the_comfy_chair | Take Clothes Off As Directed by Helenish

Take Clothes Off As Directed by Helenish

helenish is NC-17, BDSM themed, and an unauthorized homage set in the alternate universe created by

xanthelj in General & Dr. Sheppard and Coming Home.

I read Helen's story both as a sly, clever reflection of male/female relations in Western society, and a look at the potential pitfalls of a society with an institutionalized BDSM lifestyle. And it's an interesting contrast to Xanthe's stories and style.

First off, I have to say I feel kind of cheeky posting about this, because I've only read parts of General and Dr. Sheppard, and I haven't yet decided whether or not to read Coming Home. I have some strong feelings about BDSM, and (of course) that colors how I read stories with that subject matter. I think BDSM in the bedroom is a kink, and I take a live and let live attitude toward kink. BDSM (and Domestic Discipline) as a lifestyle is something else, and it's something which for personal reasons makes me uncomfortable.

Having said all that, I think I read enough of General & Dr. Sheppard to get something of a feel for the writing, and I think it's an interesting contrast. Xanthe's writing feels lush and emotional, sweeping the reader along like a fictional Tchaikovsky. Helen's writing is more spare, quirky and at times almost uncomfortable, more like, say, Erik Satie. And I think these different styles suit the different stories very well. I can see these two styles/stories existing in the same universe, the lush, operatic story told of people who are happy and suited to their lives in this society, and the quirky, sadder story of people who don't quite fit and aren't quite as happy.

I found Helen's story to be very sad, the only hopeful part being that John had finally found in Rodney a partner who loved him and would treat him the way he wants/deserves to be treated. I'm not sure if it was Helen's intent, but I read this as John not really being a sub per se (nor Rodney being much of a top), but both of them forced into the roles by the rigid hierarchy of their society, and going along the best they could. I read it as John being the sort of person who wants to play BDSM games in the bedroom, not live it as a lifestyle, and the only reason he wasn't crushed by this society is because he's a stubborn, contrary bastard.

I was almost nauseated by the way Elizabeth so obviously and earnestly felt she was doing the best, right thing for John with her inappropriate 'discipline', when in actuality she was more of a hindrance, just one more thing to be ignored/overcome in John's attempts to be himself and to do his job. Because being routinely beaten, undermined and humiliated is just the downside of being a sub who's trying to do his chosen job. (And, of course, he wouldn't have these problems if he hadn't got above himself and stayed in his proper place.) It felt very realistic, and therefore very unsettling, to see just how easy it was to strip John of his dignity and humanity, and turn him into a second-class citizen, essentially a slave. And perhaps it's all the more unsettling because there are still people in the world who are slaves, and who are routinely treated in degrading, disrespectful ways, and they too have no choice but to suck it up and endure.

Although it's a bit of a slap in the face to overlay this dynamic on our society and see the sub=women angle, I think (I hope) things are not quite that bad for women anymore. At least not in first world Western societies. It's also good to remind myself that fantasy universes aside, most of the people living rigid BDSM lifestyles are doing so because they want to, not because they have no choice. Nevertheless, I think this story is going to stay with me for a long time.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

LOL...hey, remember what department i'm teaching in at the moment ;-)

yes, i think we're not really differing a whole lot...i agree that helen's ultimately is more social commentary sf than bdssm fanfic; at the same time as she *is* using the bdsm fanfic conventions all the same...which, i think, makes it so good...more intertextuality and levels and layers of meaning...

Forgive me for butting in but what I have noticed is a trend in the comments for some to say how much they didn't like Xanthe's stories. I don't find that very feminist at all. Since I enjoyed Xanthe's stories because she was taking the usual BDSM story and making it into a romance, I resent when someone compares it to Gor novels. Someone else tried to say that before and its so far removed from the story.

People are going to have a lot of different responses, emotional and intellectual, to these stories, and they're going to discuss them here, and that's okay, that's good. An emotional response to someone's expressed thoughts isn't so much what we do here, though. I promise that nothing shared here is meant to make you feel dissed in any way. Disagreeing with the commenter and saying that you don't feel the comparison is a good one is fine, but please leave resentment at the door, as it can make discussion less open and comfortable.

Ok let me rephrase- if the point of Helen's story is to backhand Xanthe's stories, it doesn't read feminist to me.

