot of fondness for Mirror Image and Best Kept Secrets, both romantic suspense books.
Mirror Image is one where the heroine survives a plane crash and is injured beyond recognition. She is mistaken by everyone for the hero’s wife (who sat next to her on the plane and died in the crash), and can’t speak and correct the assumption. Plastic surgeons reconstruct the dead wife’s face on her. Before she recovers her ability to speak, someone comes to her at ICU and tries to conspire with her to kill the hero, who is running for the senate. Therefore she doesn’t dare reveal who she really is even when she can speak again. The hero and his wife (who was quite a villainess) were estranged, but the heroine falls in love with him and gradually wins his trust again, even though he thinks she is the wife. She also comes to love the hero’s little girl, and becomes a mother to her. Of course, eventually her true identity comes out.
In Best Kept Secrets the heroine, an attorney with the DA’s office whose mother was murdered in her late teens, goes back to the town where her mother died to reopen her mother’s murder case. She’s convinced that the man who went to prison did not commit the crime. The town is filled with people who hated her mother and a few who loved her. The heroine gets to know the two men who, as boys, hung out with her mother and were in love with her. Both of them become romantically interested in the heroine as well. One of them is the hero, who was treated as a sort of “bad seed” by the whole town but grew up to be the sheriff. He does not like the reopening of the murder case, however. There’s an 18-year age difference between the hero and heroine, but even though that kind of thing often bothers me, it didn’t in this book.
What I like about both these books is the psychological complexity of the heroine’s situation. In both books she is essentially recast in the role of a dead woman, becoming personally involved with those who knew her and putting together the pieces of the puzzle in that process. One thing that is problematic for me in Brown’s books is that the villains and some of the side characters don’t have as much depth as I would like, but the main characters in these books really held my attention. There’s no rape in these books, BTW.
Re. Seize the Fire, I am not convinced that Sheridan could only recover through shattering the trust of someone as naïve as Olympia. I do think that with a different heroine it would be a completely different book, though.
In order to find any happiness, she had to be able to reach Sheridan and to understand him, and unfortunately, I don’t think there was another way for that to happen than through her traumatic loss of innocence.
Do you feel that she finds happiness at the end, though? She seemed so broken to me. I’m sure that Sheridan’s being there for her at the end and opening up did help her to heal, but I also felt that she would need years of therapy to become a happy person.
I think that Seize the Fire is a very brave book in that it’s really willing to take a long, hard look at the dark side of the human condition. One of my favorite lines in the book comes at the end, when Sheridan tells Olympia that he loves her regardless of her role in the revolution. Olympia says that she doesn’t deserve it, and Sheridan says, “Oh Jesus… If we all only got what we deserved… Pray God to spare me that.” I think it takes special courage to say something like that in a romance, and not in the middle but in the end. To show that a character has that dark a world view, and that it could be valid. I just admire Laura Kinsale so much for that (and for her writing in genral). My hat is truly off to her for writing Seize the Fire, even though it’s not a book I can reread all the way through.
EvilAuntiePeril said on 09.17.05 at 12:02 AM • [link]
This has reminded me of a passage in a book (by a very well-know writer, but my brain’s like a sieve and I don’t want to offend by getting the name wrong) where the heroine, who writes romance, comments that in the 80s an author couldn’t get a romance published without it having a rape scene, or something to that effect. I’d be really interested to hear anyone’s perspective on this.
As for the vampire/werewolf issue, LFL, that raises some interesting points. I think that it’s telling that most frequently a paranormal hero either helps the heroine achieve power with his bite/blood, or confers it on her with same. But then she frequently ends up as powerful as him. And the converse does also happen. There’s a lot more going on with the paranormal trend, I think, but most of my ideas on it are pretty vague and floaty.
“I think the genre of Romance is served in the worst way by the MINDLESS REPETITION of plot devices, stereotypes, unexamined assumptions about sexuality and gender, and indiscriminate images of violence.” Thank you, thank you, Robin. You’ve summed up how I feel perfectly.
...and finally, on the suckling thing. I remember that SB book, and still wonder how I managed to even make it through to that particular scene. It scarred me for life, it’s so eeeewwwwww… and I don’t care how many classical/mythological precedents there are for this particular device.
LFL said on 09.17.05 at 12:37 AM • [link]
And you’ve just named two of my favorite romance novels of all time, LFL. Woohoo.
Oh cool!
Only With Your Love and why the forced seduction works for me:
1. There’s guilt, but there’s also desire, and the sense of violation Celia feels is not quite as intense as other romance heroines feel after. Interesting point re: subliminal recognition of the twin, by the way.
Good point.
2. They’ve both just gone through a pretty traumatic fight, which can sometimes lead to people humping someone they might not have.
Another good point; I hadn’t thought of that. I think the trauma of her husband’s death is also part of it. It’s strange, probably even twisted, but when it comes to fiction, I can often buy more into a forced seduction if the heroine is in need of comfort, because sex can provide that.
3. Justin’s motivation for seducing her, which seemed to be a sort of twisted competition with his brother, was pretty convincing for me. Yeah, it’s fucked up, but I love this book because it’s so fucked up.
Yes! I loved this aspect of the story too – Justiin’s relationship with his brother and the way Celia was caught up in the middle of that. I agree it’s f**ked up, and that that’s part of the appeal of the book. Which brings me back again to the fact that dysfunctional relationships can make for compelling reading material.
4. Justin pretty much treats Celia like a queen once he makes peace with how he feels about his brother and realizes he loves her.
That’s true too. Apropos of nothing, one of the scenes that stand out in my mind in this book is the one where Celia sees Justin without his beard for the first time. Even though by then she knows he and Philippe are twins, it’s still a shock to her to see it.
It’s interesting that Only With Your Love is out of print. I wonder if Kleypas prefers it that way, or if it’s just coincidental.
I love Uncommon Vows for a few big reasons:
1. Adrian is obsessed, and he knows his obsession is unhealthy—in other words, his behavior is at odd with his morals, which makes his behavior change convincing.
I think so too. In this way he reminds me of Sebastian in Gaffney’s To Have and to Hold. though the two of them are very different in other ways. I also liked how Putney introduced Adrian’s character in the beginning of the book. He was in a monastery preparing to take vows when the death of his family forced him to take on the role of earl instead. It was from that that he had a very strong moral compass.
2. Meriel resists, and resists consistently and convincingly. I liked that about her; she doesn’t swoon into her captor’s arms at the first punishing kiss or any of that nonsense.
Me too. I remember reading this book at around age twenty and being thrilled by the strenght of Meriel’s resolve.
3. The reason why Adrian changes his behavior is huge and very believable. Also, mucho excellent grovelling.
Agree with that too. Adrian spent half the book trying to atone for his sins. I really love this book too. Before I discovered Kinsale and Gaffney, Uncommon Vows was my favorite romance for a few years there.
Stef said on 09.17.05 at 04:58 AM • [link]
“I’m with you on this most of the way stef2, and certainly wouldn’t want to denigrate many of my favorite writers as well. So apologies if I offended you or anyone else.”
No need for any apology, Auntie. I didn’t think you were saying anything negative. Just making an observation, which is all anyone here has done. Frankly, I think you’re succinct and on point.
Not as good as Robin - but who is? Ha!
Fair said on 09.17.05 at 11:02 AM • [link]
WHY do heroes behaving badly have to rape?
There are SO many old movies with “bad boy” heroes who are confident, strong, cocky, arrogant, etc. etc. and yet not exceptionally violent or cruel or brooding. Modern romance writers sometimes seem to take the lazy way out by equating “manly” with angry.
it’s just as historically accurate for a hero to NOT rape, as it is for a hero to rape.
I would go even further and say it’s MORE historically accurate for a hero not to rape. There may(?) have been more rapes in the past because it was easier in some circumstances to get away with it, but surely it wasn’t seen as heroic behavior at a time when pregnancy could very well mean a woman’s death.
(And, well, a group of Vikings raping and pillaging their way through a town might be historically accurate, but a Viking who decides not to join in, who remembers his sisters at home and decides to save a girl instead of raping her, is equally plausible in context of a romance novel, and a lot more heroic.)
LFL said on 09.17.05 at 05:10 PM • [link]
This has reminded me of a passage in a book (by a very well-know writer, but my brain’s like a sieve and I don’t want to offend by getting the name wrong) where the heroine, who writes romance, comments that in the 80s an author couldn’t get a romance published without it having a rape scene, or something to that effect. I’d be really interested to hear anyone’s perspective on this.
I read something similar in an interview with Jude Deveraux. She said something to the effect that when she began writing romances, editors insisted that the hero rape the heroine in her books. I think she wrote one or two books where that happened, but then she put her foot down and said that she wouldn’t do that anymore. She was something of a pioneer in that as early as 1981 she was writing historical romances with sex scenes in them that did not contain rape.
I just found this comment buried in an Amazon review of The Black Lyon (a Deveraux book I haven’t read, but one that does contain rape): “Do remember that this was Jude’s second book, and her first historical. It’s my understanding that an editor basically required changes in the book that Jude didn’t want to make (the rape/abuse, for example; note that after this book, Jude changed publishers).”
As for the vampire/werewolf issue, LFL, that raises some interesting points. I think that it’s telling that most frequently a paranormal hero either helps the heroine achieve power with his bite/blood, or confers it on her with same. But then she frequently ends up as powerful as him. And the converse does also happen. There’s a lot more going on with the paranormal trend, I think, but most of my ideas on it are pretty vague and floaty.
