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Feuchtgebiete
Nach einer missglückten Intimrasur liegt die 18-jährige Helen auf der Inneren Abteilung von Maria Hilf. Dort widmet sie sich jenen Bereichen ihres Körpers, die gewöhnlich als unmädchenhaft gelten. Kaum ein Buch hat in den letzten Jahren soviel Aufsehen erregt wie dieses. Es wurde verrissen, missverstanden, in den Himmel gelobt und als Befreiungsschlag gefeiert. Es hat eine Debatte ausgelöst und wurde auf die Bühne gebracht: eine einzigartige Erfolgsgeschichte!
224 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2008
About the author
Charlotte Roche
9 books163 followersCharlotte Elisabeth Grace Roche is a British-born German television presenter, actress, singer and author.
Roche, who is bilingual in English and German, is the daughter of an engineer and a politically and artistically active mother. She has lived in Germany since the age of eight, having previously lived in London and the Netherlands. She grew up in a rather alternative cultural environment in a family with liberal views.
She left school after the 11th grade, at the age of 17. She obtained initial stage experience in drama groups during her time at school.
Roche left home in 1993 and founded with three female friends the garage rock group The Dubinskis. The members performed several intimate gigs in a small tour before the two other members pulled out. There followed a period where she undertook anything that would shock and offend people — self mutilation in order to paint with blood, drug experiments, or shaving her head. After successfully auditioning for the German music channel Viva, she worked there for several years as a video jockey and presenter.
In 2001, her three brothers died in a car crash on the way to her wedding. Her mother, who was also in the car, survived with serious injuries.
Roche has a daughter and is married to, Martin Keß, co-founder of Brainpool, a media company in Cologne.
Roche's book Feuchtgebiete (in English Wetlands) was the world's best-selling novel in March 2008. Partly autobiographical, it explores cleanliness, sex and femininity, and had sold over 1,500,000 copies in Germany by early 2009. For supporters it is an erotic literary classic; for critics it is cleverly marketed pornography.
Roche, who is bilingual in English and German, is the daughter of an engineer and a politically and artistically active mother. She has lived in Germany since the age of eight, having previously lived in London and the Netherlands. She grew up in a rather alternative cultural environment in a family with liberal views.
She left school after the 11th grade, at the age of 17. She obtained initial stage experience in drama groups during her time at school.
Roche left home in 1993 and founded with three female friends the garage rock group The Dubinskis. The members performed several intimate gigs in a small tour before the two other members pulled out. There followed a period where she undertook anything that would shock and offend people — self mutilation in order to paint with blood, drug experiments, or shaving her head. After successfully auditioning for the German music channel Viva, she worked there for several years as a video jockey and presenter.
In 2001, her three brothers died in a car crash on the way to her wedding. Her mother, who was also in the car, survived with serious injuries.
Roche has a daughter and is married to, Martin Keß, co-founder of Brainpool, a media company in Cologne.
Roche's book Feuchtgebiete (in English Wetlands) was the world's best-selling novel in March 2008. Partly autobiographical, it explores cleanliness, sex and femininity, and had sold over 1,500,000 copies in Germany by early 2009. For supporters it is an erotic literary classic; for critics it is cleverly marketed pornography.
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 1,223 reviews
June 26, 2011
Oh my good God.
Dude.
I can't even -
Ok.
There's a weird thing that sometimes happens where people think that if a book is insistently explicit sexually without coming close to being porn, or even slightly titillating, it must be important. We can call this the Palahniuk Principle. (I mean, right now we can call it that; eventually, we'll move on with our lives and forget that it ever came up).
The thing is, though, these books seldom actually are important. Being sexual without being sexy is not any kind of achievement; in fact, it's the very reason "humping" was coined as a sex verb in the first place. Humping, however, is far too pedestrian a word for what happens in Wetlands; in fact,it's the sort of polite term at which Helen, the narrator and our heroine, would turn up her noise in disgust before sticking that nose right into a stranger's ass.
There really is no way that I can describe to you the lengths to which the 18 year-old Helen will to prove that she understands - and thus enjoys- sex far better than anyone who preceded her on this earth. I can only tell you that, as with the vain boasting of all 18 year-olds who are still a few years away from realizing that just because they've never thought of something before, it doesn't mean no one has, it is much less shocking than it tiresome. And, I can offer you the following guidelines:
Do not read this book if:
1. You are ill - this book is not soothing, it will not make you feel better. (This goes double if you are sad).
2. You are eating - seriously. Seriously. You will not want anything to enter your body in any capacity while you are reading this book.
3. You equate promiscuity with feminism - Yeah, this book is not going to help un-muddy those waters for you. And, while I don't want to get into a whole big thing, I would like to suggest that if you think the greatest gifts you have to offer are your multitude of orifices and that you can have an orgasm simply by taking it up the ass, you maybe are not engaging with the world from a position of power.
4. You don't have time to finish it in one sitting - if you put it down, it will be a struggle to pick it back up.
5. You are thinking about getting a divorce - Helen pretty clearly seems to think all her problems would be solved if only her parents would get back together; so, unless you want your daughter to end up disgusting, you will make that relationship work.
