Yes, if you read that page, you will see that Yaoi is used by Americans to refer to what the Japanese refer to as Boys Love or BL. Since I like to buy off of Japanese websites, I prefer to use the Japanese terms. It links to this page which explains
At this past Yaoi Con, we had a whole debate on what should be considered “yaoi” and what should be considered “slash” since the two overlap. A lot of women said that for them, where the subject matter comes from determines if it is yaoi or BL. For example, a story written by Americans about Star Trek is slash, while a fan drawn comic featuring characters from Gundam Wing is yaoi/BL. This can get confused when you consider things like a Japanese comic featuring characters from Lord of the Rings - some consider it slash and some consider it yaoi/BL.
If you are interested in checking it out, there is a livejournal community called yaoi_daily where people post scans and scanlations of various BL works - both the soft romantic stuff and the hardcore porn. It changes daily, so sometimes I see a lot of stuff I like and sometimes I don’t see anything for a while. Another good place to go is Aarin Fantasy’s message board.
I’m a straight woman who spent her 20s almost entirely in the gay community: I had a gay best friend who wasn’t comfortable with the straight scene, so I hung out in her world. We went to bars and clubs pretty regularly, and I soon learned that the sight of two hot guys being hot with each other was pretty … well … hot. Good gay porn rocks, just like good straight porn rocks. And it’s definitely true that the men in gay porn tend to be hotter than the men in straight porn, plus they get more screen time (duh).
Slash does nothing for me – in fact it’s actually a turnoff.
I’d never heard of yaoi before this thread, but it doesn’t sound like my thing: I’m not into men with boyish builds, and again the slash element seems to be there.
Every time I come across that ridiculous stereotype I’m amazed that it’s still around.
I’m a long-time slash reader and huge yaoi fan (I have maybe 500+ Japanese manga and magazines) but gay porn doesn’t do much for me. I find it moderately interesting but not a turn on.
I read yaoi and slash partly for the male sex but more and more (as I get older) for the relationships and porn of any flavor doesn’t usually feature much character development. Plus, I’m not a huge fan of really big beefy guys (although I do have some interesting manga featuring beefy guys). I prefer gay themed movies with romance like the aforementioned Maurice, My Beautiful Laundrete, Latter Days, and even Brokeback Mountain to actual gay porn.
I didn’t know anybody wrote Maurice fic. Is this with Alec, or Clive?
If you don’t want to post links, can you please email me? Thanks!
I don’t know why it isn’t more popular. It’s one of the few gay romances I know of that has a happy ending. Maybe because of the Edwardian setting? As I said above, the Merchant-Ivory-ness is part of what appeals to me; I tend to think of it and Room With a View, another of my favorite films, as counterparts, in that the hero/heroine breaks with rigid societal expectations and runs off with the man he/she loves. Plus, any movie with naked Rupert Graves in it can’t go too wrong.
Thanks for the links and for explaining I find it confusing since I’m don’t read it much, but I thought BL was a sort of sub genre.
And on a related note; I’ve read definitions of ‘slash’ that goes from ‘fanfiction depicting a sexual/romantic relationship between two men that are het in canon’ to ‘gay romance/erotica/porn’. I’m leaning towards the latter, though I still think it has to fanfiction to count as slash.
Your’e in luck. I contacted the author yesterday and she gave me a link to a small collection of other Maurice fics that she has written. I’ve put links to that and the one I mentioned here (scroll down two-thirds and look for Finesse.)
I’ve wondered about the lack of Maurice fanfiction myself. Maybe the book is a bit too old and the author too highbrow or something - but then there’s still the film and it’s not as if it’s completely unknown. Maybe it’s just on of those things. I read Maurice when I was 16 and loved it. My own fic is mostly about Clive and an original character - if you read it please keep in mind that English is my second language and it’s one of the first fics I’ve written - it’s not like it’s the greatest piece of writing the world has ever seen (but since there’s no fandom it’s difficult to find a beta reader and it will have to do as it is).
Btw. there’s a new remastered wide-screen edition of the film out on DVD now. It should be really great and have lots of interesting extras.
I bought a DVD of it last year… don’t know if it’s the same edition. It’s a nice, 2-disc set with deleted scenes (mostly about the Viscount Risley subplot) and cast interviews. Either James Wilby or Hugh Grant–I can’t remember which–tells a funny little story about how they were rehearsing their kissing at the Grant home, and Hugh’s brother walked in on them. I was also amused that all three of the key actors, Wilby, Grant, and Graves, felt they had to say “I’m straight” right at the beginning of their interviews.
So, now I’m curious, for those lesbians that liked gay male porn because lesbian porn was hetero male targeted (this I get), how do you feel about some of the exhibitionist stuff on the internet such as BeautifulAgony.com, I find that far more interesting than ANY porn, even without nudity (not safe for work though). Straight male BTW.
And for those Ewan McGregor fans allow me to recommend The Pillow Book.
Most straight women I know looove boy-on-boy action (to the surprise of guy friends, straight and gay), but laugh at mainstream porn, gay and straight. But the same way straight guys are into experimental college girls and long-haired ‘lesbians’ who are only too eager to pleasure men, my girlfriends seem to be into straight-seeming guys who, oops, start making out. They don’t need to see penetration (though implied a la Brokeback Mountain is a-ok).
Because if they don’t add the “I’m straight” disclaimer, they’re liable to find themselves on the cover of every supermarket tabloid in the industrialised world with a headline like “HUGH GRANT FAILS TO DENY GAY RUMOURS”.
Sure, you and I might not give a pair of dingo’s kidneys whether someone’s straight, gay, bi, or has a romantic abnormality involving sealife, but that sort of thing can (negatively) affect people’s careers and standings in less enlightened circles.
In short, I can see why they have to do it, but it’s a shame they have to.
