Be still when you have nothing to say; when genuine passion moves you, say what you’ve got to say, and say it hot. – D. H. Lawrence
Sex. You think about it, dream about it, watch it, do it, wish you were doing it, wish you weren’t, but you’d rather not write it, because it’s not respectable. Because you’re concerned it won’t be taken seriously. Because even when you do try to write about it, you find yourself holding back, out of modesty, or shame, or fear. Because you worry about how your parents or even your friends will react when they read it. Because you think you have nothing to say.
We believe you have something to say, and we want to hear it.
This call for submissions is for the second anthology of South Asian literary erotica to be published by India’s Tranquebar press. Tranquebar’s first erotica anthology, Electric Feather, was a best seller and helped erotica gain recognition in the subcontinent as an important and influential literary genre. With this second anthology, we hope to continue the success of the first one while including a greater diversity of voices and sexual experience.
What we’re looking for: Stories that are thoughtfully written, visceral and honest, involving South Asian characters, settings, and/or themes. Stories can be titillating, dark, shocking, humorous, experimental, subversive; they can involve sex with others, sex with yourself, imagined sex, sexual fetishes—it’s entirely up to you. We’re also interested in translations of erotica written in regional languages.
■ Writers should be from South Asia or the South Asian diaspora
■ Accepting fiction and narrative non-fiction
■ 2,500 – 7,000 words
■ Contributors will receive a one-time payment
■ Please attach your submission as a Word document and include a brief bio in the body of the email
Email submissions to erotica.southasia@gmail.com by January 15, 2012.
