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Author Topic: Extremely Touchy Sensitive Historical Novel Issue
Survivor
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I was mainly referring to Catholicism as practiced in times and places where it was essentially the state religion. Where it has not been identified as primarily a secular authoritarian power (which has become rare in the last couple of centuries) the attitude towards the Pope among nominal Catholics has become more religious. But the idea of Rome as...well, Rome still has a lot of traction among many nominal Catholics.
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CoriSCapnSkip
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Thanks for the answers. Earlier I tried to post a longer reply, but did it wrong so it didn't show up.

Yes, I realize it's necessary to write about people different than myself, but in order to write about them I still have to understand them, and believe in the plausibility of what I have written enough to defend it when it inevitably gets attacked and tromped through the mud by people who call it "unrealistic" and "must have been written by a woman because a real man would never think that way." This is one major reason I ask!


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Survivor
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If you give your character manly reasons for the things he does, then nobody is going to think of him as being written by a woman. Even whatever kind of jizz-buckets you think you've got to please. Try this, you want to elicit "this must have been written by my great-grandfather because no young man would ever think that way."

Think of it this way. Your character, as nice a guy as he is, wouldn't even hesitate to kill a man who did certain things to his little sister. He lived in that sort of time, when being nice and Christian simply didn't mean what people think it means today. And, if you want to give him that sort of integrity, he wouldn't hesitate to kill himself before doing those things to someone else's little sister.

That's a man. Nobody will think, even for a moment, that he's a woman.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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True. I'm just projecting ALL my anxiety towards this right now. If EVERYTHING about the book isn't good enough, including difficult concepts, then I'M not good enough! So I ask a lot of questions to sort of form a platform, rather than just rushing in and finding...quicksand!
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CoriSCapnSkip
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Oliver, you are something else! How did you make the post with all the quotes from other posts? I wanted to quote something you said and add a comment, but couldn't find how to do it. Just like people...some boards tell ya, some don't.
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oliverhouse
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quote:
Yes, I realize it's necessary to write about people different than myself...
And I know you do, or you wouldn't ask and I wouldn't waste my time replying. Sorry if that came off as snitty; that wasn't the intent.

quote:
Oliver, you are something else!
A blast at parties, specifically...

quote:
How did you make the post with all the quotes from other posts?
Put [/QUOTE] after the material you want to quote, and [QUOTE] before it. (That sounds funny, and normally I'd say that in the opposite order, but that would have quoted the phrase "before the material you want to quote, and" instead of showing you the square brackets and all that jazz.)

If you ever want to see how someone did something in a post, click on the edit button (the pencil and paper) as if you were trying to edit it. You won't be able to actually edit the post, obviously, because you don't have that person's password, but you'll be able to see precisely what she did to get the effect you're looking at. Good stuff.

By the way, this post has a bunch of good tips in it -- to which I just added these. Guess I should have done that earlier, but there it is...

[This message has been edited by oliverhouse (edited December 29, 2006).]


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Yeah, I did that...with the edit button...but then I forgot to copy and paste, and just hit "Submit" like it was a regular post, so of course it was lost.... I'll go back and do what I meant to, and hope to get it right this time!
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CoriSCapnSkip
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quote:
To be clear: sex itself wasn't bad (that idea's actually a heresy in the Catholic Church), as shown by the fact that people often had larger families then, but it had its place.

Thanks, I didn't know the Catholic Church's position on this. My church teaches that the Catholic Church views sex as a "necessary evil," not a good. If this is not the Catholic Church's position, either the Catholic Church's position has changed, or my church has got it wrong. So the clergy who take vows of celibacy do so for other reasons, not because sex is viewed as evil?

quote:
_You_ don't need to think that way; but until you understand that people did, I don't think you'll understand why "sex=cool and liberated / no-sex=uncool and repressed" equations don't work. You'll continue to project your own biases onto the time you're writing about.

They aren't my biases, they are my insecurities based on OTHER people's biases which are pronounced enough to become part of the culture. What's more, my insecurities just got a great big boost from having it confirmed in the last few months that I have a unique brain configuration making me see things differently from well over 99% of people living on this planet. THIS is what's "keeping me from getting laid"--PERIOD. I AM CONVINCED OF THIS! I am not, REPEAT NOT, gay, frigid, religious fanatic, or man-hating radical feminist, and I'm not even ugly, so that limits possible explanations!

As far as actual relationships I've about given up but I am EXTREMELY WORRIED ABOUT MY WRITING due to the fact of being so very different from other people. If I am really *that* different, can I understand people enough to write about them, or is anything of interest to me going to be of enough interest to enough other people to even bother? Yet, look at someone like J. M. Barrie who some actual very VITAL physical and psychological differences. Okay, he was never going to write about sex--or want to. But he did write things that had meaning for many other people.

quote:
Which doesn't mean it won't sell -- Lord knows we've seen some travesties of historical misunderstanding out there -- but it won't be right.

