Smut: Stories

Alan Bennett has made a career of making the observation of transgressive behavior feel like looking through a keyhole into another room at people we know we shouldn't be watching. In "Smut: Two Unseemly Stories", he teases the characters into life slowly, deliberately, and in a way making them irresistible. How do they tick? What motivates them? He provides just enough to want us to know more at every page. At the end of the two stories (and I liked the first far more than the second), we see how people make compromises with their lives simply to get on with them.In "The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson", we peep at a middle-class lady whose changed circumstances perplex her, yet she goes on with keeping calm and carrying on. In the same way, it's not the title character in "The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes" to whom we pay the most attention. Yet we leave the story wondering whether she's more a victim or the ultimate victor.Bennett revels in relative morality. Nobody is entirely "right" or "wrong". They are, however, all able to adapt to changing circumstance, making them human, believable, and not necessarily likable. While I might forget Mrs. Forbes, who does what she has to do, Mrs. Donaldson's greening - blooming? - I won't soon forget.It was worth the postal surcharge to get this title from the UK rather than wait until January 2012 for a US release.

It is a modest book, small in size, beautifully printed on deckle-edge paper, with an almost-plain blue-grey cover. Then you notice that what seems to be a random design is actually a visual kama sutra of the possible positions in which two china teacups can engage in congress. "Smut" is used in Britain for salacious language -- not the hard stuff, but the dirty talk of young teens; in the hands of a septuagenarian master, the two longish stories that make up this book are deliciously risqué. In one, "The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson," a widow's life is transformed when her two young lodgers offer her the opportunity of watching their love-making. In the other, "The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes," the marriage of a mother's boy to a somewhat plain bride, sets off a chain of sexual complications in which many of the boundaries of age, gender, and fidelity are broken down. This is the funnier of the two stories, as Bennett gleefully demolishes notions of middle-class propriety, and shows what really goes on inside a marriage. Not in terms of the sex, but as a question of who wields the power and how, and -- though it seems almost obscene to talk of happiness in the context of a sex romp -- what really holds couples together.Many of the same qualities occur in "Mrs. Donaldson," but this story, the longer of the two, contains a great deal more. It shows Alan Bennett's extraordinary insight into the art of acting; starting off as an actor himself in  BEYOND THE FRINGE , he has made his subsequent career as one of Britain's most distinguished playwrights, most notably in  THE HISTORY BOYS . Not that Mrs. Donaldson is an actress, as such. But to earn extra money, she takes a job at a local medical school, playing patients and family members for diagnostic exercises (a job, as it happens, that I have briefly tried myself). Mrs. Donaldson realizes that she must put on two performances simultaneously: becoming the fictional patient described in the case notes, but also transforming her real life by playing the part of somebody less conventional and inhibited than she sees herself, someone in fact who would volunteer for her work at the hospital. The scene in which she becomes a voyeur, a joyous experience for all concerned, is just such a festival of multi-layered acting, because the students are effectively acting out parts for Mrs. Donaldson, without in the least reducing the sincerity of their love-making towards each other, or the enjoyment they derive from it. Role-playing this honest cannot but have a liberating effect. Not only does Bennett show how Mrs. Donaldson's life changes, he manages to get in many insights as well about marriage, sickness, aging, honesty, and sheer old-fashioned politeness.Much of the fun in "Mrs. Forbes" comes from what goes on covertly behind the facade. But the glory of "Mrs. Donaldson" is that it is so wonderfully overt. Really, there is no smut there at all!

