Hey, none of them can see my screen; it's all good

[brigdh]

There is some sort of Bible study group going on five feet away from me as I write really explicit porn. The fun part is that I didn't even realize what they were doing for the last half hour, until I stared over as I thought about synonyms for 'stroke' and happened to catch, "God has a son! The Creator of the Universe would participate in the infinite magnitude he created!"

Wow, this'll make good memories.

On a related note, do you think vaguely Renaissance men say 'cock' or 'prick'? Though perhaps prick has too many negative modern connotations for me to use without feeling like I'm insulting someone.

Comments

[rm.livejournal.com]

Prick, I think. But I don't know in any official way. My creative partner would know, but I wouldn't be able to get you an answer until tomorrow night.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It's not terribly important, I suppose, but I worry over this word choice each time I have to write it. It seems like it can be so specific to a character, and then there's the worry of picking a term that both feels true to the voice and will be appealing to the reader.

[kessie.livejournal.com]

I love how this stuff always happens to you.

As for cock or prick, I have no idea, sorry.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Ha, I know! I suppose that's what I get for hanging out in coffeeshops all the time. It's still pretty funny, though.

Ah, no worries.

[aoyagi.livejournal.com]

Isn't that like... a second time it's happened to you? :P I remember you posting about a similiar "omg I'm writing pr0n and people next me are..." thing ;) Still, super funny :P

I'd go for 'prick' if I were you (either way, I hate the word 'cock'), but I think the slightly Renaissance people would use something entirely different. I'm just not sure what >.> (yes, I'm lame like that, sue me) :P

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

It happens to me *all the time*. Which, as I was telling Kessie, is probably not surprising given how often I hang out in coffeeshops. Ah, well. It makes for amusing stories.

either way, I hate the word 'cock'

Really? How come, if you don't mind me asking. It's what I normally tend to use, so I hate to think of ruining my smut stories by writing something people think of as icky.

I tried looking up other historical terms, but I can't imagine using something like pizzle or baleen in a story that supposed to be sexy. Member is an option, I suppose, but that makes me think of flowery romance novels.

[aoyagi.livejournal.com]

I might sound like a prude (and trust me, I'm not :P), but... I tend to dislike writing/reading something that includes going into including *that* particular word. It sounds so vulgar and totally spoils the mood (for me, that is). I'm one of those people that prefers to 'dance around the subject in question', emphesize the motion/emotion/sensation of the act without getting as clinical as "take this and stick it there" kind of thing.

That's just me, of course, so don't feel the need to go by what I think is good or bad, because really, it's all subjective, right? ^^

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

No, it's cool. I love to hear what works for different people.

Is there a word you prefer, or do you like it best if the story never gets graphic enough to need specific terms like that?

[aoyagi.livejournal.com]

No, I don't have a preference, actually. I just can't stand the word 'cock'. I also dislike the word 'dick', but I usually giggle if I see it used ^^

I *do* like graphic stories, smut, smex and all that jazz, but I truly adore authors that can write a HOT!story without having to resolve to either uber!cheesy euphamisms or crude!words that jarr my attention. Unfortunately, it's SO hard to write that way ;_;

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Hee. I know what you mean, though, sex scenes are hard because the most random things can turn people off. I always get thrown out of a story if it refers to one of the characters as "boy" (instead of "man" or "adult" or whatever), for instance. I don't know why it bugs me so much, but it does.

[parallactic.livejournal.com]

I'm no help at all, but I was curious over what the consensus was.

I also didn't like the word 'cock' as well, but for totally different reasons. I'd first associated the word with poultry, which probably wasn't the imagery the writer had intended to conjure. I'm used to it now, though.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Do you know, I just heard recently that the word 'rooster' was invented by the Puritans, because they didn't like have to use 'cock' all the time, and in front of the children, even.

Though I can't remember where I heard it, so possibly it's an urban legend.

[parallactic.livejournal.com]

So if that's true, then cock meant chicken AND penis in the past. It makes me wonder how that association came about.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

According to a website I have no idea of the veracity of it, it was orginally used as a nickname in the sense of "strutting like a cock" for pert, arrogant people, particularly boys, and goes from there to slang for penis in the 1600s.

"Rooster", by the way, comes from "roosting bird", which I never would have guessed but makes perfect sense.

[fadagaski.livejournal.com]

Either/or. See Rochester's poems for reference. ^_^

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Hee, thank you. Picturing Johnny Deep as the writer, of course, makes these poems even more interesting than they would be otherwise.

[fadagaski.livejournal.com]

You ever seen The Libertine?

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Yep, that's what I was talking about. Though unfortunately I didn't like it as much as I thought I would.

[threewalls]

It's nice to know I'm not the only one who angsts about what characters will refer to their equipment as.

According to the OED, prick is first attested c. 1550, with reasonable usage from then on as both description or as a 'vulgar' term of endearment. As a term of abuse, it's 20th century at the earliest. Cock appears to be in use slightly later, say c. 1600, and somehow gives the impression of slightly more lower-class speech from the examples they give.

Another historical term for a penis you might find useful include 'weapon', dated with examples from c. 1000, 1377.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

God, every time I write something graphic enough to need a term I go through this.

Thank you! The image of either of them saying "My dear prick" cracks me up, but I don't think I could write it believeably.

[solo.livejournal.com]

Shakespeare puns on 'prick' (with this meaning), so that was definitely in common use. I can't remember seeing 'cock', though obviously that doesn't have to mean it wasn't around.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

'Prick' is what I ended up going with, based on the common consensus. First time I've used that word in a sex scene!

[madcampion.livejournal.com]

"The bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the prick of noon!"
- Mercutio, R&J

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

I adore Mercutio so much. He is far and away my favorite character of all the ones Shakespeare wrote.

[solo.livejournal.com]

Yep, exactly.

R&J got a lot more boring after he got himself killed. :-/

(Wait, was that a spoiler?)

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

I'm using prick in my YnM Bookverse fic.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Really? That's good to know; I couldn't remember seeing it in any other fanfiction, and it made me feel a bit uncertain about using it.

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

Well, I still haven't run it by a beta yet but it felt more old-fashioned to me.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, betas. I need to get back into the habit of using those for every story; I know it would improve my writing.

But hey, 'prick' worked well enough for me!

[threewalls]

You're writing Bookverse!!! Or might you be finishing a certain bookverse story, hmm?

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

Two months left to go...

[threewalls]

*squee*

[madcampion.livejournal.com]

What about using "tool"? Does anyone with an OED know when that came into use?

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

I don't have an OED, but the Online Etymology Dictionary (http://www.etymonline.com) gives 1553 for the first use of 'tool' to mean penis. I like that one; I like 'weapon' too, which has such nice symbolical connotations in this case, but they both seem- to me- almost circumscript to use in a sex scene.