Last February, an article called New Erotica For Feminists was published on McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. Written by the editors of humor site The Belladonna (a site driven by women and nonbinary writers – like the Rib for the real world!), the piece went viral, and the authors – Caitlin Kunkel, Brooke Preston, Fiona Taylor, and Carrie Wittmer – were approached by a book editor to expand it. In early March, while visiting Brown for a satire writing workshop sponsored by the Rib, they wrote a book proposal, and so began an expedited process to bring the book, titled after the original article, to the market. New Erotica For Feminists: Satirical Fantasies of Love, Lust, and Equal Pay was published November 13th, and we were lucky enough to ask the authors a few questions.
Q: The initial piece on McSweeney’s garnered a huge reaction. Other than being approached by a book editor, what was your favorite reader response to the article? To the book?
A: I think we were just so excited when the article went viral that it’s all a blur, although people did say so many nice and funny things to us. As for the most exciting response to the book, we were totally thrilled when Samantha Irby posted on Instagram about our book and wrote in a comment “IT IS SO GOOD i gotta buy a dozen more” I mean, she’s a REAL writer and everything!! It was also exciting because we’d worked hard to try to make our book as inclusive as possible, and if we pass the Samantha Irby test, we must be doing something right.
Q: What was the process of expanding the original piece? How did you land on the concept of splitting the book into chapters by vignette genre?
A: One of the interesting things we saw in the response to the initial McSweeney’s piece was that people tended to prefer completely different vignettes for different reasons. Typically in a humor piece, there are a few lines that people cluster around, but here, different elements were sticking out to people. So looking at the initial group of 12, as well as our early brainstorms of new material to put into the proposals, we started to see groups and methods of classifying them. Building out a table of contents helped us show publishers how this 800-word piece could become a 10,000 word-plus book. We could then also brainstorm and write around each chapter heading and see where we needed more and less entries, rather than write an amorphous bunch of jokes and try to organize them.
Q: The four of you obviously have a history of working well together, but writing and editing are different beasts. How was writing together different from editing together? Any surprises?
A: The most surprising thing to people who are not us is that when we say we wrote this book together, we really mean that. Because we had been working together for so long, we took advantage of each other’s strengths, interests and editing skills. While each of us certainly has a few chapters or jokes we had a heavy hand in, the book is very much a group effort. The most surprising thing might be that this is all real and it happened and is happening.
Q: A lot of the vignettes seem to be drawn from universal experiences, but others are absurdly specific (the elevator button one comes to mind). In writing this, how much did you draw from common tropes and how much from your own experiences?
A: We definitely brainstormed based on the annoying things that happen to us. (Manspreading, amirite?) Maybe the elevator button is a city thing, but we (the authors) have all witnessed a variation. Of course, we were also inspired by the news and by the classic porn/erotica tropes where pizza delivery guys and plumbers act in ways that would probably make you call for help if things actually went down that way.
Q: Continuing on the topic of inspiration, women’s rights and gender equality were big themes in the news over the past year. Were you inspired at all by current events? If so, to what extent, if not, how did you keep from letting the news influence you?
A: Some of our vignettes were definitely inspired by news events. You can see echoes of Harvey Weinstein in the starlet one and we outright mention Louis CK, although our editors thought he would have faded away by the time the book came out. (He never goes away.) With all that said, we didn’t want the book to feel dated quickly, so we tried to keep the current events references “big” so people will still know what we were talking about two years later. That said, on the flip side, we had to worry that even our “good” references might betray us during this #metoo moment.( So, keep it in your pants unless someone asks to see it, Benedict Cumberbatch, or you’ll ruin our book.)
Q: I imagine you must have gone through several revisions, including, unfortunately, cuts. What were your favorite vignettes that didn’t end up making the book?
A: Our very favorites involved a private tour of the Newman’s Own salad dressing factory 🙂 It was cut because Newman’s Own is not a big brand in the UK, but we’ve been reading it at book events and getting GREAT reactions. A lot of young women seem to have looked into Paul Newman’s eyes on the salad dressing label growing up! And his commitment to Joanne Woodward, his long-term partner, and the fact that all the proceeds go to charity make that even more fantastic. We are searching for a home for that one (it’s a longer one), but while we look, we’re going to keep reading it and invoking that steamy organic pleasure around the country.