On the other hand, there are a couple of good reasons a person might want to read this book:
1. You've ever wanted to wonder whether if it was necessary to know a character's name once you know she stuffs avocado pits into her chucha as though she were no more than an inedible new age olive - personally, I came up with "No.". And let's be honest, now that I've told you that, do you even care that her name is Helen anymore?
2. You want to feel better about yourself as a parent - we all know that you're not perfect, even though you do the best that you can. And your kids are not perfect. But, so long as they wipe, aren't deliberately walking around with dried semen under their fingernails, and don't ever land in the hospital because the complete stranger who usually shaves their anus is unavailable one day, leading them to cut themselves in a delicate area that quickly becomes infected - you have done a splendid job. Go out and buy yourself a World's Greatest Mom coffee mug and a #1 Dad t-shirt; you deserve it.
3. You've ever wanted to read a classic - I am not implying by any means that Wetlands is a classic; far from it. However, while you are reading it, your mind will wander among all of the other things it could be reading - books where language is beautiful; books that are written by authors who, instead of hauling out the thesaurus when they've run out of ways to talk about their character's assholes, never even bring them up; books where the story, though perhaps at times harrowing, is ultimately worthwhile, one that will stay with you throughout your life, and mean different things to you as you age. You will want a literary palate cleanser after Wetlands, and no simple Oprah Book Club selection or New York Times bestseller will cut it - you'll need a classic. Something that has endured, so you know it will stand up to whatever vile things Wetlands throws at it.
This is why I spent the whole book thinking "You know, I should really read Proust". And, of course, I will let you know how that goes.
Dude.
I can't even -
Ok.
There's a weird thing that sometimes happens where people think that if a book is insistently explicit sexually without coming close to being porn, or even slightly titillating, it must be important. We can call this the Palahniuk Principle. (I mean, right now we can call it that; eventually, we'll move on with our lives and forget that it ever came up).
The thing is, though, these books seldom actually are important. Being sexual without being sexy is not any kind of achievement; in fact, it's the very reason "humping" was coined as a sex verb in the first place. Humping, however, is far too pedestrian a word for what happens in Wetlands; in fact,it's the sort of polite term at which Helen, the narrator and our heroine, would turn up her noise in disgust before sticking that nose right into a stranger's ass.
There really is no way that I can describe to you the lengths to which the 18 year-old Helen will to prove that she understands - and thus enjoys- sex far better than anyone who preceded her on this earth. I can only tell you that, as with the vain boasting of all 18 year-olds who are still a few years away from realizing that just because they've never thought of something before, it doesn't mean no one has, it is much less shocking than it tiresome. And, I can offer you the following guidelines:
Do not read this book if:
1. You are ill - this book is not soothing, it will not make you feel better. (This goes double if you are sad).
2. You are eating - seriously. Seriously. You will not want anything to enter your body in any capacity while you are reading this book.
3. You equate promiscuity with feminism - Yeah, this book is not going to help un-muddy those waters for you. And, while I don't want to get into a whole big thing, I would like to suggest that if you think the greatest gifts you have to offer are your multitude of orifices and that you can have an orgasm simply by taking it up the ass, you maybe are not engaging with the world from a position of power.
4. You don't have time to finish it in one sitting - if you put it down, it will be a struggle to pick it back up.
5. You are thinking about getting a divorce - Helen pretty clearly seems to think all her problems would be solved if only her parents would get back together; so, unless you want your daughter to end up disgusting, you will make that relationship work.
On the other hand, there are a couple of good reasons a person might want to read this book:
1. You've ever wanted to wonder whether if it was necessary to know a character's name once you know she stuffs avocado pits into her chucha as though she were no more than an inedible new age olive - personally, I came up with "No.". And let's be honest, now that I've told you that, do you even care that her name is Helen anymore?
2. You want to feel better about yourself as a parent - we all know that you're not perfect, even though you do the best that you can. And your kids are not perfect. But, so long as they wipe, aren't deliberately walking around with dried semen under their fingernails, and don't ever land in the hospital because the complete stranger who usually shaves their anus is unavailable one day, leading them to cut themselves in a delicate area that quickly becomes infected - you have done a splendid job. Go out and buy yourself a World's Greatest Mom coffee mug and a #1 Dad t-shirt; you deserve it.
3. You've ever wanted to read a classic - I am not implying by any means that Wetlands is a classic; far from it. However, while you are reading it, your mind will wander among all of the other things it could be reading - books where language is beautiful; books that are written by authors who, instead of hauling out the thesaurus when they've run out of ways to talk about their character's assholes, never even bring them up; books where the story, though perhaps at times harrowing, is ultimately worthwhile, one that will stay with you throughout your life, and mean different things to you as you age. You will want a literary palate cleanser after Wetlands, and no simple Oprah Book Club selection or New York Times bestseller will cut it - you'll need a classic. Something that has endured, so you know it will stand up to whatever vile things Wetlands throws at it.
This is why I spent the whole book thinking "You know, I should really read Proust". And, of course, I will let you know how that goes.
