On writing torture and suffering

[unfeathered]

I had a brief conversation yesterday with fandom_me and _medley_ about writing people (well, usually Jack *g*) really suffering – like torture and dying – and which POV we found easiest to write that from.


The other two both said they preferred to write from the POV of the person (i.e. Jack *g*) doing the suffering. I said I found it a lot easier to write from the torturer's POV, which did worry me a bit – well, it has been worrying me a bit ever since I started Master Plan. So it got me really thinking about it.

The thing that's really weird is that I have written a lot of torture from the victim's POV. I have a hugely long series of stories which I started when I was about 13 where this poor guy gets captured and tortured a lot. It wasn't until I reached my 20s, really, and started the last one of those stories (which is the really, really long fic of doom I have mentioned occasionally) that I began to realise it was the D/s aspect that interested me more than the S/M aspect. Not that I knew about those terms, or had any idea, really, that it was anything to do with sex. Yeah, naïve little me. I didn't get that till I started reading fanfic, at the age of 30. And it was at that point that my poor victim character became a sex-slave and started discovering he liked it.

Yeah, nobody's ever going to see that story. It's very much my voyage of self-discovery, and while I'd love to share some of the very hot sex scenes… No. *g*

Anyway, the point is the first sentence of that last paragraph I wrote a lot of torture from the victim's POV. But now that I'm writing fic that's actually intended to be read by other people, I find myself unsure of my ability to write that, because I simply don't have any experience of major pain and suffering. Also, I write in a lot more detail these days, and I don't particularly want to have to imagine that degree of suffering. Perhaps it's also that there's a point, fairly early on in torture, where it stops being sexy and starts becoming a turn-off. Not to mention that anything with blood is a total squick for me.

And, however disturbing it may be to be able to associate oneself with a torturer, it's a hell of a lot more comfortable for me to imagine the glee and the satisfaction of the person making the other one hurt, than to imagine the horror of what the victim would be feeling.

There may also be something there about enjoying writing the one with all the power. Because this is non-con I'm talking about here, not power-exchange, so the power is very much one-sided. With consensual stuff, I'm just as happy to write the submissive, because I know that whatever's being done to them, they're happy with it.

OK, that went on a bit and revealed rather a lot and I'm a bit nervous about posting it now, but hey, why am I here if not to share? :-)

Comments

[smithy161.livejournal.com]

Wow, this is interesting. Not really sure I've got anything to add/ask, but it's got me thinking. A lot of my flist are really good at this D/s thing, and it's fascinating.

Actually, maybe I will add something. As a reader, I find it way more comfortable reading from the torturer's point of view. I recently read a couple of books where one of the main characters is an inquisitor, and his reasons and motives are the most interesting part of the novels. I don't like seeing through the eyes of powerless people. If it was consensual D/s, then the sub's PoV would be interesting, but in non-con it just makes me uncomfortable, and since I want to know why it's happening, I want to be seeing from the dominant viewpoint. You can only get down to the reasons and the answers in non-con if your main point of view is that of the torturer.

[unfeathered]

Oh, good, always good to get people thinking! :-)

And interesting that you feel the same as me about that.

And very interesting what you say about wanting to know why. Because I have read a fair few non-con things - hell, actually most Dick Francis books have a bit that comes into that category and they're always from the victim's POV but I still like those, even if I cringe a bit - so maybe it's if they're well-enough written as to get that across?

[smithy161.livejournal.com]

I always go for the point of view that needs the most explaining. The closest thing I've ever written to this is "Irony", which was Jack/Master, and I went from Jack's PoV even though he was quite definitely the sub - it was him with the motives. He had decided to come to the Master, who was merely reacting as he predictably would to a pretty little human offering itself.

*Explored own head.*

Not heard of Dick Francis. I'll look him up.

[unfeathered]

That's really interesting. I've never thought of it quite like that before but it makes a lot of sense.

Dick Francis writes thrillers set in the world of horse racing. I'm not interested in horses, but the thriller part is great. Very well-written. Let me know if you want a rec - I'd have to think which ones are best! :-)

[smithy161.livejournal.com]

I'm not big on thrillers, but I'll give anything a go (hell, I got through TWO Dan Brown books). Please, rec away!