Actually, I am out to be the anti-John Jakes, but it won't do simply to write about people who happen to behave differently than his characters. I have to BLOW THEM OUT OF THE WATER, DAMMIT! To do this I need proper ammunition.

quote:
The Gnostics and Manichees (and their variants) believed that the world was created by the Bad God of the Old Testament, and that everything made of matter was inherently evil; sex, being linked to procreation, was also evil. Only the Christ of the New Testament was good, and wholly spiritual; his body was an illusion.

THE ALBIGENSES ARE COMING! THE ALBIGENSES ARE COMING! Sorry, couldn't resist that, and had to get it out of my system. A lady I knew worked in a nursing home where an old lady patient regularly yelled that phrase. Now, having done a bit of reading on the crusades, I had an idea what Albigenses were. She had to look it up! And her question was: why in the world was an elderly nursing home patient in the American midwest worrying about attacking Albigenses?

quote:
Gnosticism and Manicheism were heresies. Augustine fought specifically against them.

Well, the pope led a couple of crusades against them. Much as burning people at the stake isn't really nice, it's just as well these ideas no longer thrive, not that they would anyway in today's hedonistic climate.

quote:
(There's also some irony in that post, in that Catholics are stereotypically known for their guilt, and Protestants tend not to be.)

That is darn ironic, as Catholics regularly confess their sins, which you'd think would be a good way of dumping them, rather than just brooding over them indefinitely. Maybe Protestants don't brood, just figure Jesus has their sins all bought and paid for, so why worry? Both kind of dangerous positions, really! A Catholic figures, well, it doesn't matter what I do because I can get pardoned for it, a Protestant, well, it doesn't matter because God forgives me--so why not do what I want? I guess I'm looking to write about a person who expects high standards of HIMSELF--and needs to have REASONS and rationale for holding the standards that he does, and what he considers right and wrong. I know fear of disease is a biggie, but can you write a whole book where one of a person's major motivations is not getting sick?

Nowadays they have abstinence support groups. Back then, I suppose there were no such things as social standards "expected" people in the "right" areas of society to remain virgins until marriage.

Just wondering if one can create a true maverick hero who isn't a rebel on this point! (OF COURSE he doesn't do other really antisocial things such as steal, either!)


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Robert Nowall
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"Heresy" is what one side in a religious argument calls the other side. Ever sample any of the "lost" books of the New Testament?

(I haven't been in a Catholic church to worship since I was eight---and, all things considered, I'm not sorry.)


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oliverhouse
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Well, let's be totally clear. Catholic theologians never really talked about sex: they talked about marriage. Go back to the Roman Catechism (compiled in the 1560's after the Council of Trent, just post-Reformation) and you will be told that virginity is superior -- but to marriage, not to sex. People who read superficially might therefore say that sex must be a necessary evil; however, if you get into the detail just a little bit more, you see that sex ("the marriage debt") is natural and necessary for procreation, and therefore, like all such things, it has its own dignity. This example may be thought too late, historically, so if you prefer you can read St. Ambrose, who lived in the late 4th century. This treatise is written to his sister, a consecrated virgin, and he definitely is writing a strong argument in favor of virginity -- he lays it on thick about how hard wives and mothers have it -- yet he says, even so, "For how could generation succeed generation in a continual order, unless the gift of marriage stirred up the desire of offspring? ...I do not then discourage marriage, but recapitulate the advantages of holy virginity. This is the gift of few only, that is of all. And virginity itself cannot exist, unless it have some mode of coming into existence. I am comparing good things with good things, that it may be clear which is the more excellent."

Celibacy of priests was instituted for multiple purposes: because of the superiority of virginity to marriage; because of the ability of the unmarried priest to be free to serve his congregation rather than a wife and children; and, much later, to avoid inheritance issues with respect to "sees", or parishes. But it is only a practice, not a dogma; the Pope could theoretically eliminate it. It is also specifically Roman Catholic. There are churches "in communion with" the Roman Catholic Church, acknowledging the Pope as leader (with reciprocal acknowledgements by the Pope) without using the same traditions, rites, and so on; and some of these churches have no prohibition against married priests. The Eastern Orthodox have married priests, and although they are not in communion with Rome, the married priests does not form a barrier to reconciliation.

That's probably more than you wanted to know, but there it is. Get me started...

quote:
As far as actual relationships I've about given up but I am EXTREMELY WORRIED ABOUT MY WRITING due to the fact of being so very different from other people.

I wouldn't worry that much. I don't know how you're different from other people, or which other people you're different from, but if you're really that different then you've got a built-in stereotype breaker: just make the character think like you do!

quote:
THE ALBIGENSES ARE COMING! THE ALBIGENSES ARE COMING!

Okay, that's either really weird or really funny. Not sure which yet...

quote:
> Gnosticism and Manicheism were heresies. Augustine fought specifically against them.