I am really looking forward to Susan Squires’ upcoming regency era vampire book, The Hunger, which is a prequel to The Companion, partly because in this one the heroine is a centuries-old vampire and the hero is the mortal. Also, based on the heroine’s appearance in The Companion she seems to be a confident and maybe even jaded character. It will be interesting to see what Squires (a talented author IMO) makes of this role reversal.
Robin said on 09.17.05 at 06:41 PM • [link]
“Re. Seize the Fire, I am not convinced that Sheridan could only recover through shattering the trust of someone as naïve as Olympia. I do think that with a different heroine it would be a completely different book, though.
Do you feel that she finds happiness at the end, though? She seemed so broken to me. I’m sure that Sheridan’s being there for her at the end and opening up did help her to heal, but I also felt that she would need years of therapy to become a happy person.”
I agree that Kinsale could have taken Sheridan’s story in another direction with another heroine, but I think in the context of this particular book—which is one of my top 3 Kinsales—that a big part of what makes this book so powerful is Olympia’s crushing loss of innocence. Is there a part of the tremendous pain she suffered that seems senseless? Of course, in the same way that the terrible life Sheridan had seems senseless. That’s what makes it so painful to read and so tragic for us. But given the world of the book, a world constructed with wars and revolutions and political intrigues, with capricious fathers and their jealous and amibitious mistresses (the entire world outside their island, which could support them emotionally but not physically for very long), the fact that Sheridan and Olympia have a chance at making sense of their own lives amidst that mess, of ultimately charting a different course for themselves, I feel that at least the senseless horror and violence doesn’t triumph.
So despite her appearance of being “broken” at the end, I think she has such a foundation of stability, and of friendship and love from Fish, that I think she’ll ultimately be able to re-connect to that part of herself. That’s the part that was able to bring Sheridan’s more tender feelings out of hiding, so it’s really quite powerful, IMO. Sheridan, on the other hand, who had the rug pulled out from under him SO early, seems to have found a strength in his need to comfort Olympia that I believe will continue to grow after the book ends. I definitely see their happiness as a ways off, but I see them as having much more of a shot at happiness once Sheridan could feel he actually had something to give to Olympia and she had lost her heroic illusions and gained true knowledge and understanding of who he was. I wonder if he would ever have felt worthy of her if she had come to him at the end, if her breakdown had not triggered his, and if she didn’t truy know what he had suffered. It’s terribly sad, IMO, that she finally learns the lessons of human depravity that Sheridan tries so hard to teach her, but the fact that she does seems to be the only thing that wakes Sheridan up finally.
Oh, and thanks for the Brown recs, LFL—I’ll give them a shot. Right now I’m trying to finish Lisa Valdez’ Passion, which I started quite a while ago but put down once school started.
Amy E said on 09.17.05 at 07:45 PM • [link]
Update, for the love of God, update! I’m going into serious SmartBitch withdrawals here!
Robin said on 09.17.05 at 09:23 PM • [link]
Before you do update, I just wanted to say thanks again to Sarah and Candy for giving such free reign to those of us who have wanted to talk so actively about this topic. This was seriously one of the best on-line experiences I have ever had, in part because it reminded me of all the reasons I went to grad school and all the best things about having intellectual discussions and sharing diverse, even divergent opinions. And FWIW, I think there’s enough here in everyone’s comments for a couple of books, for articles and essays, for conference papers, and for many incredible conversations about some of the most contentious issues in Romance. In other words, it was, by far, the most sophisticated and articulate conversation I’ve ever seen, online or off, about this topic. I know I learned a lot from it and thought a lot about some things in a different way. So thanks, to Candy and Sarah and everyone else who gave me such good stuff to think about.
Sharon Cullars said on 09.17.05 at 10:03 PM • [link]
A question: Has anyone read White Palace? Although I’ve not read the book, I have seen the movie starring Susan Sarandon and James Spader. Anyway, there is a particular scene that always irks me to the point I have to turn the channel then I turn back, it makes me just that uncomfortable. It’s the scene where Susan’s character forces herself on a drunk, grieving WASP played by Spader. The way she forcibly holds him down while she gives him the blow job, and the fact he is drunk is unsettling…esp. if you were to reverse the gender roles. Eventually, he gives in to the “forced seduction”. But how would that not have been rape if he had fought her through the entire act?
Monica recently blogged about a man who was raped at gunpoint by four women and someone commented how she thought that a man had to be aroused for the act to be completed and therefore his arousal ratified the initial rape. But someone pointed out there as they did here, that a body may have an unconscious reaction that in no way indicates the forced party’s willingness.
My question after this long spiel is did the book indicate this forced seduction in White Palace or was that a dramatic interpretation on the part of screenwriter/director?
LFL said on 09.17.05 at 10:17 PM • [link]
Yes, it was a wonderful discussion, thoughtful and articulate. Thank you for that, and for the warm welcome. I’m really glad I delurked, and grateful to everyone who participated for giving me so much food for thought, and to Candy and Sarah especially, for providing this great environment.
Faux Jay said on 09.17.05 at 11:03 PM • [link]
Sharon, I read Glenn Savan’s WHITE PALACE a while ago, but although I remember quite a bit about this book, I don’t remember that scene. I haven’t seen the film but the way you described the scene fits the style of this book.
WP was a very depressing read, IIRC. In fact I’d go as far to say Hubert Selby’s LAST EXIT TO BROOKLYN is a lot more cheerful. Or is it the other way round? Either way, both left me feeling like a duck without its beak.
Sharon Cullars said on 09.17.05 at 11:13 PM • [link]
Thanks Faux Jay. Well, if the scene was added to the screenplay for effect, it got the wrong one from me b/c this last time I remoted from the scene and didn’t come back to the movie at all. Especially given the discussion here, b/c any “forced seduction” scene, no matter the gender pairing leaves me feeling like you said, “like a duck without its beak.”
Candy said on 09.17.05 at 11:13 PM • [link]
I was chatting with a regular SBTB reader last night and re-reading these comments, when I saw this question by Lilith that I’m not sure was ever addressed:
A question just occurred to me as I was typing this rather windy comment: if we “demonize†the rape fantasy and call it bad, is that a demonization of an aspect of feminine sexuality?
The reader brought up the very same question last night, and said this conversation has (unintentionally) denigrated a large chunk of readers who read and love books with rapist heroes by denigrating these heroes.
At first, I wanted to say “But I’m NOT trying to demonize the rape fantasy. I just want to analyze it.” Then I realized that because I don’t like it, and because a lot of our commenters don’t like it, these fantasies have been presented in an overwhelmingly negative light.
The reader furthermore pointed out that by calling it a rape fantasy and the heroes rapist heroes/heroic rapists, that we’re already polarizing the argument, by associating the fantasy with something so overwhelmingly negative.
This was an interesting point, and one I hadn’t even thought about. She has a point. Rapist heroes in romance novels and what they do bear about as much of a resemblance to real-life sexual assault as the shenanigans in a Tom and Jerry cartoon do to real-life violence, and a lot of us made that clear during out comments, but during the conversation, we talked a lot about real-life rape, too.
The reader pointed out that a lot of people who enjoy books with rapist heroes don’t even think of what they do as rape. And she’s right. Just check out the review by Creekergirl on Amazon.com for Karen Robards’ Island Flame. In fact, read the positive reviews. Some of them call what the hero does to the heroine rape, but many of them don’t, using words like “hard,” “rough” and “brutal” instead—words that have negative connotations, but not as knee-jerk negative as “rape.”
I know many of you are probably suffering from rape discussion fatigue, but anyone have any further thoughts on this?
I just want to make it really clear that although I don’t enjoy the rape fantasy (I don’t know what else to call it, dammit) and think that some of the reasons used to justify its inclusion in romance novels are fallacious, if not downright silly, I don’t think that rape fantasies are eeeeville. If it turns someone on, then hey, it turns her on. More power to her.
Robin said on 09.17.05 at 11:44 PM • [link]
“The reader brought up the very same question last night, and said this conversation has (unintentionally) denigrated a large chunk of readers who read and love books with rapist heroes by denigrating these heroes.
At first, I wanted to say “But I’m NOT trying to demonize the rape fantasy. I just want to analyze it.†Then I realized that because I don’t like it, and because a lot of our commenters don’t like it, these fantasies have been presented in an overwhelmingly negative light.
The reader furthermore pointed out that by calling it a rape fantasy and the heroes rapist heroes/heroic rapists, that we’re already polarizing the argument, by associating the fantasy with something so overwhelmingly negative.”
Okay, I’ll warn you that I’m a little sensitive to this topic, because I’ve been told on other forums, very forcefully, that any desire to analytically approach the rape fantasy—and even people like Nancy Friday who are writing in completely accepting and positive terms about this call it a rape fantasy—is a means to denigrate women who enjoy the fantasy. I wish this person had expressed this point more emphatically on the board, because I would love to understand this point better. Especially since I think there’s a big difference from the rape fantasy as a sexual fantasy and the myriad of ways rape is portrayed in Romance.
Now, I personally disagree with the proposition that this dicussion has cast the rape fantasy in a negative light. I, for example, don’t enjoy it, but I do see it as aimed at female empowerment. Many other commentators have commented on the differences between violent rape and rape fantasies, and many have expressed the fact that they either aren’t bothered by these scenes or that they do enjoy them. I think this forum would have been very open to more people expressing why they appreciate the fantasy and what it offers them as a reader.
