The Good Parts: The Best Erotic Writing in Modern Fiction

"Forget pulp fiction," declares the editor of The Good Parts. According to J.H. Blair (by the way, doesn't this name sound like a pseudonym?), connoisseurs of erotica can now get their jollies via the literary mainstream. And to back up this contention, "Blair" offers up nearly 50 lubricious tableaux from the likes of Saul Bellow, Toni Morrison, Amy Bloom, and the ubiquitous Joyce Carol Oates. Nobody will be surprised, of course, to find filthy scenes by Kathy Acker or the ever transgressive A.M. Homes. But one doesn't usually associate the august and deeply cerebral Susan Sontag with styles of sexual will. The excerpt from The Volcano Lover may never make it to late-night cable TV, but it has its own Neapolitan frisson.

The work of pleasure began: the drop and push of pelvis, bone sheathed in flesh dissolving, blooming into pure fall. How deep it was. Touch me here, she said. I want your mouth here. And here. Deeper. Pressing, squeezing, at first she had feared she might overwhelm him with the intensity of her desire for him; he seemed so fragile to her. But he wanted to be dominated by her, he wanted to be flooded by her with emotion.

Oh, did we mention that this act of love is counterpointed by two significantly larger eruptions, those of Vesuvius and Mount Etna? Clearly the earth moved for them, too.

As this is a very moderne anthology, we're surprised to report that tribadism hardly makes itself felt in The Dirty Bits, er, that is The Good Parts. Still, an excerpt from Dani Shapiro's Playing with Fire goes some way to redressing the sapphic balance: "The first thing I notice is an absence of stubble. Her cheeks are as smooth and cold as marble. Her tongue feels strangely like my own. I hold her head in both hands as I explore her mouth." Like fellow contributors Scott Spencer, Jane Smiley, and Don DeLillo, Shapiro manages to have it both ways, mixing literature and provocation in equal parts. And sometimes, in fact, these highly articulate auteurs are forced to recognize the essentially ineffable component of eros. "Unnnh," moans the protagonist of Joan Wickersham's The Paper Anniversary. Well said! But that's nothing compared to Harold Brodkey's prelinguistic excursus, "I started going dit-dit-dit again." Do it to me one more time, baby. --Darya Silver