Interview With Erotic Writer and Editor Rachel Kramer Bussell – New York Magazine

 

Many of you may know the erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussell. You may have read her stuff or even have submitted some of your writing to one of her publication (like I have).

In the interest of helping you gentlemen understand women better, I thought I’d post this podcast Rachel did with New York Magazine’s podcast entitled “Sex Lives”.

It’s from 2017.

Apparently Bussell was in law school when an event happened that dramatically changed the course of her life…

Bussell wrote an erotic story inspired by Monica Lewinsky.

The rest of Rachel’s story is history.

Although this interview gets pretty fun… the ladies talk about political and celebrity erotica. They bring in Kanye, Kim Kardashian and even Sarah Palin and The Donald.

It’s worth having a listen.

 

Have a listen for yourself and let me know what you think. Have you read Rachel’s work?

Let me know below in the comments or email Dyann at: thebodyhouse.biz@gmail.com

The transcript of the audio is below the audio only video.

If it doesn’t play please click this link….

 

 

TRANSCRIPT OF EROTICA WRITER AND EDITOR RACHEL KRAMER BUSSELL WITH NEW YORK MAGAZINE’S PODCAST ‘SEX LIVES’

 

 

The following podcast contains explicit language.

 

“He sat behind me and put his hand on my thigh, caressing me up and down. The only thing I knew was that I wanted to ride the elevator to the top of his Trump Tower.”

 

 

HOST MAUREEN O’CONNOR: Welcome to Sex Lives, New York Magazine’s podcast about sex. I’m Maureen O’Connor and we are thrilled this week to be joined by the erotica writer and editor and teacher Rachel Kramer Bussell. Hi Rachel.

RACHEL KRAMER BUSSEL: Hi.

 

HOST: So Rachel is the editor of the annual Best Women’s Erotica of the Year book which is just out now in its second year?

BUSSELL: Volume two. Volume two rather. It’s been going for more years. You know it has been, it was started by a different editor in 2000, and it used to be annual, like, 2012, 2013, and when I took over, we started with volume 1 and 2, and there’ll be a 3 and 4.

HOST: You’re incredibly prolific in the field of erotica, it seems. Do you know how many erotica books you’ve edited or written at this point?

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL:

I’ve edited over 60. How did erotica become your thing? I feel like it kind of found me. I was in law school at NYU, and I’d written, but not fiction. I’d always written nonfiction. And then I was reading a lot of erotica, and I saw a call for a book called Starfucker, which was about celebrities, and I thought, I want to do that.

And at the time, this was 98, 99. I was following the Monica Lewinsky story, and I wrote to the editor, and I was like, can I write about Monica? And she said yes. And I wrote a story called Monica and Me. Which was basically, a fantasy about me and Monica Lewinsky because I was kind of obsessed with her and did have a crush on her and I was fascinated by this idea of what if she was really gay, or bi, or what if she was into girls.

 

HOST: I wish our audience could see the look on my face right now.

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I mean, like, obviously, this is every sweet spot of my life. I talk about Monica incessantly. You envisioned a lesbian tryst with Monica? Yes, and I researched, I read her book. I mean, I had already read all those things, but I used, you know, the real lipstick she wore on the Barbara Walters interview.

HOST: Oh my God. What was that? What was that lipstick?

BUSSELL: Glaze. Glaze by… It was like Colors of Benetton or something.

 

HOST: Was it?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: It was like brand that doesn’t exist anymore. Anyway. It wasn’t Benetton. But anyway. Obviously, I’m not paying as much attention now. But I think I might have mentioned, like, she had had an affair. It’s a little fuzzy now, but with I think a married guy before her high school. Yes. Yes. And then that guy tried to insert himself into it. And I think he was also kind of shady towards her too.

I was really, I mean, aside from my having a crush on her, I really did feel bad for her. I felt like that guy and Bill Clinton were You know, throwing her under the bus and making her seem like this total slut when they were also participating. Um, and so, you know, it was a fun, silly story.

 

HOST: You brought the female gaze to Monica.

 

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Yes. And that got picked up for Starfucker and then also Best Lesbian Erotica 2001 for the best erotica writer.

First story for me as an erotica writer, so it was really exciting, and it was right as I was leaving law school.

I did not finish law school, and it was a little, I was unsure about the legality of writing about a famous person, even though other people were doing it, because, you know, what if, theoretically, Monica sued me?

To make a very long story short. Many years later, I actually met someone I dated through that story. She was a big fan of the story, and of Monica. And then, she wound up basically telling Monica about the story.