One of the things I was immediately struck by in this discussion was the way in which people DIDN’T seem to be demonizing Romance rape/FS or the rape fantasy—it’s the first discussion about this topic I’ve seen or participated in that didn’t degenerate into a screaming match between people who felt rape in Romance was destroying women and those who felt it was perfectly healthy and anyone who didn’t was hung up somehow.
One thing I do think, though, is that there is still a lot of shame associated with the rape fantasy, and those who do enjoy it might feel somewhat guilty or at least unresolves about that. And so they might be as sensitive to others talking about it “analytically” as I am about people telling me that’s a slap against the fantasy. If someone feels strongly that this discussion denigrated those who embrace the rape fantasy, I think those points should be introduced into the discussion, and, as a I said, I think this forum is quite friendly to that point of view. BECAUSE the sheer weight of anxiety attached to the fantasy (even the anxiety over calling it a rape fantasy) means, IMO, that we need to freakin’ talk about it more, to liberate women to accept their sexuality, to make it okay for women to express their sexuality in both the dominant and submissive positions. And because the silence that surrounds this topic doesn’t seem to be resolving it or making it easier to discuss in mixed company.
I know it’s tough to keep all the different versions of rape in Romance straight—rape fantasy as it’s portrayed in Romance, rape fantasy as it’s experienced by the reader and catalyzed by a Romance, forced seduction, violent rape against the heroine by others, punitive rape against the heroine by the hero, other forms of violence against anyone and everyone—and that slippage I’m sure has occured. I know I am not always as careful as I’d like to be in elucidating all the subtle differences I grasp in my head. So perhaps we all need to be more careful about that and try to keep all those different manifestations of the device better distinguished. But as someone who’s really, really fascinated by the device, and who wants to see it as something women are trying to reclaim, I didn’t see an overwhelmingly negative tone here. So like I said, I wish those who did would have made that more expressly known here.
LFL said on 09.18.05 at 04:49 AM • [link]
I have Glenn Savan’s White Palace and have even kept it. Nora’s forced seduction of Max is in the book. It happens pretty early on. Nora and Max run into each other at a bar, having met briefly before at the White Palace where she worked was there complaining about not getting his full order. They get drunk together at the bar and Nora gets Max to drive her home because she’s too drunk, even though he’s afraid she’ll try to make a move on him.
But Max himself is drunk, and when he gets to Nora’s house he realizes he should at least have some coffee before he gets on the road again. Nora says she’s got some, so he goes into her house. Once there, she admits she got him there under false pretenses. Max can’t drive and he doesn’t have the money to call a cab, and Nora says he can sleep on her sofa. He says he’ll accept on one condition—“No hanky panky,” to which Nora agrees.
After he falls asleep Max has a weird dream at the end of which his dead, beloved wife goes down on him. There follows a scene break and then these scene (quoted under fair use):
“He opened his eyes and there was Marilyn Monore.
No—it was only a poster of Marilyn Monroe, lasciviously smirking in a matador’s hat. The sensations of his dream raged on; he was being swallowed, sucked, milked, and then he raised his head and the iridescent black hair fanning across his belly, and the upraised, fleshy, coppery ass rising and ducking behind it, and he understood, without knowing if he was grateful or outraged or what, that Nora was in the process of raping him.”
That’s the end of chapter 3. The scene continues at the beginning of chapter 4. I won’t quote the full description, but here’s the paragraph I find most salient, and interesting, for the purposes of this discussion:
“Had Nora been any less forceful or unhesitating in her assault, Max might have recovered the presence of mind to defend himself. But by the time he struggled out of his dream and saw clearly what was happening, Nora was already so far along in her work, and he himself was already so aroused, that the call to resist sounded as far-off, tinny, and ridiculous as the voice of a soapbox madman on a street corner three blocks away. Resist on what principle? For what purpose? To whose benefit? Yet somewhere he had a grievance. Then he remembered that this was an attack, a violation of his person and a breach of promise, not to mention a display of extraordinary chutzpah—and then Nora, as if to counter these objections, bore on him still further, pushing, pushing, pushing, until something came unlocked at the back of her throat with a definite tactile click, and she swallowed, along with the whole length of his prick, the last of his defenses.
Max’s head hit the pillow. Oh, whatever else this woman was, she had a talent when it came to this.”
I remember being disturbed when I read this scene, because it was clear from earlier scenes that Max was not attracted to Nora before this happened. If he had been, I might have found the scene erotic, but as it was, I didn’t. I liked the book though, and FWIW, didn’t think it was depressing. It was discomfiting in places, though.
LFL said on 09.18.05 at 05:43 AM • [link]
I agree that Kinsale could have taken Sheridan’s story in another direction with another heroine, but I think in the context of this particular book—which is one of my top 3 Kinsales—that a big part of what makes this book so powerful is Olympia’s crushing loss of innocence.
I agree completely on that point, it’s that shattering of her innocence that gives the book its power. Seize the Fire is in the top 5 Kinsales for me, BTW. I would put TSATS, FMLH, TDH and FFTS, all almost flawless books IMO which I’ve read dozens of times, ahead of it, but that’s still very high praise.
Is there a part of the tremendous pain she suffered that seems senseless? Of course, in the same way that the terrible life Sheridan had seems senseless. That’s what makes it so painful to read and so tragic for us.
I got all these same things out of the book too. I’m just saying that that powerful, moving horror and loss, that very same tragedy, makes it harder for me to see a true happy ending to this tale.
But given the world of the book… the fact that Sheridan and Olympia have a chance at making sense of their own lives amidst that mess, of ultimately charting a different course for themselves, I feel that at least the senseless horror and violence doesn’t triumph.
I’ll agree that the horror and violence don’t triumph, but neither do I feel that something else triumphs over them. For me, the book ends in a draw. Sheridan is on the path to healing, but Olympia is almost completely destroyed. His ability to open up to her and to get her to respond is a miracle, and so the book does end on a hopeful note (the reason I love to reread the ending and have read those last few pages so many times) but a hopeful note does not a happy ending make. I’m not complaining, because I think that Seize the Fire would be a far, far lesser book if Kinsale had given us an epilogue with babies and a white picket fence. I think the book has exactly the ending it should have. I just think a wrenching tale that’s at least as much about how tragic and senseless our world can be at times as it is about the power of love.
So despite her appearance of being “broken†at the end, I think she has such a foundation of stability, and of friendship and love from Fish, that I think she’ll ultimately be able to re-connect to that part of herself.
Here’s where I disagree with you. I didn’t see Olympia as all that strong. She was always making up stories about herself being a heroine to her people, borderline delusions really. I saw them very much as her defense mechanism against a harsh reality that she could not fully cope with. She had to make up stories to protect herself from a feeling of being unloved, unwanted and unworthy. The thing she wanted more than anything was to be a heroine, and in the end, her actions led (however unintentionally) to the deaths of many people. I think it would take a very, very strong person to cope with that reality, which would be crippling to a lot of people. And indeed, at the end there Olympia seemed pretty much in shellshock to me, and only came out of it because Sheridan needed her so badly.
That’s the part that was able to bring Sheridan’s more tender feelings out of hiding, so it’s really quite powerful, IMO.
I felt that it was Olympia’s defenselessness and vulnerability that brought out Sheridan’s tender feelings. I didn’t feel that she was stronger or healthier than Sheridan; if anything, I felt that he was the stronger of the two, as he was at least able to see reality and accept it.
Sheridan, on the other hand, who had the rug pulled out from under him SO early, seems to have found a strength in his need to comfort Olympia that I believe will continue to grow after the book ends.
Completely agree here.
I definitely see their happiness as a ways off, but I see them as having much more of a shot at happiness once Sheridan could feel he actually had something to give to Olympia and she had lost her heroic illusions and gained true knowledge and understanding of who he was. I wonder if he would ever have felt worthy of her if she had come to him at the end, if her breakdown had not triggered his, and if she didn’t truy know what he had suffered. It’s terribly sad, IMO, that she finally learns the lessons of human depravity that Sheridan tries so hard to teach her, but the fact that she does seems to be the only thing that wakes Sheridan up finally.
Yes, I too think that all this was necessary to Sheridan’s healing. I don’t disagree that Sheridan began to heal, and I don’t blame him for the worst of what happened to Olympia, either. It truly is a great book, and so brave. I can’t think of a romance genre book that takes a more unflinching look at the human condition.
LFL said on 09.18.05 at 06:05 AM • [link]
Candy, I do enjoy the forced seductions / rape fantasies / whatever we want to call them in romance novels. I think it is just very, very hard not to feel defensive if you enjoy these fantasies, because lets face it, these fantasies are not politically correct. I am ambivalent about them myself. I don’t think we choose our turn ons, though. I think it’s very hard to be a woman in this society at this time in history and not feel somewhat embarrassed or defensive to admit that you enjoy these fantasies, and not worry that you will be judged for saying it.
I have also participated in discussions that did make me feel that I was being judged by some of the participants for saying that I can enjoy forced seductions. Indeed, at one time, I was likened to a KKK member for defending Gaffney’s To Have and to Hold. However, for what it’s worth, this discussion has the distinction of being one of the rare discussions that didn’t make me feel that way.
And now I really stop posting so much!
Vera Nazarian said on 09.18.05 at 11:51 AM • [link]
Coming late to this one—what a great post!
Just like you, Candy, I was very annoyed/saddened/disgusted/pissed off by all the unrepentant rape going on in the 70’s era romances—about the time I started reading them. I was infuriated by the heroines literally lying down and not only taking it but liking it. And I stopped reading romance for a long time.
