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The Bad Sex Award- the written type!

edited November 2006 in - Reading

Comments

  • http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/showbiz/showbiznews.html?in_article_id=418915&in_page_id=1773

    This gives the list of contenders and some examples from their books. I think the judges will have a hard time(ooops!)with finding a winner this year.
  • Yes, they'll no doubt make it very hard for the judges.
  • Yes, they'll no doubt make it very hard for the judges.
  • Or maybe not, which could be one of the qualifying categories!!!
  • I like the last line in the report: "Whoever dares to turn up usually gets the prize."
  • Yes, I thought that was amusing too.
  • So did I.  So did I.  (I seem to be repeating myself again.)
  • Perhaps I am easily pleased, but I found the examples not overly extreme, even taken out of context as they were.

    Typical Daily Mail approach to something like this, let's hope the editor never gets as far as The Piano Teacher by Jelinek. That'll put hairs on their collective chests.
  • Random, putting the fact that it was the Daily Mail aside, it was the silliness of some of the quoted excerpts which was the point.The bad phrasing of things, I'll give you an example later on.
    Okay, writing sex scenes is not easy, and somewhere in the past threads you will find we had a discussion on this.
  • Do read this short piece about the result, from the BBC, winner is debut novellist Ian Hollingshead.

    http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6157405.stm
  • Reading the BBC and the Mail pages it does seem a good example of those that can do; those that can't criticise!

    Don't you find all this a little smug? These pieces are actually not bad; most are written from the characters POV and so are justified in the expression and style they use. Sex appears in books, to take it out would change what the writer wanted to say.

    This from the BBC:

    "The judges said 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"."

    Censorship through naming and shaming? A horrible world it would be when the academics get to tell the rest of us what we can and cannot read.

    I just have this vision of a fireplace, a group of people drinking red wine, worrying about the homeless ("...poor wretches but they bring it on themselves"), the state of modern literature ("...it's just appalling darling") and if they are going to be clamped ("...and ken wants to tax me more just because I have enough money to buy an X5")...

    It's everyone’s world and everyone can offer their opinion, good or bad, but wouldn't it be nice if someone started and award for "people who give out irrelevant and sneeringly smug awards"?

    It would get my vote...
  • Or at least everyone that can afford it... I used to live in the East End. We didn't see to many academic types down there, unless they were doing some kind of 24-hour living homeless type of stunt.
  • I was based in the East End for a while. There was a shortcut through a park to the Underground station. I didn't mind the winos - it was the rats that got to me.
  • Some of the writers actually enjoy getting on this list- Will Self I believe is one of them.
    In fact two of the male authors listed are on the shortlist for one of the mainstream awards.
    I can see why Random was getting upset, but a poorly written or awkward sex scene can kill a good book.
    Consider, if one of us presented a novel with this type of poor phrasing and description it would be a mark against our book being accepted. Once you're published it doesn't appear to matter much!
  • Random writes; "Censorship through naming and shaming? A horrible world it would be when the academics get to tell the rest of us what we can and cannot read."

    He prompts me to think this is an appropriate opportunity to bring a serious matter to everyone's attention

    There is new legislation going through its stages to be made law. This is due to Graham Coutt's defence, when charged with the murder of Jane Longhurst. The gist of his claims cite the viewing of pornographic material, enacted scenes of torture and abuse, to the extent that these images confused his comprehension of fantasy with fact. A retrial is in hand but his victims family are, understandably, distressed and incensed by his claims. Mrs Longhurst has campaigned for the new law with the intention of stopping  other mothers suffering similar anguish.

    Unfortunately, the new law takes the "sledgehammer to crack the nut" attitude which will have over zealous repercussions. As proposed wording presently stands, most adult homes contain images in contravention of this proposed new law. The damsel tied to a tree, awaiting rescue by her knight in shining armour; comic book illustrations of the Dan Dare and Judge Dredd ilk; book sleeve to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and many more.
    Penalty for harbouring such images? A statutory three year jail sentence.

    Campaigns have been mounted calling for sensible application of existing laws and judicial temperance in any new laws. Without application of common sense, every author stands to lose sales opportunity, even risk malignment, through misinterpretation of book illustrations.

    A petition awaits as many signatures as possible to gain reconsideration of the Draconic proposals.

    http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Violent-Porn/

    It's title could be less dramatic/offensive but I urge everbody to make their own investigations for the good of the majority.

    Apologies for the lenght of my post,
    Jan.
  • Thanks for letting us know about this Jan. I certainly wasn't aware of this, so I will definitely look into it.
  • Fair point.
  • I make no apology for taking space and your time to paste the following, posted on another forum.


    "Graham Marsden has started an online petition on an official Government site. It has 600 signatories so far but it could and should have 6000.

    Every argument for the proposed law is wrong and most wilfully flouts clear evidence to the contrary. Full details are available at http://www.backlash-uk.org.uk An open wiki at http://www.seenoevil.org.uk/wiki has supporting info.

    Your name (but no other details) will be public. I don't think most people need worry too much about this, the majority of signatories against this bill aren't perves.

    Please go here http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Violent-Porn/ and sign. And then get everyone you know to sign.

      The more publicity on this, the better. IF you oppose the proposals, please sign the petition and promote it on what ever other forums you use. Opposing the proposals is possible on the grounds of the rights to free speech and to a private life, which are both enshrined in the European convention and supposedly recognised in UK law. Standing up for those does not make you responsible for everything bad that was ever linked by the media to porn or to the internet! Nor does it associate you with kiddie porn, real life executions or snuff. When these proposals go through, those in possession of consensually produced 'violent porn' will be at risk of 3 years in prison and a listing on the sex offenders register. Not sure how long that might last, but even a negative CPR check (without even a charge) for someone in a sensitive job would last forever."
  • Found on the website www.informedconsent.co.uk


    As most of you know the government is considering a number of amendments and additions to the legislation governing Criminal Justice in the UK. Some of those proposed changes concern legislation which, if passed, will serve to increase levels of censorship under the aegis of the Obscene Publications Act.
    Many, although supporting the principle, have declined to sign on the grounds that they do not wish to be 'outed' to the government as having an interest in the material. The politics of fear are at work.

    Proposed petition reads:
    "We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to authorise a full and independent re-examination of the findings of the Home Office Department Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship (Williams Committee) published in 1979 with a view to revising or scrapping the current legislation concerning censorship, much of which was originally based upon false or unprovable premis."

    The core issue is not to promote pornography but to preserve the individuals personal freedom of choice. It embodies a request that the government draws upon the already recorded findings of its own committee previously funded by the taxpayer and does not place anyone at risk of 'outing'.

    The petition itself can be found at: http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/OpposeCensorship/

    Censorship laws for Adults are repressive and redundant – help repeal them.

    Censorship is prohibition by another name. History has proven that prohibition is ineffective, all it does is drive up the price and place the distribution of the prohibited commodity in the hands of organised crime.

    The imposition of censorship for adults upon the written word or images (still or moving) produced with the full informed consent of the participants is both an affront to the notion of a free society and an insult to the intelligence of the electorate.

    Censorship was originally brought in by the 'upper class' because they feared that if the 'common man and woman' was exposed to such material they would sink into such national depravity that the workforce would cease to be viable and the country would descend into sexual anarchy.

    The advent of the Internet over the past 20 years has meant that all of those images have been available, the social experiment has been conducted and no such sexual disaster has ensued. Censorship laws are redundant–repeal them.

    The Petition itself : http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/OpposeCensorship/

    The Reason behind it: http://www.ukrudegirl.com/petition.html
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