February 7, 2011
It’s a book with a buzz. It’s the first German book to top the lists of Amazon bestsellers, and the one to which reviews referred to as a ‘feminist manifesto bordering pornography’. In truth, this book is both a tale of a troubled teenager, and a reaction to the artificial and sanitized model of femininity of the cosmetic ads and glossy magazines covers.
Helen, an 18-year-old heroin, desperately needs warmth and attention, but nobody really cares about her. She wants love; she wants her parents together. She does outrageous things to get a stir from them, but to no avail. She is shameless, provocative and promiscuous, she experiments with drugs; all of that it seems to come to terms with her mother’s failed murder suicide and her parents’ divorce. Just like Helen, the book is outrageous, irreverent, attention seeking, but it’s also funny and very bold. Somewhat scatological as well.
3.5/5
Helen, an 18-year-old heroin, desperately needs warmth and attention, but nobody really cares about her. She wants love; she wants her parents together. She does outrageous things to get a stir from them, but to no avail. She is shameless, provocative and promiscuous, she experiments with drugs; all of that it seems to come to terms with her mother’s failed murder suicide and her parents’ divorce. Just like Helen, the book is outrageous, irreverent, attention seeking, but it’s also funny and very bold. Somewhat scatological as well.
3.5/5
May 22, 2009
When I was a kid, losing myself in stories and in novels, I sometimes wondered why we never read about characters going to the bathroom. Or the outhouse: Why didn't we ever see Laura do that in 'Little House on the Prairie?' Fiction seemed unrealistic to me, as a result, and I thought that when I wrote books myself, I would do it differently.
Charlotte Roche appears to be single-handedly making up for this lack in her novel 'Wetlands.' Problem is: I have to keep reminding myself it is fiction and not autobiography. While initially I applauded the boldness with which she writes about the female body, all orifices and secretions, the complete lack of self-consciousness she has toward her body, the way she embraces each and every aspect, nook and cranny so to speak, and all manner of secretions, it finally seemed she has no more to tell us than this: I like my vagina. I like my arsehole. I like to eat, lick, suck. I am not afraid.
It does not a story make.
A sensation it does, even perhaps a needed one, but...a longish personal essay would have done nicely.
Without the repetition and the subsequent numbing effect.
Charlotte Roche appears to be single-handedly making up for this lack in her novel 'Wetlands.' Problem is: I have to keep reminding myself it is fiction and not autobiography. While initially I applauded the boldness with which she writes about the female body, all orifices and secretions, the complete lack of self-consciousness she has toward her body, the way she embraces each and every aspect, nook and cranny so to speak, and all manner of secretions, it finally seemed she has no more to tell us than this: I like my vagina. I like my arsehole. I like to eat, lick, suck. I am not afraid.
It does not a story make.
A sensation it does, even perhaps a needed one, but...a longish personal essay would have done nicely.
Without the repetition and the subsequent numbing effect.
June 21, 2014
My friend pushed this book onto me, insisting that I read it. I checked it out on Goodreads, and read 1 star review after 1 star review calling this book "the worst book ever". I opened 'Wetlands' expecting something terrible.
This book isn't terrible, this book is fantastic. Yes, things can get a little gross, but its not like the main character's behavior is completely unnatural. And, in the end, I think the author proved the exact point she was trying to make as people (especially women) responded to this book with a one star rating.
Why are you so terrified of your own body and its functions?
Helen (the main character), speaks over and over about how repressed and 'hygienic' her mother and other women are, and I think she has a valid point. In our society, Germany and America and plenty of other Western countries included, we have such a fear and stigma attached to our bodies most basic functions (periods, vaginal discharge), and it's ridiculous! I especially think this fear grows from a sexist sentiment too, as I read this and began to think about how boys feel and act about their bodily functions.
Besides being thought provoking, this book was flat-out entertaining. Helen is funny, likeable, and filled with attitude. She also gained my empathy as she attempted to bring her parents back together, and talked about her various experiences. Wading through Helen's psyche is one hell of a journey. And the ending was fantastic... I finally understood the blurb on the front that compared this novel to 'Catcher in the Rye'.
Dear readers,
Do not be deterred by the negative reviews... Just read it.
This book isn't terrible, this book is fantastic. Yes, things can get a little gross, but its not like the main character's behavior is completely unnatural. And, in the end, I think the author proved the exact point she was trying to make as people (especially women) responded to this book with a one star rating.
Why are you so terrified of your own body and its functions?
Helen (the main character), speaks over and over about how repressed and 'hygienic' her mother and other women are, and I think she has a valid point. In our society, Germany and America and plenty of other Western countries included, we have such a fear and stigma attached to our bodies most basic functions (periods, vaginal discharge), and it's ridiculous! I especially think this fear grows from a sexist sentiment too, as I read this and began to think about how boys feel and act about their bodily functions.
Besides being thought provoking, this book was flat-out entertaining. Helen is funny, likeable, and filled with attitude. She also gained my empathy as she attempted to bring her parents back together, and talked about her various experiences. Wading through Helen's psyche is one hell of a journey. And the ending was fantastic... I finally understood the blurb on the front that compared this novel to 'Catcher in the Rye'.