[unfeathered]

I'll have a think/look. :-)

[unfeathered]

OK, see the thread just below for my discussion with mad_jaks and travels_in_time, but my recommendations out of that lot are:

The Sid Halley ones (Odds Against, Whip Hand and Come to Grief)
To The Hilt
The Danger
Forfeit
Rat Race
High Stakes

I should have a look at the blurbs for those and see which appeal to you. :-)

[smithy161.livejournal.com]

Thanks! You may have seen my other post, about looking for reading material, so I'll add these to my list to take to the library.

[unfeathered]

Er - no, I seem to have skated over that one somehow!

Ah well, you'll have lots to read.

Wish I had time to read. I miss curling up with a book.

Well, I'd have time to do that if I stopped spending hours every day on LJ... *g*

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

Okay I love you with a passion and I've read just about every Dick Francis there ever was so now I *need* to know where you see noncon that I don't...

[unfeathered]

Hmm, I may have got myself a little confused with my definitions there. :-)

I meant the kidnap and torture and stuff like that.

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

Yes after I was out of the house it dawned on me what you actually meant. Though Daria and whatever his name was in the one before Whip Hand (dammit I am BAD at titles) smashing Sid Halley's hand to bits in the weighing room is definitely torure and she was *so* getting off on it...
/ends ramble

[unfeathered]

I can never remember most of the titles either. But yeah. Definitely that one! *g*

Care to mention any to recommend to smithy161? My mind has gone incredibly blank and I haven't had time to look up a list. And I like so many of them, it's hard to single out one or two!

[itsarift-thing.livejournal.com]

What's she after I kind of noticed you were chatting but I'm getting a bit past navigating my way around right now.
I like nearly all of them but if she's after that *points at Daria* kind of angle there's um any of the Sid Halley ones (except for the very newest one which has really disappointed me), The Danger, Nerve (I think it is - where he ends up chained up in the stable?), Forfeit, Bonecrack and the one with the wine merchant... UM Proof is it? Shattered has quite a bit of threat in it if I remember rightly and there's another one kind of the same feeling toward the end with some guy that makes toys..?

ER yeah total fan just incase you hadn't already guessed!

[unfeathered]

I don't think she's after anything in particular - I just said they were thrillers and she said she's not really into thrillers but she'll try anything...

I've read all of those. Wasn't particularly impressed by Proof, which I only got last year, and I think I've only read Nerve once (if that is the stable one - I've been trying to remember where that came from!). And yeah, the toys one is good - I read that last year which means I must own it but I can't remember what it's called. I can't actually remember which ones the other ones you mentioned are but I know I've read them. Grr. Why can't he call them "The one with such-and-such" like Friends episodes?

[itsarift-thing.livejournal.com]

I read Proof when it was first serialised in one of the Sunday papers and remember being totally freaked out - I think I was in my late teens... And I've always been a whisky drinker so the background stuff in it appealed to me too. The one with the toy maker is driving me nuts - the toys are Rola toys and I can see him explaining how they work and everything and there's physics geekery in that one too (that I didn't even have to read the explanation for because I know/knew how to use a micrometer screw gauge). I am such a nerd...

Oh and there's Blood Sport the beginning of that's good

[unfeathered]

Ack, I need to go and look up which ones are which!

[itsarift-thing.livejournal.com]

I always remember which one Blood Sport is just because the guy is so suicidal at the beginning. And the opera connestions...

[travels-in-time.livejournal.com]

I liked "To The Hilt", about the guy who's hiding the antique artifact for his family, and "Hot Money" was my favorite because of the crazy extended family, and "Rat Race" because for some reason I loved the pilot hero and his friendship with the superjockey, and "Reflex", about the photographer whose mother kept abandoning him, and "High Stakes" was the one with the toys.

But those are all ones in which the "suspense" element is minimized, as I don't do so well with suspense. I've only read "Proof" twice, and it was years after I first read it that I was able to go back and read it again.

No, I do not have...*counts*...35 Dick Francis books sitting on my bookshelves, why do you ask?

[unfeathered]

Oh yes, To The Hilt was actually my first thought for a rec - I really like that one. Hot Money was the first one I read, though I don't think it's one of my favourites. Yeah, I like Rat Race too, and Reflex was actually the last book I read, though again I don't think it's one of my favourites.

