We live in interesting times.
Even as stridently misanthropic, hyper-PC
“feminists” like Catherine McKinnon and Andrea Dworkin, or cluelessly detached
“thinkers” like Robert Jensen continue to insist that the gentlest consensual
sex act is tantamount to rape, BDSM has gone mainstream in a surprisingly big
way, rising up from the dark subbasement of 1950s-era “criminal perversion” and
“pathological disorder” to assume the status of acceptably edgy lifestyle choice
for a brave few. In the second decade of
the 21st century BDSM seems to be where swinging was at back in the
1970s; the stuff of bourgeois weekend diversion and wildly best-selling “guilty
pleasure” fantasy fiction; an exciting hobby, enthusiastically embraced if
still not always well understood beyond the dungeons of its true adepts.
I find Jensen’s position particularly troubling. He
seems to believe that sex, by its nature, is anti-egalitarian, because, of
necessity, one partner must be dominant while the other must be submissive.
(Well, duh!) At one point in his writings he even describes how he “tried”
homosexuality but found it no more satisfactory than heterosexuality as an
expression of equality. (Apparently he’s never tried doing it sitting up, face
to face either with a woman or another man. Tell me again why anybody takes
this guy seriously?) Given his
well-publicized hostility towards pornography—and I would presume that he,
along with Dworkin and McKinnon, is among that angry mob of blinkered
intellectuals who reflexively conflate erotica with porn—I would hardly expect
to catch him reading I.G. Frederick’s erotic fiction, certainly not in any sort
of honest, open-minded way. If he did, it’s a pretty safe bet his head would
explode. (And, boy! Would I ever pay to see that!)
Unlike those lofty ascetic know-it-alls, I happen to
think that sex is a pretty positive thing by and large; I strongly believe that
love is love regardless of the form it takes; fulfilling companionship and the
diverse expression of affection occasions to be celebrated. Let’s face it; if
two (or more) like-hearted people are lucky enough to find each other out of
the teaming billions on the face of this planet, that is nothing short of a
miracle—and who is anybody to gainsay or condemn such a rare and beautiful
thing because it doesn’t take the “acceptably traditional” or “politically
correct” form?
It may be unfair to judge I.G. Frederick’s
“Shattered” and “Broken” as works of erotica even though both books are
expressly marketed as such. I think these titles might more accurately be
categorized as mainstream literary fiction with graphic descriptions of ritual
domination and submission, and some explicit erotic content. But sex is not the
real focus of these stories, and the sooner that is made clear up front, the
better. Casual consumers of erotica bring a set of visceral expectations to any
story, and have little patience for “meta-” anything. Needless to say, these
books are not for that kind of reader. Likewise,
some fans of BDSM erotica and especially serious practitioners may be unhappy
with the novels’ occasionally less-than-flattering portrayal of the subculture;
Frederick delves into the philosophy and psychology of the lifestyle largely by
showing us how it’s not supposed to be lived, and the often blatantly
unethical, coercive behavior described in these stories can be downright
disturbing (as the subtitles promise), teetering all too precariously on the
edge of the “anti-erotic.” I believe the original publisher was extremely
misguided in its approach to promotion, and did Ms. Frederick and her work a
serious disservice.
Even so, both books have a decidedly “teach-y”
quality about them; some readers may be left wondering whether they were meant
to be entertaining, or were intentionally conceived as catalysts for
controversy. Occasionally the
story-telling takes on the tenor of an apologia; many parts read less like
artfully paced dramatic fiction than the contents of some dry psychological case
study or an extended “information dump” in a textbook on the BDSM lifestyle,
less erotic diversion than a rather clumsy vehicle of didactic illustration in
the tradition of B.F. Skinner’s “Walden Two.”
These two books seem to have begun life as a single,
much-longer novel. “Broken” and “Shattered” feature many of the same players,
and while the second book is perhaps more satisfying when analyzed solely as
story, both are rather disappointing where one considers issues of
character-motivation and consistency. Indeed, what I wanted most in these
stories—what I kept hoping for as I worked my way through them—was a character
I could relate to, or, at least, root for. Unfortunately, I came away feeling
more perplexed than satisfied; having been offered a cast of characters I could
mostly either choose to hate or pity.
The 1st-century Roman philosopher, Seneca
once said “No one can be crushed by misfortune who has not first been deceived
by prosperity.” Jessica has definitely been deceived by the illusion of her
parents’ prosperity; and when her father’s Madoff-like house of cards comes
tumbling down, she finds herself standing at his graveside, alone and
destitute. The impression we get of this woman through the author’s words is a
bit confusing; she is spoiled, fastidious, almost pathologically
appearance-conscious; self-absorbed and coldly calculating while emotionally
vulnerable; she takes a scholarly interest in issues surrounding the clinical
treatment of depression, even as she appears to lack any semblance of genuine
human empathy.
Jessica’s desperate need for money ultimately leads
her into the repulsive clutches of the head of the psychology department; a
vile, ethically-challenged sadist who promptly enslaves the young woman, and
coerces her into a degrading life of BDSM prostitution. Through a series of painful ordeals,
graphically portrayed, Jessica eventually discovers her own talent for
domination, which becomes a means to self-liberation of a sort.
