Dear Readers, Until now, I have been shielded from the costs of disability because of our wonderful and vital NHS. This will change when I get home due to the considerable costs of remodelling the house, and my need for round the clock care. I ask, therefore, that if you enjoy The Kureishi Chronicles, believe in paying for good writing, and want to help with my recovery, consider becoming a paid subscriber.
Such an important facet of human life. Writing about sex matters so much to people - people need to explore and find out about themselves and others in this way. Of course Hanif your books & films have been absolutely instrumental in bringing sex, and different kinds of sex, into our lives in different ways. It helped me hugely as a young person - I just wish there had been more openness and even more writing available. Also - the bad writing in sex awards bring me so much mirth. Maybe writers don’t find it as entertaining... but come on - this corker: “Katsuro moaned as a bulge formed beneath the material of his kimono, a bulge that Miyuki seized, kneaded, massaged, squashed and crushed. With the fondling, Katsuro’s penis and testicles became one single mound that rolled around beneath the grip of her hand. Miyuki felt as though she was manipulating a small monkey that was curling up its paws.”
A friend of mine who leads writers' workshops suggests that when you write a story, you should draft a preliminary erotic scene involving each one of your characters. Well, he uses the word pornographic, but I prefer erotic. Don't (necessarily) use the scene, but write it for your eyes only. Then revisit the characters.
That’s correct, then … Melville straight off bedded Ishmael down with Queequeg and then the next thing you know the pair of them were out hunting a great white whale together, and they had to hire a skipper to take them there.
Thank you so much for this beautiful piece of writing. Did I read in one of your recent posts that you questioned whether or not you were still a writer? Yet I am reading these posts that are so insightful and well thought through. I can hardly tell you how much I appreciate them, what you say and how much work you put into saying it. A lifetime's worth of work and experience. Maybe at this point you don't even appreciate yourself how brilliant you are at this writing gig.
Also, for some the best writing about sex and sexuality, see Anais Nin, who wrote in the moment, often while the sheets were still damp, in a way that took language to some wonderful new limits.
I spent part of the afternoon attempting to describe a mental image I had of a ship's figurehead. The picture that I wanted to convey was of a wooden carving of a mermaid, pulling the folds of her ample vagina apart with both hands, as she births a human child into the waiting arms of a midwife. The name of the ship is The Lucksford Birth. The fictional figurehead is being described by a former priest who goes on to ruminate on the comparable vulgarity of church gargoyles.
The scene was inspired by Gavin Friday's version of a traditional song titled 'Four Old Whores' (rechristened by Friday as 'Baltimore Whores'). The theme of the song is that of escalating one-upmanship, focused on who among the quartet possesses the biggest vagina. Things start off relatively small with one whore claiming that birds fly in and out without touching a hair. By the conclusion of the song, the fourth and final whore is claiming that “the fleet sailed in on the first of June and didn’t come back till Fall.”
The bawdy chorus of Baltimore Whores incorporates the unsavoury line “and drag your nuts across me guts.” If there has been a more visceral description of sex, I have yet to hear it.
Having hit my daily word count, I opened the email notification of your latest post , where I was confronted by the painted spectacle of a nun, with incredibly well-developed thighs, being railed (I believe that is the correct ecclesiastical term) through a decorative iron gate by a monk.
I have a friend who writes incredibly graphic, Prisoner Cellblock H, lesbian fan fiction, presumably as a form of sexual catharsis. I wish I could churn out something so abandoned but, in common with many Englishmen of my generation, I was born with a stick up my arse and have only been partially successful in removing it.
My approach towards writing literary sex scenes (governed somewhat by the likelihood that my parents will end up reading whatever I produce) is based on David Cronenberg's celluloid adaptation of the William Burroughs novel – 'Naked Lunch'. Cronenberg was wise enough to realise that a direct attempt to translate the baffling geography of the text into film was doomed, and instead chose to reference parts of it within a narrative framework of his own devising. That seems to me to be a sensible approach when describing sex, which exists within a turbulent physical and emotional landscape, much of which lies beyond description, polite or otherwise.
