Zebra

They dressed in brilliant shades of red and pink, in chiffon and satin and silk. On a hot summer’s night, some 200 beautiful people gathered at The Book Lounge to celebrate the sexiest writing in SA.

Editor Karin Schimke, and a number of the writers who contributed to this most unusual collection, Open: Erotic Stories from South African Women Writers, were there among the crowds – including yours truly.

The launch of the book, which includes PEN Award winners Henrietta Rose-Innes and Elizabeth Pienaar and Caine Prize winners Rose-Innes and Mary Watson, as well as poet Antjie Krog, was largely organised by the writers. Led by the indefatigable Suzy Bell of Dark Lunch Books, a splendid party was organised, facilitated by sponsored airfares from Mango, cupcakes and bustier cake baked by Carol Walters, wine by Leopard’s Leap, chocolates from Lindt and Pernod-Ricard South Africa for Kahlua. Kahlua sponsored the fabulous black and white Russian martinis which lent a certain cachet to the evening. Guests who purchased a copy of the book were treated to a tube of lube from Marina Green of Whet Sensuality Emporium, who also donated the gifts for the organisers (see edgy comments below…)

Helen Moffett said, “I always thought this was a pretty big deal: South Africa’s first ever collection of erotica by women, for women. Well, that’s what we thought at first, but some of the biggest fans so far of this feisty little book have been men. On reading the first story (which neatly flips the traditional tale of voyeurism), Hugh Hodge tells me he laughed so hard he almost needed resuscitating.”

Schimke, who emceed the readings, welcomed guests, saying, “We are here to celebrate – without wanting to over-state the matter – a piece of SA literary history. For all that this anthology is discreetly flesh coloured and modest in appearance, it packs considerable punch.”

She suggested that the only part that should really interest readers was that Open contains nineteen wonderful stories in which the character’s lives are in some way enlivened by a sexual encounter.

“The writing in this anthology is done by nineteen formidable SA’s women writers. Between them they have lists and lists of national and international writing awards. These are bold and brave writers. Writing about sex is not easy and some of the biggest names in world literature refuse to “go there” because the path is too treacherous, the writer always teeters on the edge of mawkishness, silliness or gratuity.”

As Schimke put out the call for stories with sex in them, she said she could hear “a virtual rustling as writers picked up their cyberskirts and ran.” Still, she was very keen to do this book, “Because sex in its capacity for transformation, or comedy, or the evocation of an inexplicable Heimweh is seldom explored with intelligence.”

She noted that writers write about birth, death, work, family, celebration, the ritual of eating, memory, a return to lost places…any number of things, but sex remains for the most part a literary taboo. “I hoped to pull it on to centre stage and allow it speak for the characters because we are shaped as much by eros as we are by any number of other things. Yet it writers avoid it.”

For Schimke, and the authors who contributed, she saw this publication as an act of reclamation. “Women are sexual beings in a society that has hijacked our intimate lives, either by using sex to push product, or as a weapon against us. While we are surrounded by sex, we have it in our faces everywhere we turn, our sexuality is in turns owned, abused or overlooked.”

She said, “We are sexual beings in response to models that don’t necessarily suit us, as women, the extreme manifestation of these models being the almost mind-numbing number of rapes that are suffered by girls and women daily. What is lost is sex’s capacity for joy, celebration, regeneration, love, connection, growth and laughter.”

Writers Henrietta Rose-Innes, Suzy Bell, Sarah Lotz, Palesa Mazamisa, Helen Moffett, Elizabeth Pienaar, Lauren Beukes and Liesl Jobson read extracts from their stories. In conclusion, Schimke said, “This anthology – in its teeny-tiny way – is an attempt to reclaim what is good and valuable about sex back for ourselves. It wrests sex back from the pious, from the media and from the pornographers. This anthology is a celebration of sex the way we enjoy it.”

Funny stories, juicy stories, dark delights and sauce by the spoonful. The audience was titillated with tales of solo sex and bondage, lesbian romps and lusty goings on between the sheets and other unusual spots. There was something for everybody – even geriatric sex.

Open-minded Peeps

Book Details

• Open: Erotic Stories from South African Women Writers by Karin Schimke (Editor)
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  EAN: 9781770075726
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