Well, the pope led a couple of crusades against them. Much as burning people at the stake isn't really nice, it's just as well these ideas no longer thrive, not that they would anyway in today's hedonistic climate.


When there were actual battles against heretics, it was generally because they were perceived as a threat to the social order, not the spiritual one. They may have been blessed by the Pope, but they were called for and run by the temporal power. If you read the history of the Albigenses, for example, you see that people like St. Dominic tried to evangelize the Albigenses first -- the goal is to save soul, not kill them -- and only when territories got out of control politically did the troops start marching.

My history isn't perfect, so don't trust me on it, but from what I've been able to read, there's a lot more to European history than people tend to see on cursory examination.

quote:
Maybe Protestants don't brood, just figure Jesus has their sins all bought and paid for, so why worry?

I was talking stereotypes, not people -- you'll find all types in all denominations. People are still people. But for stereotypes, Jews have mothers, Catholics have Priests, Protestants have only their direct personal relationship with Jesus.

That said, yes, I've been accused, by virtue of being Catholic, of not believing that Christ died once and for all. The attitude of those Christians was "once saved, always saved." And yes, it can be a dangerous position for them to hold.

And yes, Confession, abused, can be as bad. From my perspective, it has the benefit of requiring you to acknowledge what you've done wrong to another person -- you can't sweep it under the rug -- and that person assigns you a penance that is generally supposed to help you keep from doing such things again.

quote:
I guess I'm looking to write about a person who expects high standards of HIMSELF--and needs to have REASONS and rationale for holding the standards that he does, and what he considers right and wrong.

I think you can write that person as almost any type of character, Catholic, Protestant, Atheist, or anything else. The Catholic who expects high standards of himself doesn't go to confession to eliminate guilt -- he does it because he knows he's gone below his standard, and he avails himself of the sacrament for support to live up to his ideals. The Protestant might latch onto Jesus's statement, "Be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect". The Atheist might see himself as the latest product of evolution, with an obligation to ensure that the earth continues to move in the right direction instead of enduring catastrophes and having to start over (not that that fits your current story).

People of all stripes hold themselves to high standards. I don't think you need to explain it so much as just show it.

Regards,
Oliver


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oliverhouse
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quote:
"Heresy" is what one side in a religious argument calls the other side.

I prefer Hilaire Belloc's definition, which you can find given and discussed in his book, _The Great Heresies_, here:

"Heresy is the dislocation of some complete and self-supporting scheme by the introduction of a novel denial of some essential part therein."

It has the merits of still matching what people mean when they use the word in non-religious situations, of implying more than an arbitrary he-said-she-said sort of disagreement, and of implying that the argument is crucial to the systems of thought involved. More importantly for everyday conversation, it means that the Gnostics were heretics, but Buddhists aren't.


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Survivor
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Well, Buddists can be heretics too. In fact, most of them are heretics, when you compare modern teaching and practice to that of Siddhartha Gautama.

More to the point, Belloc is right to focus on "the introduction of a novel denial" of some existing scheme, but there is no need for the scheme to be complete and self-supporting, or for it to be substantially dislocated by the denial. The existing scheme need only be orthodox.

To learn everything that there is to be known about UBB codes enabled on this board (and a few that aren't), click on the *UBB Code is ON link next to the text entry box on the "Reply to Topic" page. A little below that there is a link to the Smilies Legend.

Becoming an actual writer will make you different from 99% of the population at large. That's okay, because the percentage of people who actually read for pleasure on a regular basis is pretty small as well. Which brings us closer to the point. If your audience is receptive to reading a book about some antebellum fellow who believes (despite not being a Catholic) that sex outside of marriage would merely be disgusting and wrong, much like how we would consider sex with small children, then they are not going to have a problem with the character on that basis. That's what everyone here has been telling you.

That doesn't prevent there from being a problem on some other front, but you need to let go of your obsession with extramarital sex before you can deal with the real issue.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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quote:
I wouldn't worry that much. I don't know how you're different from other people, or which other people you're different from, but if you're really that different then you've got a built-in stereotype breaker: just make the character think like you do!

He may well agree with me on some points, but my basis for thinking he doesn't think like me is that he doesn't have the same condition I have. So I worry, well, what does he think and why? That's why I ask so many questions--to see how my character agrees with or differs from normal people and their accepted standard.

I do think he has one REAL ADVANTAGE over anyone who's trying to remain a virgin *now*--sex not only wasn't as acceptable then, it simply wasn't as available.


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Survivor
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That depends on what you mean by "available".
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oliverhouse
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Even if you have a condition, you might be able to have the character think like you without having to explain why he thinks as he does. For one thing, lots of people have had "conditions" (loosely defined as "things they can't control that make them different from most other people") over the centuries. My father, for example, was borderline autistic, but nobody diagnosed that in those days.