 

HOST: What did Monica say?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I wasn’t there, like it was, she dropped off a note where Monica used to live, and I don’t know what the note said, but Monica called her. Anyway, Monica I guess was okay with it.

HOST: Oh my god!

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: All my fantasies about Monica, which aren’t necessarily sexual, but more about like me and Monica like gossiping and being best friends. This is all coming true now because the Monica of my head is totally chill with lesbian erotica about her. I don’t think she would be.

I mean, I think I’m, you know, I’m thinking of it now, you know, I watched her TED talk and she’s now this anti bullying activist. So, I don’t want it to come across that I was usurping her, her own version of her story, but I do think public figures are ripe for being written about fictionally. Yeah. From my perspective as an erotica writer, I meant it as a compliment.

And I think the biggest compliment for me was when one reviewer said, this story sounds like it could be true. And I was like, okay, if it was true, I would have, you know, used a pseudonym or I wouldn’t have written it in the exact way that I did. Cause I think that would be TMI in some way. This is your favorite sexy librarian, Rose Caraway.

I’m ready to bring you. Rachel Kramer Bussells, ‘Monica and Me’. I think I found a way to convince the ever luscious Monica Lewinsky to come back to my hotel room with me. At least, I’m counting on it. I’ve been fascinated with her ever since the news of her affair with Clinton first broke. I mean, he’s the president! It’s not just the everyday person who can get access to being in the same building as him, let alone down and dirty under his desk.

 

HOST:

Has writing Erotica changed your sex life or changed the way you think of yourself romantically or sexually?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: If it’s changed my sex life, it’s made me think about other possibilities of things. You know, I could try, I’m not saying I’ve always tried them, but it’s, or certainly reading as much of it as I do to edit these books has given me ideas of what someone might do.

HOST: I mean, I imagine you must have this incredibly encyclopedic knowledge of all the types of things that can happen during sex or that one can fantasize about, just given the quantity of these volumes that you’ve edited or written or read. And what surprised you?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: The things that stand out for me are less, you know, a crazy position as just like my friend who, um, writes about cheese and is like a cheese expert. She also writes erotica and she wants to get her story out.

 

 

 

HOST: She’s like a, like a cheese journalist?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Yeah, I mean I think she writes for like trade journals, but she also works for cheese companies and goes to trade shows.

HOST: Oh my goodness. I love this. I guess like in the same way people write about wine and such.

BUSSELL: Yeah, like she, I mean basically cheese is kind of her life.

I don’t know if she still has a site.

It’s called Cheese Mistress.

HOST: What?

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: It was called Cheese Mistress, which I just think is a great, you know, name for a site. Um, but she once wrote a story and I can’t remember exactly where, but it was about,…

 

Uh… submissive, having to lick some sort of stinky cheese off of Dominant’s boot.

And she got so into like what cheese it was. And I think it was the illegal cheese. You know, it was like unpasteurized, super funky blue. That was part of the domination. But, you know, I really, I read that and I thought, you know, if you don’t know that much about cheese, I mean, yes, maybe you could research, but it came across that she really knew what she was talking about.

 

HOST: That’s amazing.

Erotica Writer BUSSELL: But also I feel that, um, there is a genre of person who might be like me, who is not actually submissive, but I’m like, wouldn’t it be great if somebody forced me to eat a really expensive cheese and it was delicious? And then I think like, to me, that’s fascinating because then you’re using this role playing or dominance and submission to also, you know, do something beyond just the sexual.

Like, I wrote a story once, I’m terrified of driving, I used up my license, and I haven’t driven a car for 15 years, I’m really scared of it, and I’m always, like, any time I take a cab or lift, I’m like, I talk to the drivers about, you know, should I get my license?

I’m really scared of it. Every time I think about getting lessons, I picture myself having an accident. So anyway, I wrote a story about a couple where the man forced the woman to learn how to drive and like she was so scared but it was part of their kinky role playing and obviously that was part of my own trying to get over my own fear.

 

HOST: Was it arousing to write that or was it just scary the whole time to write that?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I don’t always literally get aroused while I’m writing, because I’m sort of in a writing mode. I think I could get into the sexiness, but if someone tried that in real life, it wouldn’t fly with me. But maybe it would with someone else.

Like, I think sometimes, you know, those kinds of relationships, they can be used both to eroticize your fantasies, but also for personal development, you know? I think, like you said, even if you don’t identify as submissive or that’s not something you’ve done, there’s something fascinating about, like, sort of, voluntarily not having a choice, whether it’s to eat stinky cheese or to drive or to, you know, be tied up to a cross or something.