Oh yes, High Stakes. Liked that one.

OH, and the one with the reporter guy with the paralysed wife. I really like that one.

I haven't counted - probably about 20 - but I only started buying them a couple of years ago when I'd read all the ones the library had several times. :-)

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

High Stakes you absolute STAR I was so tired last night I really couldn't go to search and it would have been bugging me later today... To the Hilt *is* very good too *nods*

I wish I had that many Dick Francis books sitting on my shelf UNfortunately the beginnings of my collection of those (and pretty much the rest of my fledgeling library actually) were *given away* by my mother to a Christmas book drive one year while I was still away at school. She really didn't get that I could reread them over and over!

[unfeathered]

Oh, parents who throw away things without asking are awful! Andy's dad threw away loads of his stuff. I'm lucky in that mine just makes me take stuff home so I have to throw it out! *g*

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I really want to reply to this is a way that makes sense and is insightful, but I have so much to say about the subject I'm not sure I'm going to manage to even make sense, especially this early in the morning.

Basically, for all I made a crack about being a masochist and therefore writing the 'victim' POV, I wasn't being serious. There are tiers that help me determine what I'm going to write, starting with: Which character do I know the best, can I motivate the most easily, and feel most confident writing. That's Jack for me, in DW/TW fandom. (And interestingly I have stuff in progress where he's the one being the 'bad' guy, and my POV is still with him).

The second degree of determination for POV in these torture scenes is how uncomfortable I want to make the reader. I'll be honest. Sometimes ? I want it to be in your face, personal, uncomfortable, and make people flinch and squirm and *FEEL IT*. The person inflicting the damage? Their emotional response is different and so far not the one I've wanted.

And finally, and allow me to be blunt: I have no desire to understand the motivations and payoff for non-con as well as I would have to to write from the rapist/abuser's POV. Until this point I've been discussing general torture, and except non-con I will write (again) from the POV that I : A-) Know best, and B-) Will give me the tone/theme/feeling I want for the story. Non-con's different. It's just a hard line "Not going there."

Anyway! Point being. It's a big old tangled up thing and people make assumptiosn and it's both personal and not and just. WEll. MEssy.

[unfeathered]

Morning! I was starting to wonder if you were ever getting up! :-)

I'm off to work now, but I'll come back to this later.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I slept really hard and it was good!

Travel safe!

[unfeathered]

Which character do I know the best, can I motivate the most easily, and feel most confident writing.

That's interesting, because it never occurred to me to think about who I know best. I just go with whoever speaks to me (or through me).

Which may be the same thing, I just don't analyse it so much (or not before hand).

Actually, I think that response can go for your second point too, about making the reader uncomfortable. I just don't analyse it before I write it. I just write it - and usually with the intention of it being hot. Which is probably why I have been so disturbed when what I've written has been... disturbing.

I am discovering all the time how un-self-aware I am!

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's that you're un-self-aware, exactly, I think I just analyze the shit out of everything, including myself. Which isn't exactly the same thing. Maybe I've been in fandom too long, or something, and have started treating myself like a character. *G*

[unfeathered]

Yeah, it's just weird because I analyse everything too. Episodes, other people's writing, my own writing after it's written. I just find it hard to analyse stuff before I've written it. Hard to write to get an intended effect. Hard to know what the hell's going to come out.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I. Have a bit of both in my own writing. I make some very deliberate decisions and do a whole lot of weaving things to get what I'm after, and I always have a very specific goal. But at the same time - I can't judge my own writing. I can't be objective about the story. I can try to do things, but have any real opinion? Not so much. It's just kind of there once it's done.

Huh. That's really interesting.

[unfeathered]

Oh yeah, judging the result is really hard. (That's what betas are for! *g*)

But yeah. Mostly I'm just aiming for hot. Beyond that, or if it's not porn, I'm just aiming to let the characters do stuff that's in character and let them tell the story.

Hmm. Now that's interesting too.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

It is interesting. I think it's possibly (and I've noticed this recently) that it's less often that I'm telling a story, as such, and more than I'm trying to put something across - and it's a dynamic or an emotion, and has little to do with action.

*learns stuff and adores you for it*

[unfeathered]

*adores you back*

Thinking about it, that sounds like what you write. We do both do very different things with the same sorts of ideas - or should that be we approach them in different ways?

