20th Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award

Nancy Huston

To the (reaches for thesaurus to avoid saying "aptly") appropriately named In and Out Club in St James, for the Annual beano that is the Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award. It's been much in the press recently, as there are a few people who sneer rather loftily at it, claiming that it is a bullying, prudish event which should be banned. To those Puritans, I say with Cavalier disregard, that why shouldn't there be a little more joy in the world every year? The novelists chosen are all excellent, and know they are so; this is more like the impish little child in the corner of a painting sticking its tongue out than a bullying example of English prudery. If anything, the sexual passages in question are celebrated. There is always room for a bit of satyrical rompery in December; the gaiety of the nation would be less without it.

Anyway, the In and Out Club was, er, sorry, heaving with literary types who applauded as the passages were read out. Craig Raine's in particular drew gasps; the winner was Nancy Huston for her description of the sexual act as performed under an infrared camera.