When I came back to it, in the late 90’s, I was pleasantly surprised to see heroines so much more in control, so much more in my own mindset. Nowadays I think romance rules. And the baby (who the hell was she?) has come a long way indeed.
Vera Nazarian said on 09.18.05 at 12:09 PM • [link]
In addition, what some of the above comments mentioned is that to each his own, and yes, the rape/BDSM/forced/dominance act can be a turn on. Sure, I agree. However, what turned me off those early 70’s romances I read was that nearly ALL of them portrayed the hero/heroine dynamic that way. All were rape scenarios, and I got fed up. They were not a turn on but an “annoyance off.” They spoiled my mood because they did not “sing in my key.”
Sure I want some interesting dominance play in my sex reading, but I also want the tables turned. I want women being dominant and agressive, and the men being forced. I want men groveling. I want both partners taking turns. And I want balance. And I want all the flavors and nuances inbetween.
Vera Nazarian said on 09.18.05 at 12:49 PM • [link]
Candy said:
On the other, other hand, I feel like the pleasure is often used punitively, and the smugness of the hero afterwards, like “Ha! I knew better than you what you wanted, little girl†bugs me too. Because in those old romances, I feel as if the hero and heroine were in competition, and the one who was right more often was the winner, and the heroine LOST EVERY TIME. Bugged the hell out of me because I’m so goddamn competitive, and I mostly identified with the heroine. But this probably reveals more about me than about the rape device.
Oh mah gawd, YES! This is exactly how I saw it too, and this competition aspect is so right on! The woman always seemed to be “shown the error of her ways” by the hero, and his smugness was the worst part of it.
Victoria Dahl said on 09.18.05 at 07:36 PM • [link]
>>The woman always seemed to be “shown the error of her ways†by the hero, and his smugness was the worst part of it. <<
Frankly, I still see this happening a lot these days in less brutal circumstances. Very paternalistic and one reason I don’t like most of the ultra-alpha male characters. Yes, the hero also sees the “error of his ways” later in these books. . . most of the time. But smugness is not sexy to me and I don’t fall in love with these guys.
I believe it was Tori Amos who said, “So you can me come, that doesn’t make you Je-ee-sus.” Sing it, Sistah! A great come back to a forced seduction! Hee.
Victoria Dahl said on 09.18.05 at 07:39 PM • [link]
Or, even better, “So you can MAKE me come, that doesn’t make you Je-ee-sus.”
Sorry.
Robin said on 09.18.05 at 08:15 PM • [link]
“I didn’t see Olympia as all that strong. She was always making up stories about herself being a heroine to her people, borderline delusions really. I saw them very much as her defense mechanism against a harsh reality that she could not fully cope with. She had to make up stories to protect herself from a feeling of being unloved, unwanted and unworthy. The thing she wanted more than anything was to be a heroine, and in the end, her actions led (however unintentionally) to the deaths of many people.”
Oh, I agree that Olympia is delusional, and that her naivete is frightening. But I don’t see her as weak. That passage in the book where Fish is taking her to meet Sheridan, and she’s musing about all the things Fish has taught her to do, where she understands that the cold and beautiful Julia was her “governess, but Fish was her family,” indicates to me that she didn’t feel completely unloved or unworthy. I’ll absolutely agree that Julia did a number on her, one that it takes Sheridan a long, long time to undo, but I think her life with Fish has given her a sense of place and stability that she will ultimately reconnect to, albeit in a different way.
I saw Olympia as an example of what happens when the naive passions of youth met the idealistic passions of revolutionary political rhetoric, and perhaps that speaks to a certain weakness of mind or a tremendous ignorance of the world and the depth of evil possible from people, but on the island I think Olympia really discovered how strong she was, not only physically, but emotionally, as well. When, for example, she retrieves the knife, and Sheridan hugs and hugs her, I saw that moment as really pivotal in their relationship—she does something she never thought she could, and he sees her in a new way that seems to make them partners for the first time. She’s even the one who stands up and refuses her marriage, confounding Sheridan’s plans to rescue her and play the hero himself. I wonder sometimes if he had been able to “save” her if they could have lived HEA. I don’t think so, though, because the hero he thinks he needs to be is not the man she neds him to be, and IMO that would continue to be a problem for them.
As for Sheridan’s strength v. Olympia’s, I still see her as emotionally more stable than he. As for stronger, I don’t know. He has more coping skills, and more understanding of the world and therefore fewer opportunities to be disappointed in people. And he’s had to be strong in some ways to survive, but he always seems to be hanging on by a thread until he finally has to reach out to Olympia and know that he has something to offer her.
As for what attracts him to her, I think it’s more than Olympia’s vulnerability that draws him in. I think in a strange way it’s partly the fact that she has the ability to believe in ideals, as misguided as she may be in that. What an appeal and an insult that must have been to a former boy who thought he was going to Vienna to study music and ended up on a ship in the most brutal circumstances. On the one hand he clearly wants to show Olympia that she’s as stupid as he was, but I also think he still mourns the child who had his hopes dashed by a capriciously cruel father. And as many times as Sheridan tries to steal from her, trick her, and otherwise show her what a blackguard he is, she survives and refuses to be completely cowed by him. Had they not had their time on the island, I might feel that’s just a function of Olympia’s isolation from the real world, but I think it’s more than that, and I think there’s a certain resiliency in Olympia that keeps her afloat and keeps Sheridan both attracted to her and trying to sabotage that.
And back to the subject of forced seductions for a second, what do you think of the scene where Olympia is trying to get Sheridan to penetrate her? Obviously she doesn’t have nearly the physical strength he does, but isn’t that a forced seduction, of sorts? I never really thought of it that way until this discussion, and especially your description of White Palace, but it seems to me now that if the genders were switched, that scene would definitely fall under FS.
LFL said on 09.19.05 at 02:37 AM • [link]
Oh, I agree that Olympia is delusional, and that her naivete is frightening. But I don’t see her as weak.
In my opinion, delusions are usually a sign that the person finds it difficult to cope with reality. I feel that Olympia didn’t know how to take charge of the political chess game she was born into, and in which she was a pawn. It’s really interesting to compare STF with FMLH, where you have Melanthe who is also a princess. Someone is always trying to use Melanthe, and like Olympia she isn’t free from that until the end of the book, but unlike Olympia, Melanthe is able to look that reality in the eye without flinching, and to do all she can to plot her escape from it.
To my mind Olympia has a much harder time coping with the fact that she’s so politically valuable that others try to use her. That reality is too dark for her. I feel that she has a desperate need to believe in something better, and that that is why she creates a dream world where she is a heroine to her people. She clings to her illusions even when they endanger herself and others, and that says to me that she needs them very badly.
I’m not saying that Olympia felt completely unloved as a child, but I also don’t think one has to be completely unloved to be less than sturdy when it comes to coping with painful realities. Being loved in childhood is important, but there are plenty of people who are loved in childhood and still don’t deal that well with reality. Just as some people are physically bigger and stronger than others, some are mentally stronger than others.
As for what attracts him to her, I think it’s more than Olympia’s vulnerability that draws him in. I think in a strange way it’s partly the fact that she has the ability to believe in ideals, as misguided as she may be in that.
I agree, that’s part of it too. I think he’s drawn to her ability to believe in something, but I don’t see this ability as such a strength in her, since a good chunk of what she believes in isn’t real.
I think that Olympia’s making up fantasies in which she cast herself as a heroine was also a sign of insecurity and low self esteem. Otherwise, why that particular fantasy? Her romantic feelings for Sheridan, someone who started out so self-centered and hurt her so much, were another sign of low self esteem to me. She wasn’t in a situation like Rachel was with Sebastian, where the only other option was prison. She kept being drawn to Sheridan even when he was just using her in the beginning, and I can’t see that as healthy behavior.
Re. the island, yes, she did become stronger and better able to cope with reality there, and that does show that she has some resiliency. I’m not saying she has none, just that she doesn’t seem to me to have enough to bounce back into true happiness after what happens in Oriens at the end. Also, even the island was a kind of artificial environment in that there are no other people there but Sheridan and herself. The island was the place where they were able to be themselves, but as soon as they got back to the real world, it turned them against each other.
At the end, she tries to recreate the island, a place where she felt loved for herself, and had not been a pawn. The island was a place where heroism and romance were real, came from trying to make life better for each other, together, and not from her imagination trying to hide reality from her. The island was one place where she really faced reality, and had something more meaningful than her dreams, so she tries to recreate it at the end. But to me, even the attempt to recreate it was a kind of attempt to escape reality. Because she wasn’t on that island anymore, she was in England.
Again, I’m not saying she had no strength at all, just that to me, at the end of the book, she was not a poster girl for happiness.
I would also like to reiterate that I think Kinsale wrote exactly the right ending for the book. It would have been a far less powerful story if Olympia had been happier.
And back to the subject of forced seductions for a second, what do you think of the scene where Olympia is trying to get Sheridan to penetrate her? Obviously she doesn’t have nearly the physical strength he does, but isn’t that a forced seduction, of sorts? I never really thought of it that way until this discussion, and especially your description of White Palace, but it seems to me now that if the genders were switched, that scene would definitely fall under FS.
You know, I never thought of it that way, but you are right. There’s definitely a double standard when it comes to these types of scenes.
Robin said on 09.19.05 at 06:59 AM • [link]
“In my opinion, delusions are usually a sign that the person finds it difficult to cope with reality.”