We tried, rather desperately to get a Harry Potter vignette in the book because it is a pop culture staple, and very popular in the erotica world. but all of our ideas were cut, and we … understand why looking back because while they were very funny, they were maybe a little too specific and sexual.
Q: I love the doodles at the beginning of each chapter! What was the collaboration process with your illustrator, Sarah, like?
A: Sarah Kempa is so amazing! We met her online, the same way we met each other – she submitted a piece to The Belladonna, totally blind, and we loved her work. When our publishers asked us for line drawings we considered several people, but we felt that Sarah really already embodied humor and wit in most of her work in a way that felt really similar to our writing. She worked on a VERY compressed timeline (two weeks to do all the concept drawings, sketches, and final drawings!) and was insanely professional and on top of it. We met het for the first time the week that the book launched and it was so magical to see a relationship born out of The Belladonna yield such lovely comedic fruit. It was her first credit illustrating a book! And her Instagram following has increased by about 10,000 people since we started this process, so her star is clearly rising as well, which is the goal of The Belladonna – to rise together!
Q: It’s so wonderful that you included a list of ideas and resources for making a difference. How did that come about?
A: We really wanted to emphasize the serious nature of the book, and point out that it’s actually NOT OK that so many of these “fantasies” were just a desire for equality. So we thought that crystallizing all that into action steps at the end, little ways people can try to change their behavior on a personal and community level, might be a good way to help people finish the book feeling somewhat empowered rather than just deflated a bit. We want them to have an empowering laugh and then get down to the more serious side of making these fantasies a reality! We have a living resource list on our website where we keep adding books, podcasts, places to donate, etc. so people can find the best way for them to make a change. We also have a fun book club kit on that page!
Q: I know it’s important to you to promote this book on college campuses, and I agree all college students everywhere should read it. Since colleges are a place of learning and education, I have to ask: What was the most important thing you learned while writing this book?
Caitlin: For me, I learned that even as a very, very avowed and active feminist, I’ve internalized the patriarchy in ways that I don’t even know or understand fully at all times. My “fantasy” was that Congress would be 50/50, or that someone would just act appropriately. I definitely learned that I need to try and make bigger waves and ask for and seek out more for myself.
Fiona: I echo Caitlin’s answer about learning how deeply entrenched the patriarchy is in my very mindset (although I’m not going to lie–the 2016 election really showed me just how our society is deeply invested in discrimination of all forms). I worried about trolls while writing scenarios and also that we’d be accused of “hating men” if we had a vignette where women were–gasp!–the majority. It’s also deeply interesting to me that, when we do an exercise where audience members write their own feminist fantasy, the vast majority are about safety issues (and are also hilarious). Women (and non-binary people) just don’t feel safe.
Carrie: I read a LOT of actual erotica for research and inspiration and wow, most of it is really bad and does not make me horny, so I learned that. And the more we wrote, the angrier I got. So I think the most valuable thing I learned throughout this process was how to be a better intersectional feminist, especially while writing our resource section, which was the one portion of the book that we wrote and workshopped in person. That immediately drove me to be better, more vocal and active in all the causes important to feminists.
Brooke: I agree that this book writing process has taught me how much even committed feminists have been conditioned to patriarchal thinking from birth. We also realized to an even deeper degree how sad and unacceptable it is that women and non-binary individuals still feel like a basic feeling of safety and well-being still feels so far from reality. We’re learning a little more every day about how to show up for women, trans and non-binary people, and hopefully continually learning how to leverage our privilege to help make disenfranchised voices louder and stronger. We’d be so pleased if this book helped compel readers to take meaningful steps in their own lives.
Q: Sequel?
A: That depends on if enough people buy it and talk about it and review it and love it!! We would LOVE to write a sequel – talking to people about the book has sparked so many more ideas for us, and with a little more time (we wrote the book in three months!) we think we could be even more creative and far-reaching in our fantasies. So we are on board for sure 🙂
Thanks, ladies!
Be sure to check out New Erotica For Feminists, on shelves now.