HOST: Whoa, is there crucifixion erotica? The like, St. Andrew’s cross, you know, those X’s that are…

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Oh, that! Yes, not a, not a, sorry, not a Jesus cross.

HOST: The BDSM X cross, got it.

BUSSELL: Yes, yes, that cross. I don’t know about the other. I don’t know about the other kind. New idea! Oh, there’s gotta be. But, I think really, I mean.

HOST: Jesus is all naked on the cross? I mean, it’s gotta be hot to someone.

BUSSELL: I’m sure it is. I’m sure someone’s gonna tell you. I mean, I haven’t read, like, all of erotica, but pretty much anything can be eroticized. Yeah. And, and I think, like, if you can eroticize something that most people, in general, wouldn’t find sexy then you’re going to have a kind of edge over other people.

Like, I think a lot of people, if you’re writing about food, might write about chocolate or yeah, you know, oysters or whatever. But how many people are writing about stinky cheese? You can own that market. Stinky cheese erotica dot com. I don’t know if that’s taken. Feel free to buy it if it hasn’t taken.

 

HOST: Do you remember? Um, there was this brief moment online when I mean, you know, like the stupid flash in the pants. Okay, not stupid. Are you going to talk about Dinosaur Erotica? I was going to talk about the Dinosaur Erotica girls. I’m so glad you knew that. I interviewed them, actually.

Well, like, the way they told it, at least, was that, you know, one of, they were a duo, and one of the women was like, okay, so I was looking at all these, like, Creature erotica of, you know, like run away with the werewolf taken by the dragon, that sort of thing. And then she’s like, well, if we write about dragons, could we write about dinosaurs?

And she, according to her, she’s like, I just started laughing. Then I thought, why the fuck not? So, she started doing it. It found its audience, whether it was a traditional erotica audience, you know, I think a lot of people downloaded that book just for the, like the giggles of it. And then they may or may not have, you know, felt attached to it or felt drawn to the other things, but the way she described it, she’s like, it was just sort of like throwing stuff at the wall because they were self publishing, and she would try out different genres.

She would sort of, you know, try to market to her, her reading list and see which ones sort of took off or didn’t take off. A lot of people are doing some version of that, whether it’s dinosaurs or Chuck Tingle. Do you know who that is?

 

 

BUSSELL: No, Chuck Tingle.

HOST: Oh my goodness, Chuck Tingle. Gross and great name simultaneously.

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Is he the Lemony Snicket of erotica? Because that’s how, this is where my mind is going right now. He’s this guy who, I don’t even remember which ones he got started on, but basically now he puts out erotica books with crazy titles that’ll be like… Pounded in the butt by, you know, a gay dinosaur. That was, that’s, that’s a paraphrase.

 

I don’t know the exact title, but then he’s since gone on like any news thing that happens, like if something happens today with Trump, he will have a book out tomorrow about it. Like they’re about Brexit and just like.all kinds of crazy things.

I think those are more jokey in general than, but I mean, he has so many of them.

 

He’s like, I think, think there’s people who find erotica through someone like that.

 

HOST: Uhhuh. . That’s so funny. He’s like those, um, you like those like Taiwanese animation videos about the news that like as soon as the news happens, they have some like weird, like animated version of the news or you know, like Porno studios will always like.

Try to do their, their take on the sex scandal as quickly as possible, but it takes, you know, takes them a certain amount of time.

He’s like that, but he’s really fast. But Chuck Tingle can just write it and publish it. I think it’s interesting because last year, Trump erotica did have a moment and there were…

Oh my god, that’s what I was… There was like a gay Trump ebook that… It was a huge bestseller and I was thinking that when you’re telling the Monica Lewinsky story and it hadn’t, I did not know that there was Trump erotica and I was just thinking like, can you even make Trump sexy? Well, one of the ones.

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Like joke erotica? Well, I didn’t read it, but the one that I, I know was the bestseller was a gay Trump erotica. So I think there was like a political element to it. There is something about the power to eroticize something that sort of takes the control away in a way that like to invent and impose a like gay sex fantasy onto Donald Trump feels like in some way you’re sort of taking his like his power away.

 

HOST: I mean, I think it’s it’s satire in some ways and you can also play on the things that they’ve actually said and at full disclosure.

 

BUSSELL: Back in 2008, I had a website, very brief time, called Sarah Palin Erotica, and I stopped it because I was, I was a little nervous. I was like, okay, how far is this going to go?

