Author David Guterson said that he wasn’t surprised when he heard that “Ed King”,  his novel about the Oedipus Rex complex, had won the Bad Sex award from the Literary Review. The purpose of the award is to shame authors who highlight sex in a “crude, tasteless, and often perfunctory way” so that there won’t be as many bad sex scenes in contemporary literature.

Guterson’s thinking about the award is that Oedipus was not necessarily known for good sex scenes. My thinking about his award is that there is absolutely no such thing as a good sex scene involving a mother and her son. If the quotes from Guterson’s novel “Ed King” are any indication, this year’s bad sex award is extremely well deserved. Here are a few choice quotes:

• "In the shower, Ed stood with his hands at the back of his head, like someone just arrested, while she abused him with a bar of soap."
• “Then they rinsed, dried, dressed, and went to an expensive restaurant for lunch”
• “massaged, kneaded, stretched, rubbed, pinched, flicked, feathered, licked, kissed, and gently bit her shoulders”.

Last year’s winner was Rowan Somerville; during the ceremony in which Somerville accepted his prize for bad sex in literature, Somerville said that “There is nothing more English than bad sex.”  (I’ll leave any English readers to respond to that comment themselves.)

Unfortunately, it’s doubtful that the award will dissuade writers from writing about sex in crude or tasteless ways; although the award itself is not based on literary merit, it has been awarded to some of the best writers out there including John Updike. The actual awards might get the writers more attention for books from different audiences; who doesn’t want to read a book with bad sex scenes in them anyway? 

Neither of the Guterson nor Somerville seem shamed or all that embarrassed about being recipients of the bad sex award. If their quotes are indication of their feelings about receiving the award, the pair is actually a little impressed with themselves. The authors should be proud of themselves; the skill needed to write about sex in a bad way is extremely important in this day and age. Where else are literary-minded conservative Christians going to get their erotica if not from “literature”?

What books with bad sex scenes have you read lately?