Survivor, good point on requiring context to determine what heresy is. Relative to Christianity, no form of Buddhism is a heresy; relative to the Buddha's teachings, no doubt there are Buddhist heresies (though I'm not in a position to know).

I might agree with you on "complete", but the "self-supporting" aspect is important because there are plenty of times when novel ideas don't undermine the existing scheme. Thomas Aquinas's synthesis of Augustinian and Aristotelian thought is a good example; and although some people initially thought that Aquinas was a heretic, it was shown over time that his novelties didn't preclude any dogma (that is, it didn't go against the intellectual content of the religion). So in a sense, you're correct: the heresy undermines the scheme by being unorthodox; however, it's the self-supporting nature of the scheme that enables one to determine what is and what isn't unorthodox in the first place.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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quote:
Even if you have a condition, you might be able to have the character think like you without having to explain why he thinks as he does. For one thing, lots of people have had "conditions" (loosely defined as "things they can't control that make them different from most other people") over the centuries. My father, for example, was borderline autistic, but nobody diagnosed that in those days.

Geez, I'd never guess you were related to anyone like that. (lol)

You make me feel SO much better!


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CoriSCapnSkip
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quote:
That depends on what you mean by "available".

I mean, nowadays men have women practically attacking them to the point where they give in just because they get tired of fighting them off, whereas back then if a woman solicited a man for sex, she was either looking to make money, way desperate, or both.


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Robert Nowall
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quote:
I mean, nowadays men have women practically attacking them to the point where they give in just because they get tired of fighting them off,

If any women are doing that, they sure aren't doing it to me...


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wetwilly
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Where, exactly do you meet these women, CopriSCapnSkip? I want specific addresses, please.
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Survivor
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It's more than a little annoying that the autocomplete feature includes several misspellings of my commonly used logins. Though, I suppose that's entirely my own fault. It's also annoying that I'm so lazy that I don't bother to purge the list. Sometimes being lazy is like that. The other day my brother-in-law asked me how I work up the motivation to run around in the snow without any shoes. I thought this was a funny question, because it's not about motivation, it's because I'm too lazy to go put on shoes unless I'm really going to need them.

Anyway, as RN and ww indicate, this isn't something that happens to all men, and there's never been an age of this world where it didn't happen to some men. The difference is that in some ages it was perfectly acceptable for someone to reject such an advance obliquely and that severely limited the options of the aggressor. The point is that when everyone has greater freedom from undesireable sexual overtures, there is a lot more time to spend on negotiating desired matches that will lead to permanant relationships. In other words, socially accepted sex was more available, as well as being rather more discrete.

If your character is a "good prospect", then he'll be likely to seriously court a young lady he likes. One of the things he'll probably like about her is her chaste demeanor, which at the time was (interestingly and not entirely inappropriately) referred to as "virtue". I say it's not entirely inappropriate to call it "virtue" because I think that having sex with any guy who happens to come along is distinctly unmanly

Anyway, back to the subject. Nobody here has any problem with showing a man in antebellum Chicago acting like a man from antebellum Chicago. If it's simply not going to be possible for you, then ask yourself why you're trying to write about that period.


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Robert Nowall
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The last woman to come close to attacking me was an idiot supervisor at work...pretty much for the last eighteen years, the only women who've screamed at me were these idiot supervisors. I don't know how many sitcom episodes I've seen where a man and woman get into a loud and noisy argument that ends with them tumbling into a passionate embrace...but, for me, an argument like that kills any trace of desire in me. (Not that I was attracted to these women before...)
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CoriSCapnSkip
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Let me get this straight, Robert...your idiot supervisor screamed at you, then came on to you? Maybe she'd seen the same movies and hoped the screaming argument thing would work, or maybe she was just mad because she was attracted to you and then decided not to fight it anymore...?

Anyhow, I've set up several problems for myself with this particular story. Might as well keep them all in the same thread. Not only is my character living in a time and place requiring a lot of research for me (I've visited Chicago, but not lived there and certainly not in 1860) but he is a very good-looking and generally smooth, cool sorta character. (Again, a way I can scarcely imagine being.) If I were writing about a guy who looks like Woody Allen I wouldn't even raise these questions, but--
--he is attractive to the opposite sex
--they are attractive to him
--he has enough social skills to interact with them fairly well.

Yes, three things of which I have virtually NO experience! I do understand that it was less common to go on "dates" back then--a couple wasn't as likely to spend a lot of time exclusively alone unless engaged or thinking of becoming engaged--which should keep him out of at least some potentially bad spots. And any nice woman would be discreet even if the guy was totally hot, which should also keep him out of some awkward situations. Still, interactions with the opposite sex is a factor with which I'll have to deal. Meaning--I'm having enough trouble writing about his courtship and marriage, without dealing with previous girlfriends, but a guy like that is pretty likely to have at least had girlfriends before being married!?!


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Avatar300
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quote:
quote:That depends on what you mean by "available".