One of the most interesting things to me about STF is the question of what constitutes reality for any of these characters. Sheridan’s reality, for example is profoundly real to him, even if it isn’t shared by anyone else. His time with Olympia on the island is very real for both of them, in part because they have to fight for their physical survival. Political upheaval is very real to the world of Oriens, but not, for example, to Fish Stovall, whose reality is not only a world away but several powers of experience away. So I guess I’m not as inclined to see life on the island, for example, as any less “real” than what happens in Oriens. Although I absolutely agree with you that Olympia doesn’t understand how powerful her political opponents are—I think she does grasp early on what their intention is, though, which is why she seeks Sheridan out. In fact, she’s the one who makes it clear to Sheridan that his life is worthless is he marries her when he comes to propose—he didn’t even seem to think of that, despite his knowledge of human nature’s (and especially Julia’s) dark side.
Actually, I was thinking this morning about how much I think Olympia copes with on her journey to Oriens. When I think of all the stuff she went through, I would have been over the edge (or over the side of the ship, as the case may be) way before the island.
I absolutely agree with you, though, that her happiness with Sheridan will require some real healing for both of them, and that they will both probably be dealing with flashbacks and PTSS for quite a while. I really wish Kinsale had written an epilogue (or a related novel with an appearance by Olympia and Sheridan) letting us know if they ever made it to Vienna. That scene where he’s talking to her about dancing with her in Vienna is one of my most favorite in the book.
LFL said on 09.19.05 at 08:17 AM • [link]
You make a good point about reality, Robin, and yet, we both agree that Olympia is delusional, no? So, even though it’s true that each person’s reality is to some degree subjective, I believe there are also measurements on which most people agree, which we use to determine whether or not, for example, someone is delusional. :-) I see relative mental and emotional health as something that exists on a continuum, a spectrum, if you will. While I wouldn’t characterize Olympia as delusional to the point of insanity, she does have these delusions which prove dangerous to herself and to others, and about which Sheridan tries to warn her more than once.
Therefore I put her somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. Prior to the revolution in Oriens, she’s not mentally ill, but she’s also not mentally strong IMO. Now you put what happened to Oriens on top of that, and I think she’s going to be in some major emotional pain for possibly years to come. I’m not saying she will never recover, just that I think if she does, it will be a very long process and one that would require more than just Sheridan’s love.
We all, I think, to some degree, bring our own life experiences to books when we read, and so, it’s inevitable that we have different impressions of the same characters and books. I’m sure that part of my reason for feeling as I do is that I know that if I blamed myself for the deaths of many people, I would have a hard time coping. Then too, at the end of the book, we see Olympia so withdrawn into herself that she is almost unable to speak, and for me, it signals that she’s in tremendous pain. I have hope that she’ll recover enough to be happy someday, but not complete confidence. But we can agree to disagree on that. Maybe someday I’ll reread the book in its entirety, and change my opinion, I don’t know.
I really wish Kinsale had written an epilogue (or a related novel with an appearance by Olympia and Sheridan) letting us know if they ever made it to Vienna. That scene where he’s talking to her about dancing with her in Vienna is one of my most favorite in the book.
I loved that scene too. But I think an epilogue would have undercut the power of the book, and of its central message. This discussion of ours sent me into the archives of another board where I once had a lengthy discussion of Seize the Fire, and I found this old post of mine, which sums up what I think is so unique and special about this book:
“I found SEIZE THE FIRE to be about idealism and cynicism, and about the nature of the world, is it a good place, or a cruel one? A fairy tale or a horror show? Is it a place that makes sense, orderly, or is it chaotic and filled with senseless violence?
STF seems somewhat existentialist to me, perhaps even concerned with the basic question of whether life is worth living, whether it is worth it to invest emotionally in others.
On some level, many of Kinsale’s books are about this—can another person be trusted? Is it worth it to take a chance on love? But usually, it is clear to the reader that it is and the characters simply don’t know it. Or that, maybe in something like FMLH, you
cannot always have the one you love, but you still are better for loving them, and for putting them ahead of yourself.
In STF, she goes to a darker place, are you even better for believing in someone, or does it just open you to more pain? Are they the hero you want them to be, are you the hero you want to be for them, or are you just as lost and confused as they are, and then, is it better to be lost and confused together, or is that just a source of more heartaches?
I think she does answer the question that, we need to love and trust to survive. But, she also says, you have to trust and love in this very fragile thing, this very flawed person, someone who is not a hero. Someone who may be powerless or may be wounded. You have to see them for that and still love them, not in a fairy tale, but in the real world, a place where your good intentions can have harmful consequences.”
Robin said on 09.19.05 at 08:58 PM • [link]
“I found SEIZE THE FIRE to be about idealism and cynicism, and about the nature of the world, is it a good place, or a cruel one? A fairy tale or a horror show? Is it a place that makes sense, orderly, or is it chaotic and filled with senseless violence?”
Yes! And my answer would be that it’s both.
“I think she does answer the question that, we need to love and trust to survive. But, she also says, you have to trust and love in this very fragile thing, this very flawed person, someone who is not a hero. Someone who may be powerless or may be wounded. You have to see them for that and still love them, not in a fairy tale, but in the real world, a place where your good intentions can have harmful consequences.â€
Good points, LFL. And I think it’s a lesson Sheridan had to learn, as well, especially in terms of accepting himself. I think where you and I diverge in our assessment of the book is in terms of Olympia’s innate strength as a person. Despite the fact that she made a grave error in trying to apply one form of reality (the one she created in her mind while safe in England, reading a lot of political philosophy) to another (Oriens, in the middle of a potentially bloody power shift), I think I see her as fundamentally less shallow or unstable as you do, thus the differences in the way we see her relationship with Sheridan (it was also fascinating to me to see that revolutionary idealism—the kind that creates tremendous bloodshed all over the world—as borne of a certain kind of innocent and idealistic fervor). I don’t want to suggest that Olympia will simply bounce back after a few months or anything; she just surprised me many times during the book with her ability to deal with some pretty scary and potentially deadly situations, from the island, to the sultan, to Sheridan’s betrayals. I think had she the clear-sightedness of a heroine like Melanthe that Sheridan would have found her cold and intimidating, and she would have found him warped and dangerous.
Of course what happened in Oriens was far beyond what Olympia had faced before precisely because she inadvertantly contributed to a number of deaths, as you pointed out. I do, however, think that Sheridan will help her ultimately understand and accept that her comprehension of the full situation in Oriens could only come in hindsight, and that she must accept her dark side with the same ease she accepts Sheridan’s.
Although it’s not exactly a literary reference, there’s a line in David O. Rusell’s film “Flirting with Disaster,” where Tea Leoni’s character says to Ben Stiller’s character something like, “all marriages are vulnerable. If they weren’t being married wouldn’t mean so much.” I guess that’s one of the reasons STF is such a compelling book, because, as you said before, Kinsale really does take an unflinching look at the most extreme circumstances of that vulnerability.
LFL said on 09.20.05 at 01:07 AM • [link]
“I found SEIZE THE FIRE to be about idealism and cynicism, and about the nature of the world, is it a good place, or a cruel one? A fairy tale or a horror show? Is it a place that makes sense, orderly, or is it chaotic and filled with senseless violence?”
Yes! And my answer would be that it’s both.
That would be my answer too. Although I would add that the world of the book, as depicted through the side characters and their actions, was more latter than the former. Absolutely there was also beauty and goodness in that world, but most of the side characters seemed to me to confirm Sheridan’s view of the world more than they did Olympia’s.
“I think she does answer the question that, we need to love and trust to survive. But, she also says, you have to trust and love in this very fragile thing, this very flawed person, someone who is not a hero. Someone who may be powerless or may be wounded. You have to see them for that and still love them, not in a fairy tale, but in the real world, a place where your good intentions can have harmful consequences.”
Good points, LFL. And I think it’s a lesson Sheridan had to learn, as well, especially in terms of accepting himself.
Oh, yes, absolutely.
I think where you and I diverge in our assessment of the book is in terms of Olympia’s innate strength as a person.
Yes, it seems that way.
I think I see her as fundamentally less shallow or unstable as you do, thus the differences in the way we see her relationship with Sheridan
I wouldn’t say that I view Olympia as shallow. To the contrary, I see her as having a lot of depth. Just because a person is somewhat delusional and not a powerhouse in the self-confidence department, doesn’t mean that he or she is shallow. Not at all. I actually saw Olympia’s desire to be heroic as springing from a deep well of motives, which included her fears of not being worthwhile enough as well as her need to contribute to the world and make it a better place. I think there was a need to belong there, too, but that more than that, she was genuinely caring and wanted to help the people of Oriens.
I think that her attraction to Sheridan even when he was hurting her badly was also partly a sign of caring, that in addition to being drawn to his “heroism,” she saw some of his pain and wanted to heal him, and though I see this impulse as a sign of a lack of self-preservation, I can really empathize with all of this.
One of the brilliant things about this book, to me, was that at times I wanted to shake Olympia or even slap her for being so blind, but at the same time, Kinsale made me dread seeing Olympia get hurt, and when she did get hurt, it was wrenching to me. I don’t think I would have had such a strong response to the character if she hadn’t been portrayed with tremendous depth, so that she really came alive to me.
(it was also fascinating to me to see that revolutionary idealism—the kind that creates tremendous bloodshed all over the world—as borne of a certain kind of innocent and idealistic fervor).
I think that’s what revolutionary idealism is like. Even the horrific Fascism of Nazi was IMO born partly out of a fervid desire to make the world a better place.
I don’t want to suggest that Olympia will simply bounce back after a few months or anything
Then maybe we are more in agreement than we think.
she just surprised me many times during the book with her ability to deal with some pretty scary and potentially deadly situations, from the island, to the sultan, to Sheridan’s betrayals.