When it doesn’t read like a textbook, “Broken” feels
like an outdated copy of the Nieman Marcus catalog, with more gratuitous
luxury-product placements than a Hollywood summer blockbuster. The lavish,
highly-detailed descriptions of fancy-restaurant lunches are more passionate
and sensuously imbued than most of the sex scenes. The characters seem pat, one dimensional, serving
their function in the narrative like stock players in an old-time melodrama,
baldly relaying information where needed, going through the stereotyped motions
of their parts with a certain robotic efficiency. We are told far more than we
are shown; the author cannot seem to resist the urge to explain her plot points
and motivations at length—often repeating them several times throughout the
course of the story, sometimes as dialogue, more often as narrative, as in this
passage:
“Looking in
the mirror, she stared at the chain links encircling her neck. She found it
interesting that she could disassociate herself from everything that happened
at Professor Branson’s house, but the mere thought of servicing Professor
Lawrence made her ill.”
The only character for whom I felt even the
slightest pang of empathy was Alyssa, the wise, “older” friend, who seems to
function as the author’s avatar within the narrative, delivering meta-messages
along with small essential tidbits of information where needed:
“That’s what I mean by symbiosis. I am a Dominant, a
Mistress. But without my slave I have no one to serve me, no one to make me
complete. Klark is a slave, but without a mistress to serve his life has no
purpose, no meaning. We fill each other’s needs in a relationship that others
might view as parasitic.”
Later, Alyssa ruminates on the downside of BDSM’s
status as popular trend:
“The internet had perverted the lifestyle,
permitting those with no experience to claim dominant status, and men
pretending to be submissives to fulfill their sexual fantasies without offering
anything in return.”
While this may be interesting to a curious
outsider—even quite enlightening, it hardly makes for a compelling page-turner
regardless of genre.
Where, in “Broken,” we first meet Jessica as a
rather shallow object of pity, a hapless victim, passively accepting her
enslavement, by the end of that first book, she has literally shaken off her
chains, realized her true potential as a FemDom, and found a kind of peace in
the arms of a soul-mate submissive—a BDSM happily-ever-after if there ever was
one. But what are we to make of the Jessica we encounter in “Shattered”? Though now a licensed therapist, this same
character has morphed into an ice-hearted monster with no qualms about
victimizing others for her own selfish ends; cruel, manipulative, ethically
detached, she is the true student of the sadistic professor who first coerced
and enslaved her. It may well be that we become like those we hate and fear;
but it might also have been interesting to see exactly how that happened to
Jessica.
Zachary, a brilliant but deeply troubled young man
comes to Jessica’s office seeking help. (The opening paragraphs of
“Shattered” offer a pitch-perfect description of obsessive-compulsive
behavior.) The victim of childhood abuse and deep psychological trauma, he
drifts through life, lacking any meaningful focus or structure. Jessica sees
the boy as the perfect guinea pig for a radical experiment;
“Some researchers have used pain to effectively
treat depression. Pain causes the release of endorphins, which can reduce
anxiety and stimulate your sense of well-being. They can also reduce serotonin
levels . . .”
Jessica envisions bondage and discipline—“whipping
therapy”—as a way of managing Zachary’s depressive cycles. Such blatantly
unethical, unsanctioned experimentation surpasses mere unprofessional behavior,
wandering into classic “mad scientist” territory. Fully aware of what might
happen if her misconduct is exposed, she isolates and enslaves the young man,
imprisoning him in her own personal dungeon. And when he is no longer useful to
her research, she abandons him.
One of the keys to a fuller appreciation of this
narrative is to understand that “Shattered” is not about Jessica; it is, above
all, the story of Zachary’s search for liberation and wholeness. As Jessica fades from the foreground to
become the one-dimensional off-stage villain of the piece, Zachary finds
Alyssa, Jessica’s wiser, older ex-friend, a Domina who has suffered a terrible
debilitating loss. It is through Alyssa and her profound grief that the young
man realizes the horror of what has been done to him:
“She (Jessica) only mentioned one threesome; bondage
and discipline, domination and submission, and sadism and masochism.’ Alyssa
reluctantly pulled her feet away. ‘No, there are three threesomes. Those, but
also tops, bottoms and switches, and more importantly, safe, sane and
consensual.”
Finding enlightenment and purpose with Alyssa,
Zachary begins to understand himself and his own genuine needs; “A slave should
always choose if, when, and who to give himself to . . .”
Notwithstanding its awkwardly contrived happy
ending, much of what goes on in “Shattered” is quite hard to take; gratuitous
degradation and torture, pain and abject humiliation, vividly rendered—and yet,
we are left wondering, to what end. Seeing it all in our minds’ eyes, we can
begin to appreciate the quote from Nietzsche on one of Zachary’s t-shirts: “In
the consciousness of the truth he has perceived, man now sees everywhere only
the awfulness or the absurdity of existence . . . and loathing seizes him.”
CONCLUSION
I do highly commend the author for endeavoring to
bring a degree of seriousness and intellectual substance to her
storytelling—almost totally unheard of even in the more rarefied examples of
literary erotica. Ms. Frederick is conspicuously gifted, profound in her thoughtfulness;
and clearly capable of brilliance. I sincerely hope that, in books to come, she
may hone her story-craft to a point where it is worthy of her obvious
potential.
Terrance Aldon Shaw
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