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There are always lots of talk around the blogosphere about how we read books. The most often--and, to me, the strangest--topic is about romance readers using the heroine as a "placeholder" while reading our stories. A placeholder acts like a "proxy," so in that sense, a reader is experiencing the heroine's story as her own. This is shocking--shocking, I tell you!--because of course that just proves that romance readers, being mostly women, are just unrealistic people who want to be, or fantasize about, being "raped," "forcibly seduced," or any of the romance tropes that bashers always sneer about. Never mind that, if we use this logic, then we must conclude that readers who enjoy crime stories fantasize about being serial murderers and torturers and those who love their fantasies are really fey wannabes, right?
Anyway, this discussion usually results in a hand-wringing party among the romance readers because everyone gets their backs up when they're being accused of actually having "rape" fantasies and living that through the heroines. Like I said, funny how this is often hurled at the female readers, but never at male readers who read hardcore murder/crime. Would they get all worked up if I accuse them they harbor violent thoughts toward women because of their reading material?
Someone somewhere in some discussion ***g*** brought up an interesting point. If romance readers choose to put on the fictional skin of the heroine, why is there so much resistance among them to read first POV? Many readers just would not pick up a book that starts with "I." I don't have this problem, but many of my friends don't buy those books, or at least, very rarely. When I ask them why, their usual answer is because they want the hero's POV too.
So, does that mean the romance reader actually use the HERO as a placeholder? Heh.
For myself, I read for the emotional engagement. If a story is well-written and managed to immerse me deeply, I do feel angry when the heroine is being unfairly treated. If the hero acts like a bastard, I want to bash him (now is it me who feels that way or me play-acting as the heroine?). On the other hand, I "jump" from one character to another, so if the hero is getting a wallop of a deal, I'm all for his angst and anger too.
This "participation" doesn't make me want to be either the hero or heroine. A good story has the power to take the brain away somewhere for a few hours and most of us who love to read know how we can be swept away to never-neverland by just opening a book. That's the magic in reading. The experience itself is a placeholder/proxy of my day (or few hours, actually). It's like this--hmm, washing dishes or walking in a bad-ass world with vampires and magic? Or, hmm, doing bills or bantering with a lord in a Regency about horse-riding and ahem, studding? Or, hmm, clean the fridge or getting into the mind of super male spy and how to take down super female spy in some mind games?
With the popularity of urban fantasies these days, which is mostly told from first POV, I'm wondering whether those who have been so resistant to it have changed their minds and are now enjoying these books? I must admit, even the best written ones made me one frustrated reader when the heroine (main character) acted incomprehensibly mullish and thickheaded. Yes, Danny Valentine, I'm talking to you.
I'd love to hear your thoughts about how you read your romances. I understand how some readers really see themselves as the heroine. Doesn't bother me at all. I realize it's only for a few hours and that it's a form of daydreaming. I do that all the time on the roof, LOL.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
The Reading Experience
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13 comments:
Hmm... what's wrong with a good rape fantasy every now and again? LOL No, seriously. It's all about the emotion for me. But I do like both perspectives which is why I avoid first person in the books I choose to read though I am still planning to read Ann Aguirre. Got sidetracked there by a couple of authors (Showalter & Ward). I think sometimes the fantasy of living a story is kind of cool, but not the story. For example, it would be awesome to have some billionaire see me and fall head over heels and try to sweep me off my feet. Not gonna happen though, but fantasizing about it isn't wrong. If the book gives you a nice escape from life for a while is that so very wrong anyway? From someone who lived almost her entire childhood in her head, fantasy ain't so very bad. It means you are maladjusted, yes, but it isn't the end of the world. Besides, if they can complain about how violent video games make people go out and do those things, why don't we say the same about books. Also, maybe some people who read crime novels are sublimating their desires to do bad by reading about people who do. At least then they aren't actually out there doing violence. Plus, who many people you think read erotica just to get all hot & bothered. I bet a lot of them. And why is that wrong? OK - I'm getting off my soapbox now. {blushing}
Not get hot and bothered? That's part of it, but certainly not all. Like Playboy, I read for the articles. ;)
So, does no one but me remember that Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series is in the first person? It's hilarious and, though you might want to know what's going on inside her mens' heads, it makes it a little funnier and more mysterious to guess. Sometimes it's rather obvious. After all, men are really pretty obvious creatures, not as deep as we might wish. And what about Linda Howards' two books, To Die For and Drop Dead Gorgeous. I would never imagine myself as a cheerleader, and sometimes it seems that Blair rambles, but still, pretty good books, I think.
I read a LOTLOTLOT of books. I read for the emotion. Sometimes a book will make me laugh, sometimes it will make me cry, sometimes it will just make me think. All in all, I read to send my mind to another place where, sometimes, these people are really having a much worse day than I am. Or, maybe to remind me that, even when my life seems like crap, I really do believe in once-in-a-lifetime love, whether I ever find it or not.
I've never heard of that 'placeholder' theory before. Interesting. And people actually spend their time thinking this stuff up? LOL It's certainly not why I read. Books are my antidote to real life.
I have to admit I'm not a first person story fan. A couple exceptions are Janet Evanovich and Diana Gabaldon. First person is so limiting...I, I, I, me, me, me...like the other viewpoints.
Monique,
Oh, by all means, get back on the soapbox ;-). I like hearing from my readers who don't frequent those forums because their opinions, I suspect, more align with the quiet crowd. Most readers don't sit and dissect their books and genres, looking at feminist issues and dissecting social meaning in each and every action of a heroine.