Dear readers,
Do not be deterred by the negative reviews... Just read it.
October 12, 2022
Volutamente sgradevole e repulsivo, "Zone umide" è stato un inaspettato bestseller e libro di culto di metà anni '2000 che ora risiede in pile nei Libraccio a 2 euro.
Erroneamente comunicato come libro erotico all'epoca, è in verità un body horror senza l'horror.
La degenza in ospedale di Helen diventa, quindi, un interessante pretesto per esplorare e rivendicare il corpo (soprattutto quello femminile) che insistiamo a sterilizzare con detergenti, profumi, deodoranti e sostanze chimiche.
I ricordi personali, la sfrontatezza adolescenziale e i dolori fisici e emotivi affondano quindi in quelle zone umide, celate con vergogna, in un piglio anarcho-punk femminista.
Non tutto funziona e a volte sembra cadere nella trappola "voglio essere il più edgy possibile", ma preso con lo sguardo giusto è decisamente interessante, capace di colpire anche oggi che il suo tempo e il suo clamore sono finiti da un pezzo.
Erroneamente comunicato come libro erotico all'epoca, è in verità un body horror senza l'horror.
La degenza in ospedale di Helen diventa, quindi, un interessante pretesto per esplorare e rivendicare il corpo (soprattutto quello femminile) che insistiamo a sterilizzare con detergenti, profumi, deodoranti e sostanze chimiche.
I ricordi personali, la sfrontatezza adolescenziale e i dolori fisici e emotivi affondano quindi in quelle zone umide, celate con vergogna, in un piglio anarcho-punk femminista.
Non tutto funziona e a volte sembra cadere nella trappola "voglio essere il più edgy possibile", ma preso con lo sguardo giusto è decisamente interessante, capace di colpire anche oggi che il suo tempo e il suo clamore sono finiti da un pezzo.
September 20, 2011
This book was certainly 'different'. It was absolutely disgusting and made me cringe at most points and laugh at a few, but I was still strangely intrigued by this book. I think the reason why I most enjoyed this book was seeing courage that Roche had to approach the very 'taboo' subjects that it deals with. I've never read anything like this and I wouldn't like to read more, I think I only found this interesting because it's the first of its type that I've read. I can completely understand that this is a book that you would either love or hate and to most peoples tastes, it would most probably be too unsettling to read and I admit that it was very repulsive. Yes, there could have been better ways to break through the barriers of these taboo subjects, but I think Roche is successful in treating these subjects as everyday occurances - though perhaps in a rather exagerrated fashion.
April 10, 2009
This book starts out "As far back as I remember, I've had hemorrhoids." and only goes downhill from there. There's been alot of buzz around this book and its "new feminism", but there's really nothing worthwhile about this book. I'll give the book one star just in case something was lost in translation, but the writing was horrible, there is no plot, and is trying to shock just for the cheap shock value.
July 9, 2009
Absolutely loved it. It's been a while since I've picked up a book and haven't been able to put it down - Wetlands gave me this pleasure. Not that it was particularly riveting, or absorbing - it was just really easy to read. For me that is, though I guess I can understand why some people had an aversion to the content. People who are uptight about their bodies, or who prefer to avoid thinking about the fact that our bodies secrete substances and smell weird and so on and so forth.
It was so refreshing to read something so in-your-face about the female body. Unashamed. Real. I like the fact that it wasn't deep, it didn't have a complicated story line; it basically just meandered through the mind of this bored girl stuck in hospital. It was like being inside somebody's head (and body) - uncensored. And that's a rare thing. SO many times has a women's body been written about, but so rarely is it described so truthfully.
It was crass, bizarre, filthy and amusing. Pretty much my favourite kind of book content. If it had managed to mix in some pretty prose, or wittier writing then I'd be singing it's praises from the rooves - but it did what it set out to do, I think. Offend and be disgusting, and not particularly cleverly.
And I didn't even care.
I'm not saying that it was just senseless trash. It was well executed. But I think that the author could have done even more with the content. Dare I say she could have pushed it even further? Or just perhaps had a more intricate plot. An occasional distraction from the rollercoaster ride of secretions. Or maybe that was the author's intention - not letting the reader escape.
I'm passing this book onto every person that I know and I can't wait to hear what they have to say. By giving it four stars and raving about it, I'm not say, comparing it to some of my other four-star books. It's in it's own complete different world. This one has it's own special merits. It has a lot of downfalls. But the fact that it is what it is makes up for them. For me. Whilst I'm in a good mood at least.
It was so refreshing to read something so in-your-face about the female body. Unashamed. Real. I like the fact that it wasn't deep, it didn't have a complicated story line; it basically just meandered through the mind of this bored girl stuck in hospital. It was like being inside somebody's head (and body) - uncensored. And that's a rare thing. SO many times has a women's body been written about, but so rarely is it described so truthfully.
It was crass, bizarre, filthy and amusing. Pretty much my favourite kind of book content. If it had managed to mix in some pretty prose, or wittier writing then I'd be singing it's praises from the rooves - but it did what it set out to do, I think. Offend and be disgusting, and not particularly cleverly.
And I didn't even care.
