Author
:
Yosha Bourgea (
raindog@sonic.net
)
Homepage of author: None
Date: Autumn 1992
Size: 26K, single chapter, 4700 words, 9 pages
Code: m/f teen
Source: http://www.qz.to/erotica/aphatos.html
Author Information: by Mary Anne Mohanraj ( mohanraj@mills.edu ), taken from her authors page :
"[The author says:] 'I don't know that it's possible to define it [his erotica] by type; I write what interests me, and that is constantly in flux. I'd say my stuff is pretty consistently straight, not sf, and rarely concerned with measurements, bells 'n' whistles, or frou-frou.'
His stories are reposted periodically
to alt.sex.stories, are also available in the rec.arts.erotica
archives, on his home page, and someone in Israel translated his
story "Aphatos" into Hebrew. Published in Cyanosis Magazine,
Broadside (of Bradley University), local zines and several newspapers.
Also writes horror, magic realism, potboilers with twist endings,
and unclassifiable realistic stuff. Also poetry and screenplays."
Some of his (non-erotic) work can be found at
http://www.cacas.org.
The author re-emerged on the Internet in September 1998. He has kindly sent me some information about the writing of this story:
"The translation I have of the word
"aphatos" is "unspoken", not "speechless",
but your translation is close enough. What I think I had in mind
when I wrote the story was conveying an experience too powerful
and deep for human language. I've always been very interested
in the limits of language, as well as its power. What are the
limits, and why are they there? Can they
be expanded, or at least fondled a little? Does the way we use
language influence the way we experience life, and if so, how?
These are the sorts of questions I ponder when I write.
I wrote "Aphatos" in the autumn
of 1992, during my first year at university. I was eighteen or
nineteen at the time. I still remember the rush of writing it,
how strange it was. I've altered only a few words since then,
just for purposes of craft and technical polish, but the story
remains almost exactly the same as the moment I first wrote it.
Even if I wanted to improve it at
this point, I would be hesitant to do so. I believe that most
writing is hard, redundant work, but if one is lucky enough to
get it right the first time, there's no point in painting lilies."
He has posted one other story, How I Lost My Hair, available
at
http://www.qz.to/erotica/assm/Year98/15289.txt
(part 1) and
http://www.qz.to/erotica/assm/Year98/15290.txt
(part 2).
Celestial Review
:
From Celestial Reviews 302 - September 2, 1998.
"Aphatos" by Yosha Bourgea, reviewed by Fiddler.
The author recently reposted this story and asked if we remembered
it. Some
of us do and remember it as a classic.
The frame of this story is a man's indistinct
memories of his first love at
13. The girl was 16, an almost unbridgeable gap.
In the story, however, they manage to
bridge it. She leads him on a morning
exploration of a neighboring patch of woods which her generation
had made
their playground. They exchange small wonders, a few confidences,
a few
kisses. They make love.
Memories after that time become fragmented,
but the narrator keeps walking in
woods to evoke the bittersweetness of what he has had and lost.
Bourgea fulfills Fiddlers law: "The
best writers are the worst posters."
Download this one and reformat it. The experience of reading the
story
without the distractions of the over-long lines is worth the effort.
Ratings for "Aphatos":
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Fiddler (appeal to this reviewer): 10
Other Celestial Awards:
#8 on the Top 20 Stories of August 1998.
Reader comments :
9[/10]: uses some marvelous devices;
excellent visualization
- Michael Handler (
handler@sub-rosa.com
), co-moderator of
rec.arts.erotica
.
Yosha Bourgea has written a wide variety
of stories in a wide variety
of mediums. This was his first offering to a.s.s, and it is still
a
crowd favorite.
- Bookman Archives (Doug Reade) (
readebks@wolfenet.com
)
My Comments :
Aphatos is Ancient Greek for "speechless". While I won't go as far as saying that's how I felt after reading this story, it is an impressive effort, considering this was the author's erotica debut. In an interview conducted by Mary Anne Mohanraj , the author comments that "[my] first notable erotica, "Aphatos," was written on my computer in a few heated hours (highly unusual for me) and posted on a.s.s. shortly thereafter."
The narrator adopts a reflective approach, full of description. The story concerns the encounter between two people in a forest, and their subsequent exploration of each other. Aphatos begins with a quote which sets the scene very well. Quoting something at the beginning of a story can be a very effective device; authors should use it more. I also really enjoyed the story's "environmental" theme. Although Doug Reade says Aphatos is a "crowd favorite", it seems to have attracted scant attention in the a.s.s. community. It deserves to be better known.
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apuleius@poboxes.com
aphatos.txt