Good writers finish last

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There are times when we on Sepia Mutiny are happy when a desi loses. For example, when a desi author makes the short list for “one of the world’s least-coveted literary prizes – the Bad Sex in Fiction Award” [Link] (thanks Pooja!).

This year, Nirpal Singh Dhaliwal joined luminaries like former Booker Prize nominee David Mitchell and Thomas Pynchon (and five others) for consideration by the London based Literary Review for the 14th annual dishonor. I’m sure they all heaved a sigh of relief when the award went to first time novelist Iain Hollingshead instead. If you’ve never heard of the prize,

… the award’s mandate is “to draw attention to the crude, tasteless, often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel, and to discourage it”. [Link]

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p>Embarassingly, this is not the first time a desi writer has been nominated. In 2003, Aniruddha Bahal won the award for his novel Bunker 13. The very next year, Siddharth Dhanvant Shangvi was nominated for The Last Song of Dusk, Nadeem Aslam was nominated for Maps for Lost Lovers [thanks Red Snapper], and two non-desi writers were nominated for desi themed stories — Gregory David Roberts nominated for Shantaram and Will Self for Dr. Mukti.

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p>That means that a full 50% of the nominees in 2004 were either desi or writing on desi themes! The Guardian has quotations from all of the 2004 nominees [Not Safe For Work] so you can see exactly how bad the writing was. We’re talking really really bad, people.

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p>I’m a bit perplexed about the connection between South Asia and bad sex. Is it the Kama Sutra thing that attracts preposterous sex writing? Do exotification and bad sex come not so chastely hand in hand? Is it India’s own fascination with purple prose?

That said, I’d rather that desis were associated with writing about bad sex rather than having actual bad sex. Bad sex writing is funnier, and I’m all about the laughs.

38 thoughts on “Good writers finish last”

  2. the Tom Wolfe entry in the Guardian:

    Slither slither slither slither went the tongue, but the hand that was what she tried to concentrate on, the hand, since it has the entire terrain of her torso to explore and not just the otorhinolaryngological caverns

    and I found this as I why trying to figure out what ‘otorhinolaryngological caverns’ are:

    But information compulsion is not the only thing Wolfe suffers from. Another is repetition compulsion. When in doubt, repeat words for emphasis. Hoyt’s smile, for instance, is described as ‘so warm, warm, warm, loving, loving, loving, so warm and loving and commanding, all commanding’ that Charlotte ‘couldn’t move’. But later, when he deserts her, she gives way to ‘sobs sobs sobs sobs sobs sobs racking racking racking racking racking racking convulsive sobs sobs sobs sobs sobs’. A description of a basketball match begins: ‘Static::::::::::: Static::::::::::: Static::::::::::: Static::::::::::: [repeat 12 further times] choked the Buster Bowl.’ Large people are ‘giants’, their muscles are ‘slabs’, the exposed belly buttons of young women are forever ‘winking’. Over and over again. Then there is his long-running and mysterious insistence on naming muscles. All the old favourites are there: the pecs, the delts, the lats, the trapezius, the sternocleidomastoid. Perhaps because he has a female main character, for the first time, he’s had to branch out into new anatomical areas: the pelvic saddle, the mons pubis, the groin joint, the ‘otorhinolaryngological caverns’ and particularly the ‘ilial crest’ – something to do with the pelvis which plays a surprisingly important role in the novel (a bit of biological sleuthing reveals that it ought to be ‘iliac crest’ anyway – not, I suspect, the only bit of plain wrong information to have found its way through the famous research process).[link]

    and I still don’t get it? Otorhinolaryngological caverns? Ear, nose and throat? Nose?! Why nose?

    If you’re male and you knew what otorhinolaryngological caverns are prior to reading this post, you’re probably bringing down our average (“The number of partners for the average man in his lifetime was 4.53 in India, well below the global average of 7.65 and much below the Brazilian score of 11.37”).

  3. Another random comment after No von Mises’:

    If we begin’Latin’ and ‘American’ with uppercase letters, why do we not spell ‘desi’ as ‘Desi?

