What is it about grown women and sex? Do they think it's just been invented?
When I was thirteen our (all-girls) form teacher took us for Latin. I loved English, so had chosen the 'dead' language in the hope that it would help me to become a writer. Every morning, when she took the register, Miss Wright made us answer in Latin, our surnames denoting the pecking order with the addition of 'please.'
'Please' in Latin, translates as 'si placet' (with the emphasis on the hard 'c.') . We trainee teenagers carried it off without a hitch, until it came to six, which sadly, is 'sex' in Latin. And yes - you've guessed it - I was number six. Each day for a whole year I shouted 'Sex si placet,' to the great amusement of all my friends. Childish, puerile even, if girls can be called such a thing.
Move forward to 2012 and 'Fifty shades of Grey.' Middle aged women are reading this masochistic tome on their Kindles, giggling, like teenagers and sniggering behind their hands. Did I miss something? Has sex been re-invented? Are pensioners the new teens?
D. H Lawrence, eat your heart out. Lady Chatterley might just have become a Dame...
When I was thirteen our (all-girls) form teacher took us for Latin. I loved English, so had chosen the 'dead' language in the hope that it would help me to become a writer. Every morning, when she took the register, Miss Wright made us answer in Latin, our surnames denoting the pecking order with the addition of 'please.'
'Please' in Latin, translates as 'si placet' (with the emphasis on the hard 'c.') . We trainee teenagers carried it off without a hitch, until it came to six, which sadly, is 'sex' in Latin. And yes - you've guessed it - I was number six. Each day for a whole year I shouted 'Sex si placet,' to the great amusement of all my friends. Childish, puerile even, if girls can be called such a thing.
Move forward to 2012 and 'Fifty shades of Grey.' Middle aged women are reading this masochistic tome on their Kindles, giggling, like teenagers and sniggering behind their hands. Did I miss something? Has sex been re-invented? Are pensioners the new teens?
D. H Lawrence, eat your heart out. Lady Chatterley might just have become a Dame...
6 comments:
I may not have read 50 but I do hear from some that it's utter crap. Badly written, and the sex, just a portrait of a bad relationship. But least peeps are reading ;)
I haven't read it either - only the hype - but I agree with all your comments, Blodeuedd.
Pity it's the sex that matters, not the writing ...
I know people that are reading it, or should I say the trilogy. Apparently, the second & third stories are more compelling than the first, which is reportedly very hard going, if you pardon the pun! One wonders why folk force themselves to get past the initial book if it's so tiresome. I know that if I find a book difficult to engage with, I start another. It just proves that it's the topic that has everyone hooked rather than a brilliant author (like what you are Guernsey Girl).
Thanks, Elaine - my next book is called Fifty Shades of Jealousy...
Yes, it does seem to get a bad writing wrap but still a lot of attention. I think it is the tabooness of it all that appeals to people, I have no desire to read it. As I really hate reading anything that is badly written and I am sure there are many more interesting examples of erotica out in the world.
Jilly Cooper has written a really good article on this in Times 2 today saying badly written sex is worse than no sex at all in a book - that's the end of FSoG then, isn't it?
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