You try to make a point; I just sit back and see what happens. ;-)

[becky-h.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I don't know if it's so much a 'point' as an idea (if only because making a point sounds holier-than-thou to me, honestly, and I'm skittering away from the phrase) but I have very few *plot* bunnies, and when I do the writing's entirely different. But the approach is definitely different and that makes me glee.

[chatona.livejournal.com]

That was interesting. I think it's great that you do know your own motivation in all this. I never thought about these things because while I might say that I like to torture my characters, it's never actual torture I'm talking about. But I'd imagine it'd be easier to identify with the torturer because they do have all the power and... I don't know if this just concerns me or if it's other people as well, but I'm already scared enough of giving up control in real life, I don't want to imagine it in fiction. Don't mind reading about it, but putting myself into a situation (aka writing a POV) in which I/the character is helpless and powerless? I don't think I could do that and be even remotely comfortable doing it.

... God. It's a good thing I don't write torture.

[unfeathered]

I think it's great that you do know your own motivation in all this.

Well, I'm kind of finding it out as I go along, but yeah. *g*

And that makes a lot of sense, about giving up control. I like to fantasize about it, but I don't know how I'd handle the real thing.

[chatona.livejournal.com]

I know I wouldn't be able to handle it very well. Been there, done that, still have the issues. Of course I've never been tortured or anything, but psychology is a bitch. And I absolutely hate helplessness.

[unfeathered]

In that case, you should definitely stay away from writing torture! :-)

Btw, you did get my email the other day, didn't you? (Just checking)

[chatona.livejournal.com]

Believe me, I will :D

I did and I meant to reply to it. Damn it. I'm sorry! I knew there was something I'd forgotten. I did get it and thank you very, very much and I added stuff and changed stuff and your comments were very helpful.

[unfeathered]

It's OK. I just wanted to make sure you'd got it. :-)

[chatona.livejournal.com]

's not okay. I normally have better manners than that. I'm sorry!

[unfeathered]

Forgetting things is not bad manners. I forget things all the time! *g*

[chatona.livejournal.com]

But I shouldn't forget these things *bangs head against desk*

[morgynleri]

Huh. *tries to arrange her thoughts* I could spend hours just trying to get my brain wrapped around why I write the POV I do when fiddling with power-play or non-con. Or other BDSM stuff. 'S nice to figure out why people write what they write, though. A bit of insight into what makes them tick.

I know, for me, when writing power-play, I can write it from either point of view without having to imagine a situation where I'm unfamiliar. Though, I'll grant, it's easier to write the POV of the one in control, because that's where I'm more comfortable, with very few exceptions. It's not often that I'll do something like I did with Fallen, and write something from the POV of the sub.

And for all that I know Ianto is a bit terrifying in Damage Control, I identify with him the most in that story of mine. His motivations I can understand the best, and the sense of control he has over Jack in that dynamic is as thrilling to me as it is terrifying. And the most intriguing, for me, to work with.

Aaaand all that is me babbling mostly about me on someone else's journal. *head/desk* Part of me knows it's how I try to control my environment (because I'll do something similar in real life, in face-to-face conversations), and part of me wants to control the urge, because it's an aspect where I haven't been able to find control... except online, I can just not hit the post button, which is what I'm contemplating right at the moment.

And discarding after several minutes of leaving the comment alone without either posting or deleting. Or editing, either, though that's a strong temptation itself.

[unfeathered]

Honestly, it's fine to babble on my journal. We all do it and Becky and I have definitely agreed to stop apologising for it. Because honestly, talking is what we're here for!

And it is interesting. I love talking about writing. It's probably the thing I love most about LJ. Till I came here, I had virtually no-one to talk to about writing, who understood and who could talk about it from their own perspective.

On the actual subject of the post... I have to state at this point that (in case you haven't seen me state it already) I have absolutely no real life experience of any of the things I'm writing about, so everything is unfamiliar in that respect. I suspect that may make it easier for me to write the torture and stuff from the perpetrator's POV.

What surprised me initially, and made me think about this enough to post about it, was that I've always identified with the victim/submissive before and so it was a bit weird to realise that I found it easier to write some things from the opposite POV. :-)