Yes, but that’s very different than dealing with what happened in Oriens.
I do, however, think that Sheridan will help her ultimately understand and accept that her comprehension of the full situation in Oriens could only come in hindsight, and that she must accept her dark side with the same ease she accepts Sheridan’s.
Yes, I know he will try, and I love that. But I think it’s a lot easier said than done. Most of us don’t accept our own dark sides as easily as we do the dark sides of those we love. We judge ourselves by a different standard, and Olympia had a very high standard for herself—she expected herself to be heroic.
I guess that’s one of the reasons STF is such a compelling book, because, as you said before, Kinsale really does take an unflinching look at the most extreme circumstances of that vulnerability.
It’s a compelling book for that reason and many other reasons. I wish it were a book I could reread without finding it so painful, and yet, if it weren’t so painful, it would not be making its points half so powerfully.
Robin said on 09.20.05 at 06:01 AM • [link]
(it was also fascinating to me to see that revolutionary idealism—the kind that creates tremendous bloodshed all over the world—as borne of a certain kind of innocent and idealistic fervor).
“I think that’s what revolutionary idealism is like. Even the horrific Fascism of Nazi was IMO born partly out of a fervid desire to make the world a better place.”
Oh, I totally agree, but it is, IMO, rarely portrayed that way in Romantic fiction. I loved seeing how the abstract idealism of Rousseau and company shape and influence Olympia’s intellectual and political realities, and how the point of origin for her is so clear. I also thought it was fascinating that Sheridan eventually picked up the banner himself in wanting to be a “hero” in rescuing Olympia, despite his drive to rid her of such notions throughout most of the book. The way even he is not free of such idealism is one of the things that bonds them so profoundly, IMO.
“‘I don’t want to suggest that Olympia will simply bounce back after a few months or anything.’
‘Then maybe we are more in agreement than we think.’”
I think where we differ is in calculating the different proportions of factors influencing Olympia’s actions and therefore her chance at true happiness at the end of the novel. While I don’t think either of us imagine her waltzing with joy anytime in the near future (which would, IMO, defeat everything Kinsale is trying to set up in the book), I might be slightly more optimistic about their chances at closure and ultimate peace.
runswithscissors said on 09.20.05 at 01:51 PM • [link]
I’ve just been reading all the comments on this topic through again, and I’m very struck by how thought-provoking, funny … and sane the post and comments have been. There’s been no name-calling, no hair-pulling - and this despite the fact that many of the posters have very different views on the subject. This is a first for me.
So yay for SBTB and all the smart readers out there. I’m off to play a game I like to call ‘my imaginary PhD’ or what I would study if I had enough time and money. Current thesis title: historical accuracy in romantic fiction or (to quote Candy) WHY do heroes behaving badly have to rape?
LFL said on 09.20.05 at 07:35 PM • [link]
Oops, meant to say “Nazi Germany.”
Oh, I totally agree, but it is, IMO, rarely portrayed that way in Romantic fiction.
Yes, as I said on AAR, I think idealism is usually romanticized or sometimes even glorified in Romantic fiction. The heroine’s naivete cures the hero of his cynicism. I love that here, Sheridan (and the world) cured Olympia of her idealism as much as she cured him of his cynicism.
I also thought it was fascinating that Sheridan eventually picked up the banner himself in wanting to be a “hero†in rescuing Olympia, despite his drive to rid her of such notions throughout most of the book. The way even he is not free of such idealism is one of the things that bonds them so profoundly, IMO.
It was also a sign that he was starting to believe in something again. I think most people have at least a smidgeon of idealism in them, and a sense of justice. I think even Sheridan has a sense of justice, he just doesn’t think there’s much justice in the world. At the end, when he says “If we all only got what we deserved… Pray God to spare me that,” I think he’s saying that justice for humankind would be a terrible thing, and that we should ask for mercy instead.
It’s a very dark world view, another thing you don’t see too often in Romantic fiction, or most other genre fiction, for that matter. I think genre fiction is based on justice prevailing, heroes winning, bad guys getting theirs – everyone getting what they deserved. This book dances away from such easy answers. Yes, Julia dies, an yes, Sheridan begins to heal, but it’s all messier and more painful than in most genre fiction. It comes at a high cost.
And usually, the revelation of the hero’s trauma or suffering would come much earlier in the story, so that we could watch him heal. Here, it gets dropped on us at the end. That Sheridan is finally able to talk about it is a huge thing, and very positive, but at the same time we, the readers, are left with this horror story very fresh in our minds.
This book does so many things that romances usually don’t do, yet it always keeps the love story at its core. I think it’s quite a feat. There’s so much to admire in it, and if I love four other Kinsales more, it’s because the others also have so much to say, also move me very deeply and bring me to tears, and because I get more reading pleasure out of them. Seize the Fire is more painful, but that’s as it should be, I think.
I think where we differ is in calculating the different proportions of factors influencing Olympia’s actions and therefore her chance at true happiness at the end of the novel. While I don’t think either of us imagine her waltzing with joy anytime in the near future (which would, IMO, defeat everything Kinsale is trying to set up in the book), I might be slightly more optimistic about their chances at closure and ultimate peace.
Yes, I agree with all that. And I too think that if Olympia were peppy or joyous at the end, it would defeat everything the book is about.
Robin said on 09.20.05 at 07:59 PM • [link]
“And usually, the revelation of the hero’s trauma or suffering would come much earlier in the story, so that we could watch him heal. Here, it gets dropped on us at the end. That Sheridan is finally able to talk about it is a huge thing, and very positive, but at the same time we, the readers, are left with this horror story very fresh in our minds.”
I was thinking this morning about Prince of Midnight and its relationship to STF. Now there’s a book that many feel is very dark, although it follows more the structure you outline where the hero’s trauma is pre-existing to the book. EXCEPT, it seems to me that Leigh and S.T. compete for the traditional role of hero in that book. Despite everything, S.T. is still the romantic idealist, and Leigh is trying to beat that quality out of him. He’s reckless, although clearly not naive; despite his initial self-pity and isolation, he is soon determined to be a hero, pressing on in his pursuit of Leigh and her cause, even when she pushes him away again and again. He lands himself in a somewhat precarious situation in cultville, inadvertantly placing the lives of some of the young women there at stake (as well as his own). Death and destruction follows. And when S.T. goes back to his old dizziness, it’s Leigh, who had been, IMO, much less strong for all her hardness, who plays the idealist and pulls him out of his self-centered defeat.
Although there are many circumstantial differences between the book, which may ultimately account for the differences between STF and POM, POM does, IMO, present another take on the idealism/realism split and perhaps comes down more firmly on the side of idealism. Of course, perhaps it’s the fact that S.T. has already been through the fire, so to speak, that makes his idealism more “realistic,” but there are a number of points in the book where circumstances turned against his reckless bravado and he could have found himself and those he was trying to protect deep in the soup.
I don’t know where I’m going with all this, but our conversation about STF got me thinking a little more critically about the potential consequences of S.T.‘s romantic ideals.
Any thoughts?
LFL said on 09.20.05 at 09:54 PM • [link]
Interesting subject. S.T.’s idealism never seemed as dangerous to me, perhaps because it felt more superficial than Olympia’s at first. He was quick to tell Leigh he loved her, even before he really knew her and truly loved her. There was a kind of glibness to his desire for heroism, at first, or so it seemed to me. It felt like he was at least partially stepping into his role as the Prince of Midnight, rather than being completely himself. It was like a mask that he hid his fears behind.
Leigh, of course, didn’t believe him at that point in the story. As the book progressed, I started to believe in S.T. more (and I think he was becoming more genuine), and started feeling more sympathy for him when Leigh didn’t believe in him as much as he needed her to.
I agree with you that The Prince of Midnight maybe comes down a bit more on the side of idealism than Seize the Fire, but it’s still a very dark book because Leigh has lost her entire family. But it ends on a sunnier note, and even in the epilogue (which I love), S.T. is teaching Leigh to be less practical.
One of the most interesting thing about The Prince of Midnight’s take on idealism and cynicism, is that it also plays with the traditional romance tropes by making the heroine the cynical one, and the hero the idealistic one. Kinsale does that again in For My Lady’s Heart.
In that book, you have the Ruck / Melnathe pairing where Melanthe is the more cynical, realistic one, and the Allegreto / Cara pairing which is more traditional in the sense that the male is the realist, but nontraditional in that he has to give up the woman he loves to someone more idealistic than himself.
I think the idealism / realism split in For My Lady’s Heart is fascinating too, and one of the things I find most interesting there is that the event that frees the characters to find happiness, Gian’s death, is a kind of senseless accident. I’ve heard a couple of people complain about that, but personally I love that aspect of the book. Had Ruck killed Gian, we would have had a much more traditional story in which the heroine is rescued by the hero, and her stark realism might have seemed excessive. I love that Kinsale doesn’t do that. Gian remains a kind of force of nature that the characters might never have been able to defeat with either idealism or realism. They luck out, and then have to deal with their differences.
Amy Lavender Harris said on 09.20.05 at 10:42 PM • [link]
There’s a similar discussion going on over at <style=“font-weight: bold;”>An Innocent A-Blog. Excellent commentary both there and here. Here’s my comment on both discussions:
In Margaret Atwood’s, “Rape Fantasies”, a story from the Dancing Girls collection (McClelland and Stewart, 1977), a group of women sitting around talk about their rape fantasies. The protagonist points out that they are missing the point: ” ... you aren’t getting raped, it’s just some guy you haven’t met formally.” She describes a series of her own ‘rape fantasies’, in which the perpetrator is invariably inept, leaving her, in the end, disappointed.
