Roma(n)ce: a primer
anonymous asked:
I’m having a bit of a problem with some of my characters… I am aroace, but many of my characters are not. So, any tips on writing romance and attraction and desire? How does all of that work? And how can I write it without having experienced it?
anonymous asked:
Hey! I’m ace but my characters aren’t all- what does sexual attraction feel like? What does romantic attraction? Thank you!!!
gracefulpancake asked:
I’m an aromantic ace, who has absolutely no idea of what attraction feels like (whether romantic or sexual) and I was wondering if you could give me sort of a crash course in what attraction feels like and how to write it as a sub plot for a novel?
(I’d also appreciate if you could answer the following questions, but if not, that’s fine)
Also does homosexual/romantic attraction feel different than heterosexual/romantic attraction?
What do people mean when they say someone is their “type?”
And are there degrees of attraction to another person? Can someone be attracted multiple people at the same time/on different levels?
This is a complex issue!
I find it useful to get a taxonomy going to start, because the language is almost useless in combining different things under one term.
Here’s a distinction I find helpful (if it doesn’t work for you, that’s fine. A lot of writing advice doesn’t map 1:1 to real-world situations. In this case I think it does, but the typing can be useful even if you don’t agree): Love the feeling, Love the choice, and Love the way of being.
Love the feeling is what people usually mean by romantic love or attraction. And even that can be further subdivided into erotic (I wanna bonk them), aesthetic (I wanna spend the rest of my life basking in their beauty), Platonic (me and thee against the world!), domestic (I wanna spend the rest of our lives making tea and raising puppies). These often overlap, of course.
Love the choice comes in when you don’t feel love in the moment, but choose to let love guide your action and interaction anyway. People often use child-rearing as an example, or when you have an argument, but lots of people choose love without the gooshy feelings, and for a lot of reason.
Love the way of being is kinda light, saintly love, generally not used for grounded characters at all. But I think we all have met someone like this, even if they are not always like this.
Another triad people like to throw around has Greek roots: Eros (erotic or romantic love), Phileo (”brotherly” love, though it doesn’t only apply to relatives), and Agape (so-called “pure” love, usually tied with deities).
When writing characters in love, I think it’s important to pin down what kind of love you’re talking about. It will make it easier to keep the actions and dialogue more consistent.
As for the feeling? Soooo varied. Love is a feeling/Eros tends to be illogical. Somewhat compulsive and impulsive. It tends to narrow focus, so the object of affection is the only important thing in the world. This is true even in horrible, abusive versions! Some people have anxiety, butterflies in the stomach, sweat. Some feel weak at the knees at the thought of them, or smell of them, or sound of their name, or any moment shared.
I think once someone gets up the nerve to let their loved-one know how they feel, if they are denied, they can be crushed, and perhaps angry, as all that came before seems to be the universe promising success. If their affection is returned, there is often a time of NRE, or New Relationship Energy, where they tend to ignore their friends and outer lives for a while and spend time just focusing on each other, with childish wonder (and sometimes bonking).
As the NRE fades, life gets back on track, and they tend to start to explore the other kinds of love, and what their relationship will look like over time. If they have very different ideas about that, the relationship will tend not to last very long.
Also does homosexual/romantic attraction feel different than heterosexual/romantic attraction?
The main difference is that LGBT have a smaller pool to choose from and they may not know if the object of their desire will turn out to be a dangerous homophobe.
What do people mean when they say someone is their “type?”
Often observational: someone just notices a pattern of similarity in the types of people they have been attracted to. Some people stay strictly to a type, some only vaguely to a type or many types, and some try to actively subvert any perceived type.
And are there degrees of attraction to another person? Can someone be attracted multiple people at the same time/on different levels?
Yup! Definitely. In addition to the categories I named, you can imagine each of them on a slider (and there are many I didn’t get to as well). And it is absolutely possible, even common, to be attracted to more than one person at a time, in different ways or at different levels.
~~Mod Scix