I mean, nowadays men have women practically attacking them to the point where they give in just because they get tired of fighting them off, whereas back then if a woman solicited a man for sex, she was either looking to make money, way desperate, or both.


I second the aboves. Who are these women, and where can I find them?


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nitewriter
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"Who are these women, and where can I find them?"

If you are a student at almost any university you will soon discover that getting an education can quickly become a secondary pursuit should you follow the urgings of your hormones. Should you give in to that urge, you will find it requires little to no effort. In fact the real effort is in rejecting these chances so that your GPA does not suffer.
As odd as it sounds, I know a number of guys who have successfully trolled for women on Sunday services at local churches. In fact women in the congregation often make a target
(according to a minister I know) of the bishop/priest/minister ofthe congregation. Explain it? You tell me. I've long since given up trying to make sense of it at all. In fact I've noticed that alcoholics, abusers and other dysfunctionals seem especially appealing to women. This sounds crazy, but others have noticed this as well.


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Survivor
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Women hate competition, particularly in romance. This sometimes leads them to do very strange things. And most dysfunctional males have low requirements even when they have utterly unrealistic expectations.

Courtship was much easier back in a day when most of the troublesome details were handled by third parties...man, when's the last time that someone tried to set me up with her daughter? I must be getting old or something. Anyway, I'll point out that being too popular with the ladies would be a strike against your character back when marriage was the primary focus of courtship. That is, he wouldn't want to be popular with "the opposite sex", he'd want to make himself acceptable to a specific girl and her family. Particularly her father, though if he were smart he'd realize that impressing her mother was a very good idea.

Every single romantic interaction with a different female would have to be considered a failure, at a couple of different levels. For one thing, his lack of exclusivity would be a serious mark against him for any other prospect. And if he was serious about a girl in the past but didn't marry her, then he must have been dumped, right? Either that or his first pick turned out to be so horrible that he dumped her, which doesn't exactly count as "success in dating" either.

You might give this guy an outstanding reason that he hasn't ever been drawn into a match, despite his being attractive. He could be "married to the sea" or something like that (okay, not particularly likely in Chicago, but hey). In other words, he could be the kind of guy that isn't looking. Because if he was looking, and he's all that attractive, he'd be hooked up fairly quickly. Of course, that's a good way to give us some extra tension in the story, if he's already basically affianced. And since the competitive aspect would be worked out by third parties in that day, he'd probably be matched pretty well.

If you're talking about simple social interaction, like at events and such, then it's enough to have him be polite.

Still, if you want to do a character who's a social outsider or who simply isn't interested in marriage yet, then do that. Lots of guys didn't get married till much later in life back then. Sometimes a guy didn't become particularly "eligible" till after showing himself to be successful in other fields, like business or war or whatever. And there wasn't any stigma attached to it, as long as he wasn't playing around in the meantime.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Yes, he is a social outsider for a number of reasons, no, he is not looking, and the thing about "nice women" not hitting on men back then, and not wanting competition in any age (and if he's TOO good-looking, which he is, that will automatically make MOST women feel inferior and approach with caution or just flirt in a very joking way in case he might dump on them--in fact, he probably wouldn't have a clue that they did feel inferior as he's not all that vain--) all work towards easing his way in these respects.

Does this solve the issue a little *too* easily? It's not a romance book or about a guy looking to get hooked up. Just wondering if readers will wonder, if he's so damn attractive, and doesn't have major serious personality flaws, why aren't the women hitting on him? I do have to have them hit on him a little, or something, as a third-party means of getting it across that he is so outrageously gorgeous--it certainly wouldn't do to either have him looking in the mirror, or have other guys making such remarks, as a way of ascertaining this.

Oh, one funny real-life anecdote here. I went to a dance once with this guy in high school. He was a little older, possibly a senior or even a college man, and I swear to God asked me to the dance because he was sorry for me, seeing me knock myself out decorating for this dance that no one asked me to and even fellow decoraters were ignoring me. The guy was SERIOUSLY OUTRAGEOUSLY GORGEOUS--I mean, for people attracted to the preppie football player hearty Ken doll type, whereas I go more for the thin, dark, brooding type. I had this friend who asked numerous times to see the dance photo, then would look at it and say she couldn't believe it, then later ask to look at it again. Well, years later I asked what became of this guy. He had a respectable job as a minister, but someone told me he was not married. He must have been at least late 30s by then. When I asked why not, this person said, "He tries too hard." Seriously, this is life with a true-life example!


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Robert Nowall
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I can't say any of these idiot supervisors ever came on to me---God I hope not, 'cause right now I'm repulsed by the lot of them---any more than the sitcommypeople came on to each other. It's the absurdity of the situation that fascinates me. Sure, they're funny...but they don't happen in real life...
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nitewriter
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"Sure they're funny...but they don't happen in real life."
]
Ya right. Just ask Mary Laterno - and since then there have been a rash of male students seduced by a teacher.
In the corporate world the number of suits filed by male subordinates against their female supervisor/managers is growing quickly. The reason for the charges? The men are often given a simple ultimatum - sex or face being demoted or even fired.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Hmmm...the tables have been turned.