Since authorial intent is another place where we don't usually go, here, I won't speculate as to what Helen's motives were, but I will say I enjoyed reading both stories in a two-sides-of-the-coin kind of way and took something different (and enjoyable) from both of them. Some readers are going to prefer one permutation of the universe over the other, obviously, tastes being what they are. I don't think enjoying one over the other invalidates either.

I agree because I enjoyed both stories but it seems to have taken on different meanings to different people and I still am not convinced it's a feminist story if the outcome is lambasting another author's stories whether that was the author's intention, as you said, is up to the author.

But I'm still puzzled by how reading it as a feminist critique lambasts Xanthe's story? They are quite different approaches in quite different styles describing very different responses to acculturated BDSM relations around which all of these worlds are structured.

The critique, after all, is not with Xanthe as much as it is a parable of real life...and Xanthe's isn't, certainly, but to say that Helen's feminism lambasts Xanthe's stories would be like saying that writing about Zelenka lambasts a McShep writer...just because it focuses on a different issue doesn't make it critical.

Now, granted, one could argue that the negative view of the dom/sub relations in Helen's story fly in the face of the ideal ones in Xanthe's, but for anyone to read it that way, they'd have to actually believe in the Romantic notions Xanthe puts forward rather than understanding them as revelling in a variety of tropes...I mean, if we actually believe that only our true mate can (and will) solve our life problems and that true love creates bonds so strong they'll overcome injuries and end in simultaneous death...then, yes, any questioning of a world that creates that might be read as criticism.

I for one,. enjoy it as a beautiful (if not even remotrely realistic) fantasy, and revel in the way physical action metaphorically represents and constitutes emotional closeness...but I still am cynical enough to understand that Helen's version of the dynamic may be going on at the same time...and might be hitting a little closer to home--in all its unpleasantness...

Yeah, I was quite taken aback by the comments to the story. I enjoyed the story (in that it made me sad and stuck with me) when I read it because it seemed a social statement about the world I grew up with in the early 70s, when I was "encouraged" by my guidance counselor to take home ec rather than shop (I was going into tech theater in college, and shop made more sense to me. My counselor said "but someday you'll want a real home and family, not that career nonsense".) I really didn't see it as existing in the same world as Xanthe's story (which I love) except for them having BDSM lifestyles in common, although I like the idea

fiamaya expressed below about possibly Helen's set in the past while Xanthe's is in the present. But some of the comments to Helen's story really bothered me, sort of "this is why Xanthe's story is so wrong" in tone. I know that not everyone likes BDSM, and people are free to not read it, just like I don't read rape!fic or death!fic because they upset me on a personal level, but I don't say those stories shouldn't be written or that the writers/readers are wrong to write them.

Thank you for posting this! I hadn't read all the comments left to Helen's story, and so I've been kind of baffled by the assertion that people were dissing Xanthe's stories, because I honestly haven't seen anything like that here in this discussion.

The thing is, comparing Xanthe's stories to Helen's really is apples and oranges because they're not the same kind of story, you know? Xanthe's are a very specific kind of romance, where things are kind of idealized and there are heroes and villians and dramatic sweeping plot arcs, and for readers who like that kind of story they are wonderfully well written. Helen's is a completely different kind of romance, more low-key, gritty and realistic, where everyone is painted in shades of gray, and again, wonderfully well written for readers who like that kind of story.

The thing is, they're so different that I think there are going to be significant numbers of people who like one style, but don't like the other. (Of course, that's no excuse for being rude or ugly about it.)

Yes! It's like comparing a Regency Romance like Georgette Heyer's books to Ibsen's "A Doll House." Yeah, they're set in the same sort of background, they use the same sort of characters, but one is a romance and the other is a social commentary.

I can only speak for myself, but I don't think I ever said I disliked Xanthe's stories. I do have a bit of an issue with BDSM, but it's a personal issue and nothing to do with Xanthe's writing.

I do think the fact that two extremely different stories--different types of stories--have been set in essentially the same universe is really interesting and cool and makes for some unusual compare and contrast opportunities.

From the reactions to the story, it has garnered some of the most disparate reactions to it from being humorous to being feminist to being sad.

I would say it's all of the above, actually.