I'm not saying that it was just senseless trash. It was well executed. But I think that the author could have done even more with the content. Dare I say she could have pushed it even further? Or just perhaps had a more intricate plot. An occasional distraction from the rollercoaster ride of secretions. Or maybe that was the author's intention - not letting the reader escape.
I'm passing this book onto every person that I know and I can't wait to hear what they have to say. By giving it four stars and raving about it, I'm not say, comparing it to some of my other four-star books. It's in it's own complete different world. This one has it's own special merits. It has a lot of downfalls. But the fact that it is what it is makes up for them. For me. Whilst I'm in a good mood at least.
November 2, 2011
The In Your Face Sexuality-- This is the book's greatest strength, and the one part of the book I genuinely loved. Whether Helen – an eighteen year old in hospital for anal surgery to excise an infected haemorrhoid -- was talking about her reasons and methods of shaving body hair, masturbating with her fingers or avacado pits, or leaving behind drops and smears of menstrual blood for others to find and be scandalized by, I was fascinated, titillated and cheering in equal measure.
I loved that her sexuality was inherent in everything that had to do with her body. Every bodily excretion from snot to vaginal “slime” was expressed in minute, loving detail. And even more, I loved that Helen was in control of her sexuality, and having all the sex she wanted, when she wanted, with a thirst for the feeling part of life that she was determined to slake her own way – and that way was through her (nearly) shameless embracing of sex and her sexuality.
Nice Men-- A welcome touch in Charlotte Roche’s novel is that all the men that Helen interacted with –- but Dr. Notz -- were nice, and even he wasn’t nasty, simply an arrogant surgeon. And those men who were the objects of or partners in Helen’s desire were universally cool, and never anything more than supporting characters. This was Helen’s story. She was in control. Her men were merely some of the tools she used to experience her body with her senses. When it came down to it, she just had good taste in men (the story never seemed to suggest that nasty men don't exist, just that Helen naturally stayed away from them).
The Brothel Scene and Shaving Scene = The Novel-- These two fascinating set pieces were too brief, and I felt very shortly after each that Roche needed to go back so that Helen could give us more. It felt as though something wonderful was about to be revealed in these scenes, and then they stopped just short of that revelation. Which, in microcosm, was exactly how I felt about Wetlands itself. The end was too abrupt. And I swear it was just about to get really good.
Crazy Helen-- I am unsure how to feel about the crazier bits of Helen. She spends much of the novel trying to bring her divorced parents back together, while struggling to reconcile herself to an horrifying childhood incident: she came home from school one day to discover her mother in a gas filled kitchen with her younger brother; her Mother had emptied a bottle of sleeping pills into herself and her son, and Helen saved them. From then on, though, the entire family spent their lives pretending the suicide attempt had never happened. This eventually leads Helen to sterilize herself as a late teen and nearly kill herself in an attempt to stay in the hospital long enough to bring her parents back together. All of which helps to create a rich and believable character, but undermines many of the positive aspects of Helen’s sexuality. What could have been an emotionally healthy (though not always physically healthy) embracing of sexuality, slips into implied self-loathing, and suddenly Helen’s fascination with her body becomes morbid shameful.
The Pahlaniuk-ness-- Roche’s Wetlands has been compared to J.G. Ballard’s Crash, but I think it is more akin to a Chuck Pahlaniuk book. Imagine the early, pre-Tyler Durden life of Marla Singer and you’ve Helen. Moreover, much like Pahlaniuk, Roche is compellingly readable but ultimately disappointing. I loved parts of this. I think it will make an amazing, though disturbing, film, and I will definitely read something else of Roche’s, but I can’t consider myself a fan of the author or her book. I am more of a curious onlooker.
(One final note: Roche writes in German, so I've no doubt that something was missing in translation, even if just a bit of readability. If you can read German and you've read the original version of this, I'd love to hear your opinion.)
I loved that her sexuality was inherent in everything that had to do with her body. Every bodily excretion from snot to vaginal “slime” was expressed in minute, loving detail. And even more, I loved that Helen was in control of her sexuality, and having all the sex she wanted, when she wanted, with a thirst for the feeling part of life that she was determined to slake her own way – and that way was through her (nearly) shameless embracing of sex and her sexuality.
Nice Men-- A welcome touch in Charlotte Roche’s novel is that all the men that Helen interacted with –- but Dr. Notz -- were nice, and even he wasn’t nasty, simply an arrogant surgeon. And those men who were the objects of or partners in Helen’s desire were universally cool, and never anything more than supporting characters. This was Helen’s story. She was in control. Her men were merely some of the tools she used to experience her body with her senses. When it came down to it, she just had good taste in men (the story never seemed to suggest that nasty men don't exist, just that Helen naturally stayed away from them).
The Brothel Scene and Shaving Scene = The Novel-- These two fascinating set pieces were too brief, and I felt very shortly after each that Roche needed to go back so that Helen could give us more. It felt as though something wonderful was about to be revealed in these scenes, and then they stopped just short of that revelation. Which, in microcosm, was exactly how I felt about Wetlands itself. The end was too abrupt. And I swear it was just about to get really good.