Of course, my big problem with all my writing is obsessing about the things I don't know, or "might get wrong," rather than what I do know and feel is right about it.

[This message has been edited by CoriSCapnSkip (edited January 04, 2007).]


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Survivor
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One thing I may not have made clear...back in the day, the courtship procedure was "chaperoned". Not just in the sense that we tend to understand today, where the chaperone is simply to keep anything inappropriate from happening. In the day, the responsible adults in a young woman's life would take on the active role of finding suitable suitors

Thus, if you didn't want to get married, all you had to do was avoid the attention of older female relatives with genetic agendas. There were serious drawbacks to this system, mostly for those young women who didn't have good chaperones to find them a fiance. But that was the system.

Why are you trying to set your story there if you know absolutely nothing about the most basic social customs of the era? I'm really wondering by now.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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I DO know SOMETHING of the basic social customs. I just also know the tendency of people to go against them. That survey I came across recently, which said over 90% of people were having sex outside of marriage as far back as the 1940s, really shocked me! That was very different than the expectations which society projected at the time, or what I would have expected. Perhaps people's memories were wrong, or the survey was skewed.

As for my own story--the hero is an outsider--back and forth--from a prominent family, but estranged from them. And the girl he ends up with is an orphan "or something," living in someone's house as a poor relation or servant. No living, responsible, older female relatives. I'm still working out where she came from and what happened to them. It is my most difficult problem right now. I DO know of the people she is living with, the LAST thing they'd be thinking about is setting her up!


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Robert Nowall
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On sex surveys...if the name "Kinsey" comes up in connection with it, take what it says---anything it says---with a grain of salt.
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J
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Never have I seen a conversation sprawl over so many topics.

On the subject of heresy, I'll throw in a plug for the book "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton.
It's pretty damned good, even though G.K. (a catholic) consigns protestants (specifically Calvinists) to the pit of eternal damnation. At least he's intellectually honest about the implications of his belief in orthodoxy, unlike the effete prevarications of other catholics I know, who insist that the catholic church constitutes the only body of Christ, but at the same time lack the courage to admit the logically compelled collorary that protestants like me are therefore not part of the body of Christ. G.K. ain't afraid to follow his ideas to their logical endpoint, and for that I admire him.

On the topic of sex, and particularly on the topic of not getting laid because of being substantially mentally different from everyone else, I say "use what you've got." My thought processes have been shown to be substantially different in kind than everyone elses, and at first that hindered my romantic endeavors. As I grew older and wiser (or wilier), I used my mental uniqueness as an asset, and had to beat them off with a stick until my wife came along. Now she beats them with the stick if they even look at me, then beats me for good measure. ; )


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Survivor
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The late forties were another post-war era, lots of people who had "seen the world" and were a bit more willing to step past the boundries. And of course those boundries were already post-Civil War, after the Great War and the twenties, and so on and so forth.

And humans do lie about stuff. Call it false memories if you will.

Culture is highly variable. My own ancestors on both sides had all sort of marriage arrangments. If you were writing about 19th century Chinese petty nobility...but you aren't. But the personal histories of early Mormons were probably more illuminating. Establishing the practice of plural marriage took great effort. It wasn't easy to get upstanding men to accept it...often it was far easier to get upstanding women to embrace the concept. These guys were not looking for chances to get extra helpings. Of course there was a highly selective oversight process in place, generally the kind of man who would be looking for license would not be permitted to exercise it through these marriages, which had to be authorized by the Church. But while they may not have been representative in a statistical sense of a general population, they did represent the confrontation of an established sexual morality with a non-monogamous practice.

The resistance was not superficial. These men had lived fundamentally monogamous lives, they were not ready to accept anything else. Nor were they readily able to maintain the practice in secrecy, rumours of polygamy were abroad before anyone actually entered a plural marriage. The lesson is clear. Not only were upstanding men of their previous cultural affiliation not eager to explore past the bounds of monogamy, they were not easily able to do so secretly. Taking them as a sample, it seems abundently clear that a lot of antebellum Americans were not getting any on the side.

As for the particulars of your story...I think it's necessary to understand why and in what sense he's estranged from his family. There are various reasons for that kind of thing, and some lead naturally to the interpretation of an iconoclastic outlook with regards to contemporary sexual morality.


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Although I have some ideas as to why he's estranged from his family, and that morality is probably pretty secondary to that, there's enough I don't know that the story could still take interesting turns.
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Zero
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ok going WAY back, sorry,

quote:
I can't think of anyone who thinks Superman is a wimp.

yeah his clothes make him a wimp and so do those green rocks... long live batman!