I might attempt something a little more stylised the next time two or more of my characters fuck. Morrissey was widely mocked for the sex scene in his baffling genre-hopping novel 'List of the Lost' though, when read within the context of the surrounding purple prose, it is entirely in keeping with the rest of the book.
The disguises that writers have thrown over sex and various sex acts, to shield themselves from being hauled into court, and thereafter exiled to France, reminded of the Empress of the Blues and Queen of Sexual Innuendo – Bessie Smith, whose lyrics abound with fat cabbages and the insertion of bacon overflowing the pot. One of her later songs references a 'buffet flat'.
In an interview, Smith's niece, Ruby Walker, elaborated upon this little known real estate term: A buffet flat was a residence where each room catered to a different sexual proclivity. On her visit to such a domicile, Walker had her eye on a good looking man, who turned her down on account of it not being “a fish day”.
It is fair to say Sex has popped up so to speak quite a lot in your writing/films. I thought it was wonderfully handled in The Mother - depicted in her artwork and then discovered by her daughter.
Great...I think it is worth it. I have the Screenplay & the Film.
I saw the film first...A much older woman has crazy sex with a young muscular builder....(Daniel Craig,/later to be James Bond). But...it is handled so well...Roger Michell was the perfect Director for HK's stuff....
Really good article - as a teenager i wrote a short sex story crammed with naive genetically impossible descriptions which my father found and marked as a teacher would... now I suppose I would let any reader use their imagination which is probably cowardly.
Love this. I also got paid for writing stories about sex, once upon a time. Whilst quite enjoying the process of the writing, despite it probably being terrible, once I had pushed "send" I was left feeling empty and depleted. When I write about any of the other wonders of life though, whether it's something as banal as a fly or a cushion, I am filled to the brim with joy and repleteness. Why is this I wonder? Was it the vision of the "one handed reader?" I think it probably has to do with our intention behind what we write. My sex stories were being made for money and with a specific audience in mind. The other stuff is written from the heart and soul and without thinking of the end result/happy ending/ money shot. Thanks for your dispatch...
Totally agree with your wise man quote/ sex got nothing to do with love or very little. Thank God too. But I think the self expression part is vital - we are sexual beings - I have found that without that identity I flounder. So it’s not having sex so much as being it.
On writing about sex and sexuality, 'The New Life' by Tom Crewe is impressive. Grounded in fact, written as a novel, it dares to tackle facets of human sexuality and relationships honestly and openly. Worth a read. Warm wishes to you Hanif.
First time I read about sex, in a conservative India, was Henry Miller. I was 14, did not speak even to “boys”. After that, sec or no sex, I imagined sex even in my school course work. Schrödinger equations, Fibonacci series all spoke sex to me. No one now shows or writes about sex the way it is, replete with the truncated conversations, the extra-corporeal feelings and the banal post coital pragmatic period
The sex scenes in the Buddha of Suburbia made a big impression on me as a youth. I particularly remember the one where Karim and Jamila are having friend-sex and she is telling him what to do. Just, chef's-kiss.
I enjoyed this piece a lot. I wonder if knowing more about a character's sexuality or sexual life would make a better book, though I understand what you meant by it, Mr. Kureishi. That painting is great.
Hanif - best of luck to you. I share many of your challenges. The latest of which dealing with divorce caused in the main by my injury. In cae you mightfind helpful in any way, I've kept the following blog for 8 years:
Who knew what the young Graham Greene had really been doing with his time upstairs? Horrified at what illicit thoughts those wadded paper balls contained within their moistened ink stains … mild-mannered curiosity can turn to outraged sensibility in even the most pleasant personality, once their prying curiosity has gotten the better of them.
That anecdote about the neighbor discovering the balled up, tossed out drafts is pure gold.
Same! And the beautiful Freudian mistranscription 'doll money'
My favourite part too.