  4. IÂ’m a bit perplexed about the connection between South Asia and bad sex. Is it the Kama Sutra thing that attracts preposterous sex writing? Do exotification and bad sex come not so chastely hand in hand? Is it IndiaÂ’s own fascination with purple prose?
    “The number of partners for the average man in his lifetime was 4.53 in India, well below the global average of 7.65 and much below the Brazilian score of 11.37”

    Hmmm….

    Seriously, sexual rebellion seems to make up a HUGE part of South Asian writing, particularly in the diaspora. Half of Naipaul’s books were about hooking up with someone and how it all turned out crappy. Maybe it has something to do with the modern-day silence surrounding sex in Indian society? Or at least the very ritualistic rules surrounding it?

  5. Half of Naipaul’s books were about hooking up with someone and how it all turned out crappy.

    Are they? Which ones?

  6. Well, I was trying to be funny, so that’s not exactly accurate of course. But a lot of his novels DO rely on sexuality and sexual discoveries as a major plot element (even if it’s not exactly “hooking up”).

    To varying degrees, “A House for Mr. Biswas”, “Half a Life”, “Magic Seeds”, and the early parts of “The Enigma of Arrival” deal frankly with sexuality and its consequences. Sometimes that’s within the context of a marriage (though rarely a happy one — and almost ALWAYS one entered into in a burst of desire overriding good sense), but often it’s not. His novels — particularly the ones that involve acculturating into the West — are filled with early sexual discoveries, adultery, and various “forbidden” sexual acts (inter-caste and inter-racial in settings where those are Really Big Deals).

    It should be noted that I like all of these novels, though!

  7. I once read a story about a Muslim man who watched porn involving a guy getting a bj and so he went and asked his wife for one. She said it was haram and refused to do it and so he waited until she was asleep with her mouth open to get one. She woke up in the midst of it and hid in the washroom for the next few days disgusted.

    Bad sex fiction at it’s finest 😉

  8. IÂ’m a bit perplexed about the connection between South Asia and bad sex. Is it the Kama Sutra thing that attracts preposterous sex writing? Do exotification and bad sex come not so chastely hand in hand? Is it IndiaÂ’s own fascination with purple prose? ennis, are you sure there IS a connection between South Asia and bad sex (in writing)? I mean, there has been an increase in novels, generally, with little sexual episodes, and in my opinion the vast majority suck. Perhaps there is a current trend towards bad sex writing, period?

    And also, I think the one thing writing about South Asia does invite bad sex-wise is bad analogies and descriptions. If a person does mention the kama sutra, or someone’s flexibility, or their masala mirch like hotness or mangoes then apparently the characters cannot get it on.

    She said it was haram and refused to do it and so he waited until she was asleep with her mouth open to get one. She woke up in the midst of it and hid in the washroom for the next few days disgusted. Bad sex fiction at it’s finest 😉

    Or kind of gross and sexually violent 🙂

  9. ennis, are you sure there IS a connection between South Asia and bad sex (in writing)? I mean, there has been an increase in novels, generally, with little sexual episodes, and in my opinion the vast majority suck. Perhaps there is a current trend towards bad sex writing, period?

    When 3/8 bad sex nominees in one year are desi or writing about desi issues, there’s an association. 36% of all books aren’t by desis or on desi topics, not by a long shot.

    Similarly, the likelihood of a desi writer being nominated for a bad sex writing prize seems higher than that of them being nominated for a high award.

    Maybe I should have provided some of the quotes from the Guardian in the text of the article, but below the fold. I didn’t want to make the site NSFW though …

  10. I once read a story about a Muslim man who watched porn involving a guy getting a bj and so he went and asked his wife for one. She said it was haram and refused to do it and so he waited until she was asleep with her mouth open to get one. She woke up in the midst of it and hid in the washroom for the next few days disgusted.

    😮

  14. Neal

    Magic Seeds is the novel of his that deals with sexuality most explicity (not in terms of depiction and description, although there is that too — but in terms of exploration, perhaps)

    I think.