[This message has been edited by Zero (edited January 07, 2007).]


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Survivor
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I think that the fact that judges himself by human standards is what makes him a wimp.
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Zero
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That is true. If you set the bar low enough anyone can "justify" how awesome they are. Perhaps for a superman (kryptonian?) he is quite the weakling... and so (much like a picked-on toddler with legos) he "plays" with humanity.

[This message has been edited by Zero (edited January 08, 2007).]


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Kewl. Superman is a wimp on his own planet, and superhuman here. That makes my day.
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eclectic skeptic
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Popular subject.... Who would of guessed? <----rhetorical question BTW
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CoriSCapnSkip
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The quickest explanation I can offer is, I know there are certain behaviors I feel comfortable writing about and certain ones I don't, so am trying to find some acceptable way to fit my character into something I feel comfortable writing.

Assuming there were only about three ways sex outside of marriage was "available" in the given time and place:

--Guy is so desperate he seeks the services of prostitutes.

--Has an affair with a "kept woman" not of his class or whatever.

--Desperate older woman pulls a "Mrs. Robinson" on him, and no, sorry, I don't know names and numbers of these women!

So my problem is, when he gets to the war, and a group of guys is going out whoring and invites him to go along, certainly he says, "No, thank you," but what is he THINKING?

As he's not a religious freak, I'm pretty sure he's NOT thinking, "I would, but God's gonna burn me if I do."

If he's *not* thinking, "Geez, I really want to," is he a total wimp?

If he's thinking, "The only reason I don't is fear of sexually transmitted disease," is he sensible or just shallow?

If he's thinking, "You guys are sorry losers, reckless, etc., to suggest such a thing," is he an insufferable prig? (I have to make it clear he is NOT!)

So, I have to get inside his head. I think he is confused on some levels. He is not the only one!


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Survivor
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I don't think that he would be afraid of STDs so much as disgusted by the entire notion. I personally would merely be indifferent at the suggestion itself. But the "gross out" factor is largely a social construct. Babies will happily eat their own poo if you let them (sure, they'll spit it up pretty quickly, but they'll put it right in there). How do you feel about eating, say, somebody else's poo, or perhaps watching someone eat yours? Imagine that somebody suggested going to a place where they did that.

I would barely be able to register the concept that it was supposed to be "sexual activity". It's POO!, would be my reaction. Yes, I know that there are individuals who claim to derive some kind of sexual satisfaction from eating poo or watching others do so, but it's sort of like the hot wax right on the genitals thing...I've heard of it, but that doesn't mean I really believe it.

Of course "actual sex" should be fundamentally different. Even if he's disgusted by the thought of a prostitute, I'd think that his instincts would have some say in the matter should he be confronted with a reasonably healthy woman offering sexual gratification. He might still feel horrified, but he'd probably feel tempted. There's also the question of whether he's an officer or not. If you're talking about the Civil War, they were handing out commissions to pretty much anybody who had any higher education at all. It would be very...demeaning to visit the same prostitutes as the enlisted men. Even among the enlisted men, the volunteers would probably feel distinct shame about patronizing the same whores as the draftees. Also, units were drawn from localities, so you would know the other men from back home...it wouldn't be very anonymous. It took years for the war to change the rules as much as it did, and it didn't change the existing society so much as affect the moral culture of the frontier.

If he went to fight somewhere in Europe (for some fool reason), it would be very different. It would take a serious attachment to definite moral principles to resist the various influences he'd encounter, whether as a junior officer or enlisted (and traveling to Europe to enlist would make him one hell of a damnfool, besides). The class structure meant that prostitution was far more common, and even rape was considered a normal part of pretty much any investment of a populated area, the question was whether you restricted rape to the servent classes and left the upper class women alone.

Also, you need to consider what kind of loner he is. Is he somebody that simply doesn't enjoy ordinary companionship that much? That would tend to immunize him against peer pressure, and it would make him less likely to seek out sexual gratification from common women. Those two factors combine powerfully in the event, he might really not be interested in having sex even if a healthy young female was presented. On the other hand, perhaps he's out of step with conventional morality...no, I think you already foreclosed that option.

Anyway, why are you suddenly sending him to war?


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CoriSCapnSkip
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Yes, he'd be disgusted by the gross-out factor--disease--as well as the general idea of prostitutes.

He goes to the Civil War only because he's interested in the issues at stake and feels it's his duty to be there--not because he gets off on shooting people or thinks he'll be away from family influences and more able to do things he wouldn't at home.

It would be hard for me to write about a VERY social person as I'm not one myself. I do think he is extremely smart, and impatient, unwilling to suffer fools gladly, or quietly! This would work towards waaay cutting down on any close regular circle of friends.


