Stephen Elliott Gets the Kinks Out

As I was preparing for the relaunch of Beatrice, Stephen Elliott was kind enough to let me print the introduction to his new collection of eleven linked stories, My Girlfriend Comes to the City and Beats Me Up.

This could have been a memoir. It isn’t. Most of it is true. This could be a sexual memoir. Ultimately, I made the poor marketing choice to call this a book of stories because there were too many things I knowingly made up. With the exception of “Early In Our Relationship,” “My Stripper Year,” and “Just Always Be Good,” which were originally published as non-fiction, nearly every story has already been published as fiction. Real life does not always finish as neatly as fiction. Also, as I say in “I’ll Love You Back,” I didn’t want to be responsible for the truth of my recollections.

But the reason I am admitting here to the general, if not complete, truth of this book, is because I believe in being open about sexuality. Recently there has been a rash of crackdowns on practitioners of consensual sadomasochism. Our president, who sanctions torture all over the world, who threatens to veto bills banning the American military from torture, has initiated a war at home on people who like to tie and hurt each other in the privacy of their own bedrooms. In response to the Department of Justice crackdown on SM websites many sex educators have taken down their pages. The result is that people who are just beginning their explorations in the world of Bondage and Discipline are going to find good information advocating safe and consensual play harder to find. When that happens beginners are more likely to play without safe words, to engage in dangerous activities, like cutting and asphyxiation, with partners who are not properly trained. And people are going to continue to live unhappy and ashamed of their desires when they could be leading satisfying and passionate lives.

It is in the best interests of everyone for more people to be open about their sexual desires. More pride flags need to be displayed on porches and windows and tattoos. As kinky people we need to talk to our non-kinky friends about our desires. We can’t wait for the approval of others; we must force them to accept us. We will never have political power until we let the politicians know that we are not ashamed.

With that in mind I take responsibility for these stories, for every sexual act depicted, many of which occurred when I was younger, before I made the effort to acquire the information I needed. I acquired scars instead. This is not a memoir, but it’s damn close. And I’m OK with that. And I’m OK with you knowing that.

2 October 2006 | guest authors, uncategorized |

Author2Author: Helen Boyd and Kate Bornstein

When it comes to identity issues, Kate Bornstein has long been one of my favorite writers. So when Helen Boyd, the author of My Husband Betty, offered to talk with Bornstein about her new book, Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks and Other Outlaws, I didn’t need much persuading. (By the way, Boyd’s second memoir, She’s Not the Man I Married, continues her account of making a marriage work when one of the partners decides to pursue their transgendered identity; it comes out next spring.)

Helen Boyd: I’ve had people tell me my writing voice is very chatty—and I find yours is even more so. Does your voice as a writer come out of your experience with performance, or vice versa?

Kate Bornstein: My first editor, Bill Germano at Routledge, encouraged me to make the book performative because he recognized that as a strength of mine. So I have different fonts and typefaces representing different voices: the main text of the book, quotes from other people, and a third voice that’s me, usually arguing with something I’ve said in the main text. So the book reads like a conversation, one you’re listening to, one you can take part in. I like the performative nature of writing, can’t seem to write straight text. I try to imagine myself in the reader’s place, and when I sat down to write about alternatives to suicide, I quickly realized if I was having a really bad day, I’d want a book that would make me smile just by looking at it.

Yeah, our writing styles are chatty; but our work has more in common than that. I recently interviewed Betty Dodson who said that the strength of writers like you and me and her is that we write in the first person about our own lives. I’m curious to know what kind of response you’ve been getting from different areas of the publishing and literary and academic worlds to your subjective writing style; and while you’re at it, what do you think is the future of subjective writing?

(more…)

1 October 2006 | author2author |