Rape fantasy is a very touchy issue for many discussion boards. Many readers will slap down others who admitted to enjoying the "old school" romances of the 70s and early 80s because of course, those were all about rape. In fact, it's very seldom that I don't see a reader say she enjoyed the books with the caveat that it was wayyyyy back when and not now. That's understandable because some of those books were quite horrifying in the depiction of humiliating the heroine.
Yet. There are some readers who really get into the emotional core of those books, of the heroine being humiliated and humiliated, usually because of a Big Misunderstanding, and then get the satisfaction of reading the hero's reaction when he sees how wrong he had been in his judgment. Why that is so, I don't know, just that I have read those kind of books. They don't even have to an old historical. Just pick up any Presents today by Michelle Reid, LOL. I love her, btw, but man, those books so not for those uncomfortable with uber alpha males.
I see you avoid first person books in general too. Do you feel, in your case, that first person robs you of some of the emotional engagement?
Theresa,
I loved the Linda Howard cheerleader books, as well as JE's Stephanie Plum series, esp. the earlier books. The first person POV didn't bother me too much, although yeah, it would have been nice to understand Wyatt (LH's hero) a little more from his side of the story.
I find that, if it's in first person, the narrator has to keep me interested with her motivation. If her motivation doesn't resonate, I start to "come out" of the story. That's the only bad thing about first POV for me.
***************
Leilani,
So do you read any of the now popular urban fantasy books, like the Anita Blake series, for instance? Or Mercy Thompson series?
Jenn, you really shouldn't encourage me. Many of my views on this do not align well with mainstream talk. The fact is, I see nothing wrong with the "placeholder" concept. If someone reads a book to be in that situation, who are we to tell them it's wrong. They aren't hurting anyone. I've read plenty of "rape" books in my day. One of them was a real rape too. He drugged her and raped her while she was drugged, more than once in fact. I still remember the title too. It was "Demon Lover" but the author wrote gothics, not mainstream romance. Of course, I did this in Catholic high school. You can imagine the um... impact it had on my "friends". Ultimately, we each have to judge what is best for us. If we don't like it, no one is forcing us to read it. Heck, even Judith McNaught has done the whole rape thing. And I adore her books. To me, some of those are more real than the contrived ideas of some books today. I think that is partly because I recognize that when a man feels deeply, he is also driven to do both the most amazingly good things and the most amazingly awful. Some women do that too but it is not as usual or likely.
I love Michelle Reid, but then I read every Presents my local BAM has.
As for first person POV, there are several reasons I generally don't read it. First, I tend to relate to and understand men's motivations better than women's. Most urban fantasy in first person is a woman's POV. Not easy for me to get into. Second, I write in first person POV exclusively because I write my own dreams, daydreams and fantasies and what I write is happening to me in my mind. To me, it is an intensely intimate POV. Thirdly, I do not create "placeholders" when I read. I empathize and emotionally engage but do not place myself in the book. First person POV invites exactly that kind of "placeholding" by opening the reader to "I" and offering it up.
Harlequin tried to do a line of first person POV books from the hero's point of view. I think I read one. It was so shallow and stupid. It made it out like he was so shallow. Men really aren't that shallow. Just as Jed, or Heath. ;)
Frankly, I think I should let it go there and step down from my soapbox now.
I see things like the Pensieve in the Harry Potter-verse; like a movie playing in my mind. But I have no problems with readers slipping on the skin of a character either.
Funny what you point out about the slip-skins who won't read first person!
I'm more like how you read Jenn...but I like reading 3rd POV more because then I can see what the heroine's thinking as well as the hero. I enjoy escaping to another world, but that's more so because I'm on a journey with the characters [like what we talked about in your earlier post]...therefore, I don't really put myself in their shoes, I just empathize and yes wanna bash in the hero's head when he's being a jerk in general.
I have read 1st POV books, but not many simply because it's hard to find characters that are readable with 1st POV. I did love "On the Couch" by Alisa Kwitney because it was 1st POV of both the heroine and hero. And the heroine was just funny.
JP, I like that analogy - the Pensieve. It is like a movie in your head for me too. I can even "hear" the characters speak. They have voices in my head too.
Monique,
But I like you on your soupbox! ;-)
To be honest, 1st POV wasn't as readable to me when it was popular with chick lit or detective/noir mode as it is now with urban fantasy. I think it's because I never liked detective stuff except in movies and I can't take chick lit more than a few chapters. With urban fantasy, there is at least the promise that the heroine will be as dark as the heros I tend to enjoy reading, so I dig that.
JP,
Yes, I see a movie in my head too, but with the added feature of me adlibbing dialogue and new scenes, LOL. It all depends on how involved I am with the book. A beloved scene stay in my mind forever and my digging it up for a reread is in part because of my emotional response to it, not because I want to play the part of that heroine in that book.
>>Most readers don't sit and dissect their books and genres, looking at feminist issues and dissecting social meaning in each and every action of a heroine.
WORD! I don't and i'm a writer. I also don't put myself in the heroine's place, but whatever floats other people's boats is fine with me. I also write a LOT in first person. I love it so. I hart it. Infinity *ggg*
Amie,
I find writing in first POV for chapters and chapters hard! So kudos to you. I think I've spoilt myself with switching POVs because I keep wanting to tell the other person's story too. Need practice....
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