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franc li
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It might be worth exploring the idea that reproduction is governed not by who men can attract, by by who women choose. I'm not sure I entirely understand it, since it's supposed to turn Darwinian evolution upside down. Certainly in the case of the peacock's tail (and some conjecture, the human cerebral cortex) the resulting dimorphism makes the species less fit, rather than more fit for survival.

So this is why it can be true that an awful lot of women are desperate to get with guys AND many guys are lonely. All the women want the dude with a peacock's tail. While they don't like to compete for competitions sake, they do absorb what this "peacock's tail" is from their friends.

Does that make any sense? 'Cause honestly, not everything ya'll are saying is connecting with my brain.


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hoptoad
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hey cori,
this thread is so long and convoluted now it virtually excludes newcomers simply by anxiety about repeating what's already been posted, and a reluctance in reading the whole thing. but I have a question.

Is understanding all these permutations of catholic this-and-that really essential to this character?

Has you're question at the start been answered? If not, then, as you well know there are plenty of mormons on this site and it's not uncommon nor considered unmanly to be a virgin at the time of marriage. To that last point the opposite applies, you know the old saying 'only those who resist temptation know it's real power'.

So in the mind of some religious men, the preservation of virtue -- whatever that virtue may be -- in the face of temptation, opposition or trial, is a mark of true manhood.

That idea is an important one. The old 'he who rules his tongue is greater than he who takes a city' scenario.

PS: It seems this character is guided by his assurance of the correctness of his inner vision rather than by external pressures. This is a fantastic insight into what most men would consider true manhood. Though now considered schmaltzy the sentiment in Rudyard Kipling's If is what I am alluding to.
this 'standing fast' quality. The ability to weather the tumult and emerge undiminished.

I know you probably a well aware of this poem, but here's a link anyway if you're interested in a genuine late Victorian take on manhood. IF.


PPS: In my opinion in the above scenario he would just be thinking, 'That's wrong.' or 'I'm not like that.' and try not to think about it at all after that. The worst trial a man like this can face is having a companion who has morals just as high as his own and whom the MC holds in high regard, but who then chooses to ignore those standards and knows exactly what arguments to produce in order to undermine the MC's objections.

I don't know if that last paragraph makes sense.

[This message has been edited by hoptoad (edited January 18, 2007).]


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Survivor
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Naturally I assumed that he would go to the Civil War because of the slavery issue. Almost nobody from the North volunteered on any other basis. One reason the Union lost so many of the early battles so badly (disputed but quite clear if you do the math) is that the Northern soldiers generally didn't actually shoot at the enemy. And the fact that they all expected to go home after a few months in the field also became a major problem. That's not what I was asking. I was asking why you suddenly sent him off to war. Not that it's a bad thing, it just seems quite a drastic shift in your story.
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CoriSCapnSkip
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As my main character is not a Catholic, understanding the Catholic outlook is not at all essential to his character, but I appreciate having possible misconceptions cleared up. Not all my questions have been answered, but they have been really helped.

quote:
PPS: In my opinion in the above scenario he would just be thinking, 'That's wrong.' or 'I'm not like that.' and try not to think about it at all after that. The worst trial a man like this can face is having a companion who has morals just as high as his own and whom the MC holds in high regard, but who then chooses to ignore those standards and knows exactly what arguments to produce in order to undermine the MC's objections.

Yes, that is relevant and exactly the situation he is facing. If the person closest to him was supporting his ideals, he wouldn't have such a struggle. But neither is this person trying to make "converts" to the "dark side"--just justify his own actions. Very confusing for the main character with all the equivocating!

Yes, he does enter the conflict primarily due to the slavery issue, with perhaps preservation of the union second. And, I am not suddenly throwing him into the war--it was always my intention to write about the war but I am writing things that happen before and after it as well.


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franc li
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I have to say it is bizarre how long this thread has gone on. I would not recommend you try to encapsulate all this information in your character's thought process. We could go on for pages still about the psychological constructs that would be anachronistic in your novel, apart from sex. Does the guy think of drinking and gambling as potential addictions? Does he know of kleptomania, pyromania, and serial killing? Does he worry about his weight or the compatibility of his personality with his peers?

People in that time had other stuff to worry about. I don't know what it was, that's your job. Sexual literacy was not one of them.


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Survivor
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You also didn't answer the question of whether he's going in as an officer or not, or detail his service career. How serious are you about realistically portraying his experience in the war?
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CoriSCapnSkip
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What I can definitely say is this:

--He is under 18 (five months to be exact) when the war breaks out. You had to be over 18 to even (legally) join, and, remember, everyone thought the war would be over in a month. I doubt he even went into combat until his 18th birthday--may have been in training, in the home guard or whatever--then extremely unlikely someone at that age even with a perfect record would become an officer right away.

--He has an extreme temper--enough to clash with superiors without particular fear of the consequences--cares a lot more about being "right" than staying out of trouble. He would, for quite some time at first, not be promoted, or, if promoted, be demoted. If he left the war as an officer, he certainly did not go in as one.


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