Such an important facet of human life. Writing about sex matters so much to people - people need to explore and find out about themselves and others in this way. Of course Hanif your books & films have been absolutely instrumental in bringing sex, and different kinds of sex, into our lives in different ways. It helped me hugely as a young person - I just wish there had been more openness and even more writing available. Also - the bad writing in sex awards bring me so much mirth. Maybe writers don’t find it as entertaining... but come on - this corker: “Katsuro moaned as a bulge formed beneath the material of his kimono, a bulge that Miyuki seized, kneaded, massaged, squashed and crushed. With the fondling, Katsuro’s penis and testicles became one single mound that rolled around beneath the grip of her hand. Miyuki felt as though she was manipulating a small monkey that was curling up its paws.”
A friend of mine who leads writers' workshops suggests that when you write a story, you should draft a preliminary erotic scene involving each one of your characters. Well, he uses the word pornographic, but I prefer erotic. Don't (necessarily) use the scene, but write it for your eyes only. Then revisit the characters.
That’s correct, then … Melville straight off bedded Ishmael down with Queequeg and then the next thing you know the pair of them were out hunting a great white whale together, and they had to hire a skipper to take them there.
Thank you so much for this beautiful piece of writing. Did I read in one of your recent posts that you questioned whether or not you were still a writer? Yet I am reading these posts that are so insightful and well thought through. I can hardly tell you how much I appreciate them, what you say and how much work you put into saying it. A lifetime's worth of work and experience. Maybe at this point you don't even appreciate yourself how brilliant you are at this writing gig.
Also, for some the best writing about sex and sexuality, see Anais Nin, who wrote in the moment, often while the sheets were still damp, in a way that took language to some wonderful new limits.
I spent part of the afternoon attempting to describe a mental image I had of a ship's figurehead. The picture that I wanted to convey was of a wooden carving of a mermaid, pulling the folds of her ample vagina apart with both hands, as she births a human child into the waiting arms of a midwife. The name of the ship is The Lucksford Birth. The fictional figurehead is being described by a former priest who goes on to ruminate on the comparable vulgarity of church gargoyles.
The scene was inspired by Gavin Friday's version of a traditional song titled 'Four Old Whores' (rechristened by Friday as 'Baltimore Whores'). The theme of the song is that of escalating one-upmanship, focused on who among the quartet possesses the biggest vagina. Things start off relatively small with one whore claiming that birds fly in and out without touching a hair. By the conclusion of the song, the fourth and final whore is claiming that “the fleet sailed in on the first of June and didn’t come back till Fall.”
The bawdy chorus of Baltimore Whores incorporates the unsavoury line “and drag your nuts across me guts.” If there has been a more visceral description of sex, I have yet to hear it.
Having hit my daily word count, I opened the email notification of your latest post , where I was confronted by the painted spectacle of a nun, with incredibly well-developed thighs, being railed (I believe that is the correct ecclesiastical term) through a decorative iron gate by a monk.
I have a friend who writes incredibly graphic, Prisoner Cellblock H, lesbian fan fiction, presumably as a form of sexual catharsis. I wish I could churn out something so abandoned but, in common with many Englishmen of my generation, I was born with a stick up my arse and have only been partially successful in removing it.
My approach towards writing literary sex scenes (governed somewhat by the likelihood that my parents will end up reading whatever I produce) is based on David Cronenberg's celluloid adaptation of the William Burroughs novel – 'Naked Lunch'. Cronenberg was wise enough to realise that a direct attempt to translate the baffling geography of the text into film was doomed, and instead chose to reference parts of it within a narrative framework of his own devising. That seems to me to be a sensible approach when describing sex, which exists within a turbulent physical and emotional landscape, much of which lies beyond description, polite or otherwise.
I might attempt something a little more stylised the next time two or more of my characters fuck. Morrissey was widely mocked for the sex scene in his baffling genre-hopping novel 'List of the Lost' though, when read within the context of the surrounding purple prose, it is entirely in keeping with the rest of the book.