Here’s one:
““All right, let me tell you one,” I said. “I’m walking down this dark street at night and this fellow comes up and grabs my arm. Now it so happens that I have a plastic lemon in my purse, you know how it always says you should carry a plastic lemon in your purse? I don’t really do it, I tried it once but the damned thing leaked all over my chequebook, but in this fantasy I have one and I say to him, “You’re intending to rape me, right?” And he nods, so I open my purse to get the plastic lemon, and I can’t find it! My purse is full of all this junk, Kleenex and cigarettes and my change purse and my lipstick and my driver’s licence, you know the kind of stuff; so I ask him to hold out his hands, like this, and I pile all this junk into them and down at the bottom there’s the plastic lemon, and I can’t get the top off. So I hand it to him and he’s very obliging, he twists the top off and hands it back to me, and I squirt him in the eye.”“
The story closes with this private musing: “... I think it would be better if you could get a conversation going. Like, how could a fellow do that to a person he’s just had a long conversation with, once you let them know you’re human, you have a life too, I don’t see how they could go ahead with it, right? I mean, I know it happens but I just don’t understand it, that’s the part I really don’t understand.”
The protagonist in Atwood’s story is confused, finding her own rape fantasies tepid and unsatisfying and not understanding why. In part it’s because she can imagine the setting but little of the plot: she can’t get past her need to issue stage directions. That’s because sex is not about stage directions. It’s not about posing so that your hair spills invitingly across your breasts (simultaneously concealing and inviting). It’s not about superstructures of leather and lace worn to be pulled off in acts of taking or tease. It’s not about ‘power exchange’, that clinical term favoured by those looking to be or beat a willing corpse. It’s not about ‘tops’ and ‘bottoms’. That’s all a tepid act, and one reason literary and performative sex is almost invariably self-parodying.
A good sex scene (not to mention good sex) should acknowledge that sex is a visceral assertion - against mortality, against enemies—but also toward them in a collision of contradictions made manifest in the moment. By exposing these contradictions, sex is also against the kinds of orderly or hackneyed stage directions the mind dreams up in efforts to deny or bury the body.
And rape fantasies? Although they leak out of the pages of so many torridly titled bodice rippers, they aren’t about sex any more than rape is. Rape fantasies are a (sadly) socially acceptable way of rationalizing and repressing the viscera, of perpetuating the stereotype that women lack viscera, that sex means being penetrated by others whose purpose is to enact urges we don’t ourselves possess. Describing women’s sexual fantasies as rape fantiasies is a misnomer, a subterfuge invented to make women’s sexual narratives conform to the social norm that women do not ourselves possess the visceral (and animal) sexual identies men are admitted to have. In my view they aren’t rape fantasies at all, but rather a denial of women’s sexual desire, a re-writing of the view once espoused by some radical feminists that all sex is equivalent to rape. In other words, criminalizing male sexual desire (in literature and in life) is preferable to admitting our own.
I am going to challenge the claim that women have rape fantasies at all. While women may fantasize about strong (or supplicant) males and various forms of power exchange, these are not fantasies about rape. They are half-admitted-and-half-buried narratives of female sexual desire, in which women are not yet quite able to take possession of our own desire and visceral power. I’d like to see some more ownership by women writers of female sexual identity, including all its contradictions.
Robin said on 09.21.05 at 09:45 PM • [link]
“S.T.’s idealism never seemed as dangerous to me, perhaps because it felt more superficial than Olympia’s at first.”
Although I hate to say this, since it sounds like an insult to Kinsale (although it’s not meant that way), do you think that’s due in part to the gender difference? Because I felt the same way you did, even though S.T. did some REALLY reckless things in the book. But I think we’re really supposed to want his idealism to prevail, especially because Leigh is sooooooo cut off from herself and we see how damaged both she and S.T. are from the very beginning. I need to think more about this—and possibly read POM again, since it’s been a while—but it still seems to me that the gender switch might not be totally insignificant here.
“He was quick to tell Leigh he loved her, even before he really knew her and truly loved her.”
Yes, like Olympia did with Sheridan. Remember how she regrets that she wasted the words on him when she didn’t even know what it meant to love him, so that by the time she really means it, she feels that her declaration has lost its potency?
“There was a kind of glibness to his desire for heroism, at first, or so it seemed to me.”
Very true, but later it felt kind of desperate for me, especially when he robs the carriage.
“It felt like he was at least partially stepping into his role as the Prince of Midnight, rather than being completely himself. It was like a mask that he hid his fears behind.”
How do you think this differs from Olympia’s adoption of the heroic fantasies, especially if they’re in part a coping mechanism for her? Do you think he knew the difference whereas Olympia didn’t, or that he was simply better equipped to get out of trouble, or had a better handle on the outside world as it related to his self-concept? It’s interesting, because I think POM could have been a book as dark as STF. And while I’m so glad it isn’t (I love the epilogue, too, especially the way Kinsale tips her hat to John Lyons, both there and when he’s gentling Mistral), I’m not sure where to locate that crucial difference beyond the fact that S.T. may be idealistic, but he’s not naive. Perhaps that’s the toxic combination for Olympia, along with the fact that she cannot be anything but a political pawn for those more powerful. On one level, S.T.‘s lack of naivete makes Leigh’s disgust with his Romanticism more powerfully convincing, but we still don’t reject him as completely as she does, perhaps because the fact that he’s already been “broken,” makes his idealism deeper and more considered than Olympia’s, more fully earned and therefore safe to believe in. And yet he seems to lose it so easily when he comes back to England, as if it’s dependent on his physical well-being. I don’t know, but I think I need to re-read POM this weekend.
Robin said on 09.21.05 at 10:33 PM • [link]
“I am going to challenge the claim that women have rape fantasies at all. While women may fantasize about strong (or supplicant) males and various forms of power exchange, these are not fantasies about rape. They are half-admitted-and-half-buried narratives of female sexual desire, in which women are not yet quite able to take possession of our own desire and visceral power. I’d like to see some more ownership by women writers of female sexual identity, including all its contradictions.”
Your comments, Amy, about the boundary breaking nature of sex reflect precisely the complexity of female sexuality and sexual desire, and make me ambivalent about discarding the term “rape fantasy.”
In the same way that Andrea Dworkin’s position on heterosexual sex as rape was simplistic, IMO saying that women don’t have rape fantasies at all is somewhat of an oversimplication. It’s certainly an oversimplication I’m sympathetic to, since I am very much on the side of liberating female sexuality from some of the more parochial restrictions we build-in to our sexual socialization, I do think that some women would very much defend the idea that they do have rape fantasies. Of course they’re not “rape” in any realistic sense, since the sex is consensual, at least in so far as someone is creating the scene with themselves as submissive in the fantasy. But I do think that the taboo of rape, the power differential, the sense of having no control (forgetting the irony of the fantasizer’s mind controlling the fantasy)is critical to the fantasy. It may be a revision of rape into a pleasurable experience, both for all I know, some women have rape fantasies and then mentally have their “attacker” arrested, tried, and convicted all as part of the fantasy. But in a more mainstream sense, I still think that the illicit connotation of the “rape” is, for some women, critical to the success and tantalizing effect of the fantasy. And if the point is to empower female sexuality, it may be that the conversion of something that in the real world makes women a victim but in the fantasy can yield a very different outcome may not be such a terrible thing. It may not reflect the ideal state of female sexuality, but echoing the answer that some people gave to my question about fantasizing about rape in a more equitable social environment, I think it’s possible to imagine that even in a world of totally liberated female sexuality that women might have “rape fantasies,” for reasons that might be the same or different than they are now.
IMO you are certainly right, though, in discussing the way that textualized sex limits and defines and confines and circumscribes and flattens, etc. the act and all of its attendant emotions (although I don’t necessarily agree that it’s all “self-parodying”), and in the case of Romance, that limitation is even more apparent, which is another reason I’m resistant to the idea of eliminating the rape fantasy category. For one thing, if you’ve read any Romance, espcially that written in the 80s, there is some actual RAPE in those books, completely above and beyond the rough sex some of us might argue over in other books. There is a tremendous continuum of sex in Romance, from rape of the heroine by men other than the hero, to SMBD fantasies, to so-called forced seduction, where the heroine seems ambivalent about her participation, to angry and punitive sex that the hero inflicts upon the heroine, to sex that is portrayed as rape but written in such a way as to clearly titillate the reader, and on and on. I don’t think in all cases that it’s about the subversion, sublimation, denial, or infantalization of female sexual desire. Sometimes it can be that, in the same way that sometimes it can be about the empowerment one gets from contolling the fantasy in their own mind in response to what they’re reading, and in the same way it can be about rewriting a scene of personal victimization so that one is no longer the victim. Absolutely I believe that women are, as a group, ambivalent about our sexuality. But I think the so-called rape fantasy can serve an empowering purpose, depending on the circumstances, depending on it’s origin, and depending on the relationship between the fantasy and the fantasizer. Same with other types of sexual fantasies, some of which place the woman either in the submissive or dominant position.
One thing only touched on in this discussion is the difference between a fantasy as it’s written by an author and a fantasy as it’s created in someone’s head, either spontaneously or in response to an author’s rendering of a certain sexual situation. IMO there’s a lot to unpack in that difference, and there’s where we’ll see a lot of what you’re talking about, right alongside a lot of other stuff that, as you say, embodies all the contradictions at the heart of trying to define something as complex as female sexuality.