I didn't read any humor in it, but I'd agree both with feminist and sad.

It's really interesting to see the various reactions here. I thought the story was definitely very funny in places, in a black comedy, meta kind of way (the relationship conversation with Laurie, for instance -- to me, that's painfully funny, with the emphasis about equally on the painful and the funny) as well as a helenish-dialogue kind of way.

I don't see it as foremost a feminist commentary, though I see that thread, nor do I see it as sad because they do work it out, the romantic goal of mutual understanding and acknowledgment of love is achieved, a typically grumpy and abrasive Helen kind of romance, but romance just the same.

For me the story is primarily about Rodney and John finding their way to each other and understanding each other. All the rest, fascinating as it is, is the frame that makes it possible to write these words and these interactions to show this scene with Rodney and John and that and to tie them together scene by scene to get to the payoff, the acknowledgment, the emotional payoff.

Xanthe's story is using the bdsm theme to write a glorious, well-lubed slippery slide of romance, where friction is barely acknowledged and John has to be emotionally ept while Helen's story takes them opposite and mirrored, beyond canon characterisation - John in particluar, not so much Rodney - in the other direction.

What interests me in reading other opinions and thinking about my response is how much it underlines how narrow my focus can be. Sure, feminist commentary, very clever but hey, more important: hard won, emotionally inarticulate romantic payoff.

have you seen Ces's comment to my post?

I just responded to it and am really thinking now about what makes us read slash, what our underlying desires are that come out to play...

b/c i'm with you on some level; i saw the feminist stuff, commented on it, even, but if I reread it won't be for that but for relationship and "emotionally inarticulate romantic payoff" (beautifully articulated btw :-)

See, the "emotionally inarticulate romantic payoff" bugged the crap out of me. I had no idea where it was coming from or why it was there. I see both John and Rodney coming from canon as having to work hard to talk about emotions (John in particular, whereas Rodney's just kind-of comes out), but doing it (as can be seen when John does talk to Teyla about his ffeeling), so the stiltedness of their interactions kept tripping me up. V.V. annoying, yet still a good story.

I am still thinking about a lot that Ces has said. I found her body replacement theory not a close description of what fan fiction is for me, but I didn't know how to say it in that conversation (from last week? In your LJ?). Putting in the context of Helen's story and this discussion I see why it doesn't work for me all the time. I love a big foofy romance with glamorous and beautiful and fabulous hero/ines as much as the next person but Helen's kind of story is also something I want from my fan fiction and something I reach for when I get round to writing but rarely achieve, so I triply admire the skill in others.

Hee! I'm going to have to reread the story for the hard won, emotionally inarticulate romantic payoff; not to say I missed the actual story, but I was pretty caught up with my delight in the metanarrative framework. :)

LOL...I think that stories that have such strong reactions as this one may do so exactly because we read them for different reasons and with different payoffs! (Or rather, they lend themselves to be read for different...)

I'm reminded of the responses to Freedom, where different readers took near contrary interpretations from it. And I'd argue that was one of the reasons for its wide appeal and success! (Then again, my current definition for "great" literature is writing that allows for the largest amount of literary schools to get something out of it...)

I am deeply amused that Freedom won a 'gen' category award from the stargate fan awards, as that was my reading of it. *g*

yup...mine too (and the author's fwiw :-)

Are you joking? You're not joking, are you? That's the best bit, every time John and Rodney approach but miss, no matter how bad each encounter is, how unsatisfying underlying that is this faith and hope that there's something better, something they want that no-one else has come close to offering, something worth trying for even though they're both rubbish at it and just can't seem to get on the same page for more than five seconds at a time. And the best bit is that it's not said; John can't talk to Rodney because he can't even talk to himself but he knows the most important thing about himself and that's what he's not. It's so hard for them but at the end there's this tiny little green shoot o' love, forced up between the cracks of a slab of fuckedup, gasping in the sun.

But then, I have always loved Helen's style of making characters argue themselves into love.

but....could that simply be that we read the story like that, b/c we already "know" that they belong together?

i'm wondering whether reading this about some random couple, we wouldn't end up seeing them as very dysfunctional and not all that meant to be after all...do they argue themselves into love or just make do with what's left???

Take Clothes Off As Directed by Helenish

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