And it wasn’t that I wanted people to fetishize Sarah Palin. It was much more that they were mocking, you know, some of the things she had said. Yeah. And some of the belief she held. And I have a little bit mixed feelings about it now because, you know, would I have been okay with, Like Hillary Clinton erotica.com.

Like is it different if it’s not your candidate, you know…

 

HOST: I don’t know it doesn’t bother me whatsoever. It’s really kind of gay erotica about Trump and some in some ways I think that’s because I see him as a person who sort of forcefully sexualizes other people all the time that it’s a little bit of like a taste of his own medicine.

But then when you think about sort of like who is bearing the brunt of always being sexualized or not or to what degree or say like, um, you know. Like someone like Monica Lewinsky was forcefully sexualized by so many men and then there’s sort of this liberation to then having like this, like, you know, a lesbian, like love story with her.

It’s crazy because it’s like, I don’t want to just draw, you know, a rule about it is or isn’t okay to fantasize and talk about people. But yeah, I think that you’re right that it starts to feel weird. At what point does it feel like you’re sort of taking advantage of somebody, or sort of exerting too much of your own, like, will onto them?

 

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Yeah, I mean, I, I think it’s tricky, and I’m not at all denigrating the people who have written Trump or any other, you know, celebrity erotica.

HOST: I think you can do it in a way that’s all Trump Okay, but, I don’t support all Trump erotica, because I think that’s not my bag, FYI, but I fully support anybody who wants to willfully make Trump into their imaginary fiction puppet.

BUSSELL: I haven’t checked recently if there’s more, but I have a feeling it wouldn’t sell as well now because, you know, I think the people who are buying gay Trump erotica are I think we can assume not Trump supporters.

No. You know?  So I think now if you’re not a Trump supporter…

HOST: Although are they? Milo Yiannopoulos had that whole daddy will save us thing, right? That was very sexual. Is very sexual. That is. But I think that… I don’t think he actually fantasizes about that though. You know…

 

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: Or does he?

From ‘ Trump Temptation, The Billionaire and the Bellboy’;

“He brushed his hand against my cheek, leaving a stream of self tanner dripping down me. He sat behind me and put his hand on my thigh, caressing me up and down. The only thing I knew was that I wanted to ride the elevator to the top of his Trump Tower. He moved closer, putting his cold, dead lips on my neck.

I shivered with excitement. His hand felt like an old, dried out gingerbread house. I was in love. I should tell you something. He breathed onto my neck. Tell me later, I said as I reached for his pants. Close your eyes, he said. I was reluctant, but obedient. I unzipped his pants and touched his cold, scaly thigh.

I opened my eyes as I grabbed his thick, long TAIL! WHAT?! DONALD TRUMP IS A FUCKING REPTILIAN! I screamed and let go of his tail. His neck flared up like that dinosaur on Jurassic Park, you know which one I mean. He hissed and leapt for the window, leaving behind nothing but broken glass. And shattered hearts.”

 

HOST: We’re both sitting here with like stunned looks on our faces like what do we, I don’t know.

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I know as I’m simultaneously thinking about Trump erotica but also trying to not think about it like in any detail. Cause it’ll gross me out. But I think like, I sometimes assign people writing celebrity erotica because Celebrities kind of exist in this interesting space where we think we know them, and maybe we know certain things about them, but do we really know what it’s like to be Angelina Jolie?

HOST: Like, probably not, like, and so I think we can project onto them what we think they’re like, and what it would be like to be with them, or, you know, what, what their life might be like behind closed doors. Like, maybe they’re totally boring in bed, like, and by boring, I mean, like, maybe they’re weird. Quote unquote normal.

I don’t, I don’t believe in that, but I don’t know how else to say it. Like, or, or do we think that all celebrities are always having super. You know, crazy outlandish sex just because we think their lives are so over the top. I bet a lot of celebrities have boring sex, and here’s my theory for this.

Because there are certain people who don’t know that they’re capable of being boring. Like every time they talk, everybody looks at them and smiles and listens to every word and laughs at every joke they make. And I think when you exist in that world where you’re used to that, you never get any negative feedback.

 

So I have noticed sometimes that when somebody like, just have never… been like ignored in their lives or like nobody rolls their eyes like zones out while they’re talking because like they’re always hanging on their every word. I imagine that that effect of the like boring conversationalist who thinks they’re riveting the whole time.