LFL said on 09.23.05 at 01:44 AM • [link]
“S.T.’s idealism never seemed as dangerous to me, perhaps because it felt more superficial than Olympia’s at first.”
Although I hate to say this, since it sounds like an insult to Kinsale (although it’s not meant that way), do you think that’s due in part to the gender difference? Because I felt the same way you did, even though S.T. did some REALLY reckless things in the book. But I think we’re really supposed to want his idealism to prevail, especially because Leigh is sooooooo cut off from herself and we see how damaged both she and S.T. are from the very beginning. I need to think more about this—and possibly read POM again, since it’s been a while—but it still seems to me that the gender switch might not be totally insignificant here.
Well, it’s been a long time since I reread POM, but to me it doesn’t sound like an insult to Kinsale, because I’ve always thought that she intended S.T.’s idealism in the beginning of the book to be more superficial than Olympia’s. Olympia was really fervent, whereas early on in POM, S.T. seemed like he was to some degree bringing out a canned speech that he hadn’t truly thought about. So for me, to say that is actually a compliment to Kinsale’s skill.
“He was quick to tell Leigh he loved her, even before he really knew her and truly loved her.”
Yes, like Olympia did with Sheridan. Remember how she regrets that she wasted the words on him when she didn’t even know what it meant to love him, so that by the time she really means it, she feels that her declaration has lost its potency?
Good point, I had forgotten that. But, here’s the difference. S.T. had said those words to other women before, and the sense I got from the book was that he mainly used those words as an opening for an exchange in which he traded his glamour and fame for sex and, at most, affection that was as superficial as his words. I don’t think (though I could be wrong) that Olympia had said those words to anyone before she said them to Sheridan. She certainly didn’t say them to a lot of men. And I think it’s fair to suggest that the more people you say “I love you” in the romantic sense to, the cheaper it seems to an observer.
“There was a kind of glibness to his desire for heroism, at first, or so it seemed to me.”
Very true, but later it felt kind of desperate for me, especially when he robs the carriage.
Yes, well, there were two things going on. His heroism had been his stock in trade, and he wanted to regain his celebrity. I think (though as it’s been a while since I’ve read the book, I could be mistaken) that it was the closest thing to love he’d had, so even though it wasn’t love, he wanted it back. He also wanted to regain his success. The other thing was that as he came to genuinely love Leigh, he really wanted to be a hero for her sake. It became his way of wanting to prove his love. But that was later on. It’s in the beginning of the book that he seems glib to me.
To be continued in my next post.
LFL said on 09.23.05 at 01:47 AM • [link]
“It felt like he was at least partially stepping into his role as the Prince of Midnight, rather than being completely himself. It was like a mask that he hid his fears behind.”
How do you think this differs from Olympia’s adoption of the heroic fantasies, especially if they’re in part a coping mechanism for her? Do you think he knew the difference whereas Olympia didn’t, or that he was simply better equipped to get out of trouble, or had a better handle on the outside world as it related to his self-concept? It’s interesting, because I think POM could have been a book as dark as STF. And while I’m so glad it isn’t (I love the epilogue, too, especially the way Kinsale tips her hat to John Lyons, both there and when he’s gentling Mistral), I’m not sure where to locate that crucial difference beyond the fact that S.T. may be idealistic, but he’s not naive.
I think that’s a lot of it! He has the life experience to know better, and isn’t as young as Olympia, so for that reason, we judge them differently. S.T. also has a bit of an ulterior motive early on. He wants to get into Leigh’s pants. Both he and Olympia want to bolster their self-image IMO, but in Olympia’s case there are fewer defenses. As much as Leigh hurts S.T., it never feels to me like she takes advantage of him. In STF, I feel that Sheridan is taking advantage of Olympia’s naivete and blindness. Sheridan is too emotionally wounded to be able to do better, and therefore I forgive him, but I feel that taking advantage of Olympia is almost like conning a disabled person. It’s very hard to watch.
I do also feel that S.T. is better equipped to get out of trouble, but I’m not sure he had a better handle on the outside world as it related to his self-concept. He needs the adulation of strangers to feel good about himself, so he’s not that different from Olympia. It’s interesting to compare them to Samuel in TSATS. Samuel also has a messed up self-concept in the beginning, but yet his brand of heroism is done in secret. He doesn’t need the outside world to tell him he’s okay, but not because he knows he’s okay. He still looks for outside approval, only from Dojun, and the Ashlands. It appears that Kinsale is really exploring the whole issue of self-concept in those three books, and to some degree, in FFTS also. Jervaulx is almost the reverse of S.T.: someone who holds on to his self-concept no matter what the outside world has to say about him.
On one level, S.T.’s lack of naivete makes Leigh’s disgust with his Romanticism more powerfully convincing, but we still don’t reject him as completely as she does, perhaps because the fact that he’s already been “broken,†makes his idealism deeper and more considered than Olympia’s, more fully earned and therefore safe to believe in. And yet he seems to lose it so easily when he comes back to England, as if it’s dependent on his physical well-being. I don’t know, but I think I need to re-read POM this weekend.
I’m not sure that S.T.’s idealism seemed deeper or more considered than Olympia’s to me. Maybe a little. I have to think about that more.
Robin said on 09.23.05 at 04:42 AM • [link]
Hey, LFL, I’m going to re-read POM this weekend and then email you my response to your post. Samuel, by the way, is a very interesting counterpoint, as is Jervaulx.
LFL said on 09.23.05 at 06:27 AM • [link]
Good idea, Robin. We’ve hijacked this thread long enough. :)
Ammie said on 10.23.05 at 11:10 PM • [link]
I think there’s a lot of really well-thought out analysis on the subject of rape in romance, but one thing keeps me from buying any of them: The authors.
The notion that the woman who wrote about rape and rapist heroes was brilliantly commenting on the political climate of the day, or that she was providing therapy to her readers by reconciling masculine and feminine attitudes towards sex just boggles my mind. Or even that she was doing this unconsciously—I just don’t buy it.
I think the reason there is so many ideas about rape and the rapist hero in novels and why women like it is because, just like the convultions a writer would have to go through to make the rapist hero into a bonafide hero, we are trying to make sense of something that is really, really basic. We are jumping through hoops trying to find a socially acceptable reason for rapist heroes and the women who love them.
It’s taboo, it’s sex, people mix taboo and sex all the time because it increases their level of pleasure. Because it’s dangerous. Danger is sexy. Someone wrote about how men love guns and killing. That’s dangerous, that’s sexy.
Rape is definitely a taboo and a fear of women, far more than men. Of course authors would chose that method of making sex dangerous—and thus increasing the reader’s pleasure.
At the time rape was this fuzzy thing that happened to bad girls. Most readers at the time probably had a hazy notion of what rape was and didn’t have any clue about the very traumatic repercussions of rape. Now they do, so rape isn’t sexy anymore.
Candy said on 10.25.05 at 07:46 PM • [link]
Most readers at the time probably had a hazy notion of what rape was and didn’t have any clue about the very traumatic repercussions of rape. Now they do, so rape isn’t sexy anymore.
This reminds me of an article I read a while back about a serial rapist up in Washington who was scaring all the women senseless in the early 80s. Some radio station interviewed the local police chief about what the women could do to defend themselves. And the police chief jokingly said something like “Not much you can, ladies. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.”
Callousness and tasteless humor aside, a lot of people back then still view rape as violent sex, not sexual violence, with the idea that if a woman had enjoyed sex before with other men, or if she encouraged the advances right up to before the rape, that it somehow made the rape OK. So you have a great point, Ammie.
Like you, I’m not sure I buy into the idea of romance authors in the 70s consciously or unconsciously attempting to reconcile the conflicted attitudes about sex, but I think their writing certainly reflects the conflicted attitudes, and then nosy biddies like us come along and go “Look at that, now—isn’t THAT interest?” And author intention doesn’t necessarily factor much into literary analysis, anyway. After all, Flannery O’Connor insisted to her dying day that her bizarre, violent stories were about the grace of God and nothing else, and now there’s all this scholarship viewing her stories as anything BUT about grace. I’m with you, though: the rape was there for titillation, and in my opinion, as a lazy sort of shorthand to indicate what a very manly man the hero was. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that all that other squirrelly crap wasn’t in there too.
Kassiana said on 12.05.06 at 12:26 AM • [link]
Hm. I’ve always liked rape fantasies. I haven’t always been comfortable with that fact, as I was raised by two ‘60’s era feminists, but have become more so as I aged and learned more with the help of my wonderful spouse.
I think that one reason I do is that I regret having remained a virgin for so long. I converted to a very conservative form of Christianity at age 13 (just when the hormones start buzzing) and ended up deconverting at age 26, a year after I got married. I also was very interested in sex and read a lot of romance novels and non-fiction research into sexual behavior, but felt guilty about my liking these horrible “unGodly” things. I actually went through phases where I’d throw away or get rid of my romance novels, and then give in and buy more/read more months later.
It’s possible, of course, that they influenced my sexual development. I would now describe myself as a BDSM female submissive, after some hard thinking and work to resolve who I am. While it’s still challenging to integrate, as I am also a committed feminist, I have no problem accepting that I find being tied up and “forced” into things I already want to be incredibly arousing and sexy.
My spouse doesn’t find coercion as sexy as I do. That’s okay. My spouse isn’t me. You aren’t me, either. At least I hope not, because if you are, you’re wearing my underwear.
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