    But I’m not sure it’s a signature of his novels any more than any other significant writer. Sexuality is perhaps the most important impulse that compels humans and of course the novel as a form explores this.

    Naipaul does write about the awkwardness and darkness of male sexuality in several of his novels — I’m thinking off the top of my head about the scene in ‘A Bend in the River’ when Salim spits on his lover in disgust, in the Mimic Men the inadequacy of the narrator and his reliance on prostitutes. Interesting topic though.

  15. When 3/8 bad sex nominees in one year are desi or writing about desi issues, there’s an association. 36% of all books aren’t by desis or on desi topics, not by a long shot.

    Yeah, but this is one year; it’s not necessarily endemic. Maybe it’s like the glut of chick-lit that came out post Bridget Jones’s Diary. Also, aren’t there more published desi writers in the UK? (I myself don’t know; I’m just making this up)

    Similarly, the likelihood of a desi writer being nominated for a bad sex writing prize seems higher than that of them being nominated for a high award.

    That’s not really surprising, though, is it?

  17. Some of those extracts are truly hilarious. But a couple of them are so bad, and so funny, that I fear I won’t be able to make love to my girlfriend for a while without laughing — Aniruddha Bahal’s comparison of a man shagging to a dude changing gears on a motorbike is brilliantly demented. And Siddharth Dhanvant Shangvi’s book — car crash novel. Sitting there open mouthed wondering how such camp and arch and precious writing ever got published.

    Anyone read Nirpal Singh Dhaliwal?

  18. I fear I won’t be able to make love to my girlfriend for a while without laughing

    Is there some sinister right wing plan to enforce chastity on all unmarried young browns? Paging SpoorLam!

  19. Ennis, you forgot to mention Nadeem Aslam’s nomination for his purple prose in Maps for Lost Lovers, including gems like this:

    His mouth looked for the oiled berry. Her taste came and went tidally salt and sour in his mouth, as eloquent as weather.

    Yuck! And ‘eloquent as weather’? What the hell does that mean?

    The smell of his armpits was on her shoulders – a flower depositing pollen on a hummingbird’s forehead.

    Oh yes! Flowers and hummingbirds! Oh joy! Sex and lovely flowery sexy things.

    They detonated the remains of each other’s orgasms with fingers and tongues, areas of their bodies sticking together with sweat that was like the weak glue that holds segments of an orange together.

    Look, I’ll be honest, I’ve had a few shags in my life time, and nothing ever got detonated, and I never felt like a slice of orange enjoined to another by a weak glue of sex (why orange? Why not apples? Or pears?) nor as though I was being plucked by a hummingbird.

    But these authors must have had some amazing mind blowing fucks in their lifetime. Damn, I envy them, for sure.

    The only thing they left out in the descriptions was mangoes.

    ‘His mango juice detonated her over ripe mangoes and in a splatter of singing hummingbirds their sweat made chutney in the guava of their souls’

    Someone give me a book deal, fast.

  20. Thanks – updated.

    Camille, that’s now 50% of the 2004 nominees were desi or desi-themed, split evenly between the two.

  21. As someone recently mentioned on the News tab, this blog is screaming for a Bad Sex in Fiction-themed 55Friday, like a man and woman simultaneously exploding in a 2000-gigaton thermonuclear detonation of desire and mutually-assured destruction, the mushroom cloud of their passion suffusing the bedroom like acid rain in a post-apocalyptic nuclear winter.

  23. is there an award for “good sex” writing? is there any way to write well about sex (as opposed to love, romance, courtship) without it sounding somewhat awkward, in modern fiction? what do people in the know consider examples of good sex in writing, either historically or in more modern fiction? henry miller comes to mind. any others?

  24. Breasts like brinjal anyone?

    Yuck!

    Anyway, anyone who compares breasts to fruit or vegetables is disqualified from the respect of good readers for life as far as I’m concerned.

  25. Anyway, anyone who compares breasts to fruit or vegetables is disqualified from the respect of good readers for life as far as I’m concerned.