I wonder if there’s a sexual analog to that and if there is I have a feeling that that everybody’s so thrilled just to be there naked with them that like maybe they don’t know whether they’re being boring or not. They’re always getting positive feedback. I mean, I think the same way with celebrity gossip, like, if you’re writing stories inspired by celebrities, like, you’re projecting, obviously, your own ideas and fantasies onto them.

 

HOST: But, I mean, don’t we all do that? Sort of why they exist.

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I mean, aren’t we all curious about, like, what Kim and Kanye’s sex life is like? Okay, I am. I am, is what I’m trying to say. Like, wouldn’t you just want to know? Like, I do. Yeah, I mean, I guess we know some of it just from like, Kanye rapping.

HOST: What celebrities do you see people writing lots of erotica about?

I think it’s usually, I see more the, the persona as, as a whole. You know, I’ve assigned and I do in person writing workshops and I’ve assigned, be inspired by a celebrity. A lot of people go for, And I say like you can use a broad definition of celebrity. A lot of people go for like a smaller celebrity, not like an A list Madonna type person, but a, someone who’s a big fish in a smaller pond, like something, someone I might not know about, you know, but that’s famous in their own, in their world.

They are the Mick Jagger or whatever of that, of like, you know, whatever, concert pianist or something.

HOST: Oh, classical pianist. I think if I was a classical pianist, I might be weirded out if someone wrote erotica about me. Now that I think about it, there was a time way back when, when I was blogging at Gawker that one of the commenters, because they used to be able to like, do like, sort of elaborate comment threads on their own, started writing erotica about me, and actually that I was like, that is so weird, and yeah, am I a massive hypocrite as I say this?

I think at the time I was just like, what the fuck? This is gross, and then like, the person like, freaked out and apologized to me and didn’t do it again, but. a weird line between am I being sexually harassed or…

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I mean, it’s I do feel awkward about the fact that yes, I got my start. I wrote a story about Monica Lewinsky who yes, she’s a public person, but she’s also a private person.

I mean, there is a tension there and someone once sent me a story for one of my anthologies that I was one of the characters and it was really freaky and I knew it was I forget if they use my full name or they said Rachel but like They looked like me. It was weird. It was you. And I was like, okay, first of all, like, this is weird for me, but second of all, would I really be that narcissistic to publish it in my book?

Like, that would look horrible. That was just a bad strategic choice there. But it is weird. Although, do you think the person was just kind of flirting with you somehow? I am not sure.

HOST: What did, did you say anything to them?

BUSSELLS: I just reject, like, I just sent my standard form rejection. But I think that is an interesting line of, like, who is it acceptable for, and I feel like we’re opening a weird can of worms.

It’s a can of worms that also, no matter how hard I try, I can’t come up with, like, a unifying principles exactly. And I’m not an expert because I dropped out of law school, but, you know, legally, I think there’s certain things you can do. At least I was told when I wrote the Monica story that the publisher, well, I was told that they would assume the responsibility, but that legally you’re allowed to write as long as it’s clearly fiction about a celebrity.

But like, you know, are you and I celebrities in that definition? I don’t think so.

 

 

 

HOST: I think on that note, Rachel, if people want to find you, find the book, how, how can they do that?

Erotic Writer BUSSELLS: They can find the book at bweoftheyear.com, as well as on Amazon and other retailers.

And they can follow the book at bweoftheyear on Twitter.

Well, thank you so much for coming, Rachel.

BUSSELL: Thank you.

HOST: So every week we ask our listeners to call in to leave us voicemails. I’d love to hear if they read or listen to Erotica, what context they do it in. Is it like purely because they want to get off or is it just sort of imagination time?

Erotic Writer BUSSELL: I’d love to know if they read it or listen alone or with someone else.

HOST: Alright, so in what context of your life does erotica exist? I’m also really curious about books that maybe were not intended as erotica, but became that for you. Which ones were they, and which portions? If you want to call us, you can reach Sex Lives at 646 494 3590, leave us a voicemail at any time.

And that’s it for this week. Sex Lives is produced by Epheme Shapiro and Alana Milner. Thanks also to Andy Bowers and Laura Mayer at Panoply. Thanks for listening, and we’ll talk to you next week.

 

Quick producer’s note: The Trump dinosaur reptilian erotica piece that you heard, uh, was written by the brilliant Elijah Daniel. And it’s called Trump Temptation, The Billionaire and the Bellboy. Performed, here for you, by yours truly, Epheme Shapiro.

THE END

Here’s a list of erotic writer Rachel Kramer Bussell’s books…

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THANK YOU for reading this Short Erotic Story…

HAVE A SENSUAL DAY.

Dyann Bridges  xoxo