Crazy Helen-- I am unsure how to feel about the crazier bits of Helen. She spends much of the novel trying to bring her divorced parents back together, while struggling to reconcile herself to an horrifying childhood incident: she came home from school one day to discover her mother in a gas filled kitchen with her younger brother; her Mother had emptied a bottle of sleeping pills into herself and her son, and Helen saved them. From then on, though, the entire family spent their lives pretending the suicide attempt had never happened. This eventually leads Helen to sterilize herself as a late teen and nearly kill herself in an attempt to stay in the hospital long enough to bring her parents back together. All of which helps to create a rich and believable character, but undermines many of the positive aspects of Helen’s sexuality. What could have been an emotionally healthy (though not always physically healthy) embracing of sexuality, slips into implied self-loathing, and suddenly Helen’s fascination with her body becomes morbid shameful.
The Pahlaniuk-ness-- Roche’s Wetlands has been compared to J.G. Ballard’s Crash, but I think it is more akin to a Chuck Pahlaniuk book. Imagine the early, pre-Tyler Durden life of Marla Singer and you’ve Helen. Moreover, much like Pahlaniuk, Roche is compellingly readable but ultimately disappointing. I loved parts of this. I think it will make an amazing, though disturbing, film, and I will definitely read something else of Roche’s, but I can’t consider myself a fan of the author or her book. I am more of a curious onlooker.
(One final note: Roche writes in German, so I've no doubt that something was missing in translation, even if just a bit of readability. If you can read German and you've read the original version of this, I'd love to hear your opinion.)
November 14, 2017
Schade, dass die Hintergrundgeschichte der Hauptfigur durch die vielen Versuche zu schocken und zu provozieren so kurz gekommen ist. Diese hört sich nämlich eigentlich recht interessant und tragisch an. Meiner Meinung ein Buch mit einem unglaublich hohen verschenktem Potenzial.
October 23, 2011
Cuando decidí leer Zonas húmedas sabía bien con qué me iba a encontrar. Leí la sinopsis, así que estaba al tanto de la temática escatológica de la novela. También leí las reseñas de Goodreads y otras redes sociales de lectores, por lo tanto sabía bien de su baja puntuación y de las muchas críticas negativas. Aún así decidí darle una oportunidad. "No puede ser tan malo", me decía. Si alguien previamente me hubiera advertido y ahorita me dijera "te lo dije", tendría que darle la razón.
El mayor problema de Zonas húmedas no es, curiosamente, lo escabroso, el culto a lo desagradable ni un erotismo mal entendido. A mi juicio lo peor del libro (aún sabiendo que leí una traducción y que puede haberse perdido algo en comparación con el original) es lo pésimamente escrito que está, lo inconsistente de la historia, o mejor dicho, la casi total ausencia de anécdota, la intrascendencia de los personajes secundarios y la absoluta superficialidad del personaje central, Helen, construido por Charlotte Roche como una especie de caricatura de la adoloscente postmoderna, liberal y liberada de convenciones.
He leído entre las críticas positivas de la novela que ésta preconiza un nuevo feminismo. Feminismo que no veo en lado alguno. No se trata en absoluto de un juicio de valor, pero que un personaje decida despreciar las convenciones de la higiene para hacer de ellas un supuesto rasgo de individualidad me parece descabellado. ¿Qué tiene que ver que a un personaje le parezcan caros los tampones y por ello se introduzca en la vagina compresas caseras de papel higiénico con un nuevo paradigma de libertad de la mujer?
Tras la lectura de Zonas húmedas siento que su autora quiso simplemente ser escandalosa y controversial a juro. No hay mayor erotismo que el encubierto, ya lo dijo George Bataille, y no hay mayor muestra de erotismo que el "Emma se abandonó" de Gustave Flaubert, no descripciones de cómo una mujer decide comerse todas sus excreciones corporales. Charlotte Roche no sólo no es una verdadera transgresora, tampoco sabe crear una atmósfera realmente erótica.
Le doy 1 porque no es posible dar menos, pero esta novela me parece un insulto a la inteligencia de cualquiera. Y no lo digo solamente pensando en lo desagradable que resulta, sino en lo inconsistente de su narrativa.
El mayor problema de Zonas húmedas no es, curiosamente, lo escabroso, el culto a lo desagradable ni un erotismo mal entendido. A mi juicio lo peor del libro (aún sabiendo que leí una traducción y que puede haberse perdido algo en comparación con el original) es lo pésimamente escrito que está, lo inconsistente de la historia, o mejor dicho, la casi total ausencia de anécdota, la intrascendencia de los personajes secundarios y la absoluta superficialidad del personaje central, Helen, construido por Charlotte Roche como una especie de caricatura de la adoloscente postmoderna, liberal y liberada de convenciones.
He leído entre las críticas positivas de la novela que ésta preconiza un nuevo feminismo. Feminismo que no veo en lado alguno. No se trata en absoluto de un juicio de valor, pero que un personaje decida despreciar las convenciones de la higiene para hacer de ellas un supuesto rasgo de individualidad me parece descabellado. ¿Qué tiene que ver que a un personaje le parezcan caros los tampones y por ello se introduzca en la vagina compresas caseras de papel higiénico con un nuevo paradigma de libertad de la mujer?