    I mean, enough already! It’s too obvious. Think of something else. Or do we need a description? I mean, why compare breasts to anything else anyway? It’s not as if anything else stands in comparison to them. A breast is a breast is a breast, they are nice, that’s all we need to know, move on, they’re good enough as they are.

  26. 23

    Meghdoot by Kalidas. Marathi translation by Kusumagraj is quite smoking as well. I know. Ancient and not English. I mention it because they made it sexy. Shringaric if you please.

  27. Yeah but I mean, metaphor and analogy are pretty important parts of literary writing. You can’t just call a, uhm, spade a spade.

    I mean if you want “he came on her boobs and it was real hott”, there are many, many “erotica” sites on the Internet where you can find it. But it’s not going to win a Booker Prize. I second “Whose God…” — it’s really hard to write about sex in a good, arousing way for a modern literary novel. The metaphors are silly, but if you’re too blunt it gets dismissed as simple pornography.

  28. For goodness sake, who publishes this crap! The only place they should appear in is a sex joke book! I am going to print them out and read them at snooty dinner parties!!!

    I think most of them get the ideas from their childhood, I had an aunt that referred to the female sexual organ as ‘your cookie’ (we used the word biscuits so it didnÂ’t ruin the Oreo experience) another aunt called big boobs mangoes and smaller ones lemons. The line that stands out the most to me is when I heard, while scavenging for food in a kitchen I shouldnÂ’t have been in, my aunts berating a newly married cousin of her lack of producing children, her response, “I will let the train go in the tunnel tonight” Needless to say the rest of the underage occupants of the house heard it within the next 10 minutes. If you see a brown girl making out in the DC-Metro (red line), know its me, it just makes me horny for some reason! 🙂

  29. Writing erotica is often like trying to cook from a cookbook. The meal never quite turns out as pretty as it looks in the pictures. It makes one appreciate that Henry Miller did have a bit of literary talent.

    “It was a dark and stormy night….” The original bad novel

    “Uh, that’s what she said!” – Michael Scott The Office

    “Don’t worry we’ll make those mosquito bites look like juicy juicy mangos” – Sari Saleswoman in Monsoon Wedding.

    “Me so horny” – Full Metal Jacket

  30. Asha’s Dad:

    “Don’t worry we’ll make those mosquito bites look like juicy juicy mangos” – Sari Saleswoman in Monsoon Wedding.

    This is from Bend it Like Beckham…

  31. Payal,

    Thanks. I’m ashamed, but I blame it on hypoglycemia. Been up since 5 am. Only a protein bar and red bull. Rounds, clinic, unecessary bronchoscopies ordered by attending….still waiting 2 hours for Stat chest x-ray.

    I’ll sum up my performance with a quote the father from Monsoon Wedding “Idiot!”

  33. “Hooray! Asha will see her dad tonight and Ammamma will get relief.”

    So you guys take turns?

  35. This is not surprising because desis don’t usually write OR talk about sex, apart from here on SM of course, and never inter-generationally. Here’s Ma’s take on the Birds and the Bees in the only conversation we had related to the onset of puberty: “Now don’t swim in the same pool with boys. That is how babies start to happen.” Thankfully, one of my sisters decided to fend off boredom during a Bay-Area-based Bengali gathering by telling me the facts of life.

  36. As someone recently mentioned on the News tab, this blog is screaming for a Bad Sex in Fiction-themed 55Friday.

    A N N A did respond to my suggestion with a “Hell, yes!” We’re waiting… ;).

  37. Does anyone remember the “Goodness Gracious Me” skit, paroding the pottery wheel and wet-clay routine from “Ghost”? To the strains of “Unchained Melody,” Kulvinder Ghir massages Nina Wadia’s hands in a ball of roti dough. Standing up, they bump and grind with flower on their faces, and then Ghir descends out of the frame, leaving Wadia with an expression of ecstasy on her face. Then she stops, opens one eye, and sees Ghir sitting at her feet, eating a somosa.