Literature Is Sexy, Believe It or Not.

Chapter 16- It's All About Sex

If you read a novel very closely you may find some hidden sexual underline meanings. In chapter 16 Foster talks about how as a literature professor it is fairly easy for him to notice the sexual intentions of writers. 

Sexual Symbolism has been around as early as the 20th century. Though they didn't invent sexual symbolism because it was considered "bad" to put in literature they found escape routs to talk about it without it being so obvious. Books were often read at the dinner table with families which is why they kept the topic of sex hidden so well.

In films when there were couples who were physically attracted to eachother they would even keep everything hidden. In all of the films back then they even put couples on seperate twin sized beds. Which I found very odd. They did that for religious purposes but even as a Christian the bible says that a couple isn't  "married" until they have sex. Sex is considered a sin if it is acted upon during wedlock. So, that makes makes me curious as to why they would put married couples in seperate beds on films. I have  personally never seen a film where that has happened, but that would really confuse me. I guess it was mainly to protect the innocence of the children. If there was a scene in a film where a couple is obviously about to have sex they work cut is to a weird, "sexual", random scene. For example, waves on an ocean, a train entering a tunnel, a campfire. I personally thought that those were not very sexual and not very obvious, but apparently it all made sense at the time.

I've noticed that sex is not at all as hidden now as it was in the twentieth  century. You can turn on a show on a kids network and you could see kids kissing, which to me is extremely weird. I feel like it was a good idea to cover up sex because it kept the innocence of kids longer. Now, there are people who read books that are strictly about sex. 

Adding sex into story lines does make the plot more interesting. It gives two characters a really strong connection and physical frustration which is very fun to read. Sexual symbolism was especially hidden when it was about homesexuality, which is a tiny bit more understandable because homosexuality was totally unexceptsble then. They were very big on church and preferred to glamorize eveything.

I wonder what made them decide to intentionally publicize sex. Did the culture change? I think that maybe people became more liberal and began more excepting of different things. For example, people could not even dream of excepting homosexuality, but now homosexuals are being granted rights. Wow! How much the world has changed.

I'm interested to see how literature
will progress in the future. Who knows what will be in books then. I'm actually pretty excited.