Tras la lectura de Zonas húmedas siento que su autora quiso simplemente ser escandalosa y controversial a juro. No hay mayor erotismo que el encubierto, ya lo dijo George Bataille, y no hay mayor muestra de erotismo que el "Emma se abandonó" de Gustave Flaubert, no descripciones de cómo una mujer decide comerse todas sus excreciones corporales. Charlotte Roche no sólo no es una verdadera transgresora, tampoco sabe crear una atmósfera realmente erótica.
Le doy 1 porque no es posible dar menos, pero esta novela me parece un insulto a la inteligencia de cualquiera. Y no lo digo solamente pensando en lo desagradable que resulta, sino en lo inconsistente de su narrativa.
February 19, 2009
This book featured on the cover of the Sunday Times magazine and I got it because I was morbidly attracted to the controversy and cringing sickness that the review highlighted. I have got to say that the review was very accurate as I couldn't help but feel sick to my stomach while reading the story. I also spent a reasonable amount of time pondering on the controversial statement that the main character, eighteen-year old Helen, makes about hygiene. According to her, we are all slaves of hygiene, except for her, who's a maverick of dirtiness. She loves to taste and swallow her own mucus, pus, body flow and liquids, including her own blood, vomit, vaginal mucus discharge, menstruation, zits, tears and boogers. And, mischievously, she also likes to have other people taste her "delicatessens" without knowing. As a result, being the hygiene freak that I am (but had no idea until I read this book), I found Helen a very disgusting character from the outset and it took me a while to warm up to her.
What is more, hygiene matters aside, I thought this book was very poorly written, but then I don't know if that's the author or the translator's fault. The first chapters are a pain to read and to follow as paragraphs go unconnected and different ideas and states of mind are expressed in the same paragraph. Only after one has "conquered" the first part of the book does the writing become more fluid and enjoyable.
And it's here, on the second part, that the story also becomes surprisingly warmer and more interesting. The aim is no longer to scandalise the reader with Helen's lack of hygiene but to open her heart to the world. She becomes a rather endearing person, as she reflects on her loveless family life and concocts a plan to get her estranged parents together. The whole story takes place in the hospital, where Helen is being treated for an anus ailment. So her plan revolves around getting her parents reunited in her hospital room.
You cannot help but sympathise with Helen's family predicament. And suddenly all that cringe makes sense. She is disgusting because she doesn't love herself enough to take care of herself. Her mother and father are two aliens who can barely maintain a conversation with her for more than two seconds. Helen doesn't know what her father does for a living and she resents her mother for attempting to kill her younger brother while failing to commit suicide. In the end, she doesn't feel loved because she was never truly loved by these two strangers. She actually seems to have a healthier relationship with her avocado pits, which she nourishes like children, than with her own parents.
Overall, this is a very clever and innovative book, but unfortunately poorly written and too cringy for my taste.
What is more, hygiene matters aside, I thought this book was very poorly written, but then I don't know if that's the author or the translator's fault. The first chapters are a pain to read and to follow as paragraphs go unconnected and different ideas and states of mind are expressed in the same paragraph. Only after one has "conquered" the first part of the book does the writing become more fluid and enjoyable.
And it's here, on the second part, that the story also becomes surprisingly warmer and more interesting. The aim is no longer to scandalise the reader with Helen's lack of hygiene but to open her heart to the world. She becomes a rather endearing person, as she reflects on her loveless family life and concocts a plan to get her estranged parents together. The whole story takes place in the hospital, where Helen is being treated for an anus ailment. So her plan revolves around getting her parents reunited in her hospital room.
You cannot help but sympathise with Helen's family predicament. And suddenly all that cringe makes sense. She is disgusting because she doesn't love herself enough to take care of herself. Her mother and father are two aliens who can barely maintain a conversation with her for more than two seconds. Helen doesn't know what her father does for a living and she resents her mother for attempting to kill her younger brother while failing to commit suicide. In the end, she doesn't feel loved because she was never truly loved by these two strangers. She actually seems to have a healthier relationship with her avocado pits, which she nourishes like children, than with her own parents.
Overall, this is a very clever and innovative book, but unfortunately poorly written and too cringy for my taste.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 11, 2015
Good for the way it ends: just like in ‘les amants de pont neuf’, and not so good for the way it begins: just like Triers’ ‘Nymphomaniac’.
As to the denoument: a good book to read on the back of Geoff Dyer’s ‘Jeff in Venice, Death in Varnasi’. Where the narrative learns you (sic) that life is a pile of shite, and then...you die. Here, though, be an alternative ending: Find the pearl in the poo. Heres cheers to happy endings.
As to the beginning: well sigh. Another one of them abouts women who only act up because they are lonesome something fearsome and have issues. By act up I mean being sexually explicit. The idea being that a happy woman (meaning she has snagged abloke and a white picket fence) can now finally pack up the Cleopatra Grip technique in favour of ...um...baking chocolate chip cookies? The only women who defy this seem to be the lesbians. I’m sorry, but its just the way it...seems...it is. Check out Edna St Vincent:
I, being born a woman and distressed
By all the needs and notions of my kind,
Am urged by your propinquity to find
Your person fair, and feel a certain zest
To bear your body’s weight upon my breast:
So subtly is the fume of life designed,
To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
And leave me once again undone, possessed.