The disguises that writers have thrown over sex and various sex acts, to shield themselves from being hauled into court, and thereafter exiled to France, reminded of the Empress of the Blues and Queen of Sexual Innuendo – Bessie Smith, whose lyrics abound with fat cabbages and the insertion of bacon overflowing the pot. One of her later songs references a 'buffet flat'.
In an interview, Smith's niece, Ruby Walker, elaborated upon this little known real estate term: A buffet flat was a residence where each room catered to a different sexual proclivity. On her visit to such a domicile, Walker had her eye on a good looking man, who turned her down on account of it not being “a fish day”.
It is fair to say Sex has popped up so to speak quite a lot in your writing/films. I thought it was wonderfully handled in The Mother - depicted in her artwork and then discovered by her daughter.
Brilliantly done.
Now I will have to read that.
Great...I think it is worth it. I have the Screenplay & the Film.
I saw the film first...A much older woman has crazy sex with a young muscular builder....(Daniel Craig,/later to be James Bond). But...it is handled so well...Roger Michell was the perfect Director for HK's stuff....
Really good article - as a teenager i wrote a short sex story crammed with naive genetically impossible descriptions which my father found and marked as a teacher would... now I suppose I would let any reader use their imagination which is probably cowardly.
Love this. I also got paid for writing stories about sex, once upon a time. Whilst quite enjoying the process of the writing, despite it probably being terrible, once I had pushed "send" I was left feeling empty and depleted. When I write about any of the other wonders of life though, whether it's something as banal as a fly or a cushion, I am filled to the brim with joy and repleteness. Why is this I wonder? Was it the vision of the "one handed reader?" I think it probably has to do with our intention behind what we write. My sex stories were being made for money and with a specific audience in mind. The other stuff is written from the heart and soul and without thinking of the end result/happy ending/ money shot. Thanks for your dispatch...
I really appreciate this comment.
“It was as though we had been possessed, and when the fever had gone, we could only speculate what it had all been about.” Apt.
As a wise man once told me, “Sex is an important part of self expression but an infinitesimal part of love.”
You note the dilemma of lack of language for sex in literature. Also true in pasychotherapy.
Totally agree with your wise man quote/ sex got nothing to do with love or very little. Thank God too. But I think the self expression part is vital - we are sexual beings - I have found that without that identity I flounder. So it’s not having sex so much as being it.
The neighbor's discovery... hahah!
On writing about sex and sexuality, 'The New Life' by Tom Crewe is impressive. Grounded in fact, written as a novel, it dares to tackle facets of human sexuality and relationships honestly and openly. Worth a read. Warm wishes to you Hanif.
First time I read about sex, in a conservative India, was Henry Miller. I was 14, did not speak even to “boys”. After that, sec or no sex, I imagined sex even in my school course work. Schrödinger equations, Fibonacci series all spoke sex to me. No one now shows or writes about sex the way it is, replete with the truncated conversations, the extra-corporeal feelings and the banal post coital pragmatic period
I imagine your neighbor smoothing out cum-soaked wads she picked up from the brick-paved paths and wondering at their inspiration.
The sex scenes in the Buddha of Suburbia made a big impression on me as a youth. I particularly remember the one where Karim and Jamila are having friend-sex and she is telling him what to do. Just, chef's-kiss.
I enjoyed this piece a lot. I wonder if knowing more about a character's sexuality or sexual life would make a better book, though I understand what you meant by it, Mr. Kureishi. That painting is great.
Hanif - best of luck to you. I share many of your challenges. The latest of which dealing with divorce caused in the main by my injury. In cae you mightfind helpful in any way, I've kept the following blog for 8 years:
https://ironmess.com/
Who knew what the young Graham Greene had really been doing with his time upstairs? Horrified at what illicit thoughts those wadded paper balls contained within their moistened ink stains … mild-mannered curiosity can turn to outraged sensibility in even the most pleasant personality, once their prying curiosity has gotten the better of them.