Yes, the two novellas/short stories of this volume are risqué and they would have made my mother uncomfortable, but smutty? Not really. So don't be put off by the title - this is not Nicholson Baker territory. SMUT actually is about people playing roles and keeping secrets from one another, though in each of the stories the biggest secrets do happen to involve sexual activity. But the sex itself is handled in a sufficiently oblique or adroit manner that the book never flirts with the pornographic.In the first piece, Mrs. Donaldson is a fifty-five-year-old widow who needs some extra income. So she takes a job at a local medical school as a "Simulated Patient", acting out various complaints and conditions in mock consultations that are part of the medical school curriculum. She also takes in as lodgers a young couple, one of whom is a student at the medical school. When the lodgers fall behind in the rent, in lieu of money they invite Mrs. Donaldson to watch an evening of intercourse. The ramifications of that experience keep rippling through her life in new and wholly unexpected ways.The second story features a quintet of characters - Mr. and Mrs. Forbes, their handsome 23-year-old son Graham, his unprepossessing wife Betty, and the person with whom Graham shared a bed the night before he and Betty were married. They all try to keep secrets from one another, and in some cases the secret is that they know the other's secret. It all makes for a thorny tangle.Before an Amazon friend recommended SMUT to me, I was not familiar with Alan Bennett. I now will gladly read more of him. His writing is a treat: light, succinct, sophisticated, devilishly humorous, yet compassionate. He is British, and the stories and characters are quite British, but they easily travel across the Atlantic.Five stars for "The Greening of Mrs Donaldson"; four stars for "The Shielding of Mrs Forbes". The average of four-and-a-half stars I round down due to the rather slim nature of the volume.

Alan Bennett's latest book explores sexuality in suburbia with a 55 year old widower who becomes a peeping tom landlady in lieu of rent to her exhibitionist lodgers, and a secretly gay banker who gets blackmailed by one of his lovers.The title "Smut" and the word "unseemly" both give the wrong idea about the stories - they might have seemed transgressive in years past but watching people have sex and being gay aren't really taboo any more. The quaint terminology employed by Bennett is reflective of the style in which he writes, that is in quietly articulate prose that neither offends nor exhilarates. The storytelling and writing is never less than masterful but for all that the stories themselves are never shocking and have a charm to them that's quite disarming.The way Bennett drops information onto the reader - character A is sleeping with character B who is pregnant with character C's child - or an elderly woman being propositioned by a younger man, is very matter-of-fact and casual, which is how Bennett manages to keep the reader on their toes - blink and you'll miss the revelation!While the book and it's subject of modern day sex may sell itself as racy, it's actually quite light and unchallenging. It's a good read and I enjoyed it but it's unlikely to make a deep impression on anyone. A "nice" book about sex - only Alan Bennett could've done it!

BENNET, A COMIC GENIUS, YOU CANT FAIL TO BE ENTERTAINED BY SMUT, EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED AND DELIGHT IN THIS MASTER OF STORY TELLERS. HEARD "THE SHIELDING OF MRS. FORBES" WHEN IT WAS BOOK OF THE WEEK ON RADIO 4, AND COULD HARDLY WAIT FOR THE NIGHTLY INSTALLMENTS EVEN LISTENING TO THE RADIO AT HOME WHEN I USUALLY ONLY LISTEN AT WORK.! THEN FOUND IT ALONG WITH THE OTHER STORY ON AMAZON. NEEDLESS TO SAY IT HAS BECOME A FAVORITE. ITS RUDE, CRUDE AND A DELIGHT ALL ROUND. IF IT DOES NOT MAKE YOU LAUGH OUT LOUD THEN YOU MUST BE MISSING THE POINT.!!!

Two short stories in true Alan Bennett style. Wished they went on longer, or that there were 8 more to read. Could not put this book down. Loved it. A must for existing AB fans or those who want some light entertainment but that are not easily shocked!

I didn't really enjoy this as much as I had hoped I would!

Alan Bennett is the absolute master of comic dialogue and these two slightly racy tales do not disappoint in that respect. There were a couple of places where I was genuinely laughing out loud to myself. I would say that although the stories are set in the present day (indicated by a couple of references to the internet and mobiles) some of the attitudes of the older characters towards sex appear quite implausible in this day and age and the stories feel more like they should be set in the 60s or 70s. But this doesn't detract significantly from two entertaining stories. Ideal for the Bennett fan or even someone unfamiliar with the rest of his work.