Think not for this, however, the poor treason
Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,
I shall remember you with love, or season
My scorn with pity, —let me make it plain:
I find this frenzy insufficient reason
For conversation when we meet again
Charlotte Roche’s Helen seems to be acting out due to lonliness incurred from the divorce of her parents. Yet another missed opportunity to assert female sexuality independent of some underlying emotional emptiness.
Charlotte Roche is playful, though. In this, her first novel, theres experimentation. Which is to say there is a tentative stretching of the boundaries (hers. Not mine), like a lion cub taking its first forays into game territory: bold and assertive but....not yet at its peak. Roche chooses scatology as her playground. She is going to wallow in, smear, imbibe, spray blood and excrement, thats what she is going to do.The problem is, it feels like she only knows her subject academically, with insufficient ‘on the ground’ experience. I say this because of how protag Helen, having described all these acts of ....willful..discharge.....all of a sudden seems to be racing half way through a hospital with her sphincter wide open trying to reach her lavatory before ‘busting one out’. What Roche lacks here, is MY experience of a M&S middle class toilet where a lady of middle eastern origin, faced with the long queue winding its way out and past the roche china bowls and starter sets, hoisted up her skirts and bent down and let one drop on the floor right in front of the row of sinks. Now, if she had witnessed this, as I have, she would not have had her protag runing around hospital floors in agonising pain after said person just plopped out tampons on the elevator floor just because it seemed like a good idea. Honestly, these amateur authors: Charlotte. Go the whole hog, please. Or let me tell you how to do it.
Still. Someone had to come out and write a novel about bodily fluids and functions. In all their wondrous dexterity. And charlotte Roche does step up to the task, with an appropriate degree of grossness. So credit where its due.
As to the denoument: a good book to read on the back of Geoff Dyer’s ‘Jeff in Venice, Death in Varnasi’. Where the narrative learns you (sic) that life is a pile of shite, and then...you die. Here, though, be an alternative ending: Find the pearl in the poo. Heres cheers to happy endings.
As to the beginning: well sigh. Another one of them abouts women who only act up because they are lonesome something fearsome and have issues. By act up I mean being sexually explicit. The idea being that a happy woman (meaning she has snagged abloke and a white picket fence) can now finally pack up the Cleopatra Grip technique in favour of ...um...baking chocolate chip cookies? The only women who defy this seem to be the lesbians. I’m sorry, but its just the way it...seems...it is. Check out Edna St Vincent:
I, being born a woman and distressed
By all the needs and notions of my kind,
Am urged by your propinquity to find
Your person fair, and feel a certain zest
To bear your body’s weight upon my breast:
So subtly is the fume of life designed,
To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
And leave me once again undone, possessed.
Think not for this, however, the poor treason
Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,
I shall remember you with love, or season
My scorn with pity, —let me make it plain:
I find this frenzy insufficient reason
For conversation when we meet again
Charlotte Roche’s Helen seems to be acting out due to lonliness incurred from the divorce of her parents. Yet another missed opportunity to assert female sexuality independent of some underlying emotional emptiness.
Charlotte Roche is playful, though. In this, her first novel, theres experimentation. Which is to say there is a tentative stretching of the boundaries (hers. Not mine), like a lion cub taking its first forays into game territory: bold and assertive but....not yet at its peak. Roche chooses scatology as her playground. She is going to wallow in, smear, imbibe, spray blood and excrement, thats what she is going to do.The problem is, it feels like she only knows her subject academically, with insufficient ‘on the ground’ experience. I say this because of how protag Helen, having described all these acts of ....willful..discharge.....all of a sudden seems to be racing half way through a hospital with her sphincter wide open trying to reach her lavatory before ‘busting one out’. What Roche lacks here, is MY experience of a M&S middle class toilet where a lady of middle eastern origin, faced with the long queue winding its way out and past the roche china bowls and starter sets, hoisted up her skirts and bent down and let one drop on the floor right in front of the row of sinks. Now, if she had witnessed this, as I have, she would not have had her protag runing around hospital floors in agonising pain after said person just plopped out tampons on the elevator floor just because it seemed like a good idea. Honestly, these amateur authors: Charlotte. Go the whole hog, please. Or let me tell you how to do it.
Still. Someone had to come out and write a novel about bodily fluids and functions. In all their wondrous dexterity. And charlotte Roche does step up to the task, with an appropriate degree of grossness. So credit where its due.
July 14, 2018
This was torturous. But not for the reasons you might think. Ten years ago, when this book was first published, everyone was talking about it. Even the 13-year old me couldn't escape the hype, but was I too young to really care what was causing such a row. A decade later, I felt ready to find out for myself.
The plot of Wetlands is quickly told: Eighteen-year old Helen Memel is in hospital, recovering from an operation. To distract herself, the precocious teen begins to explore her body, recounting her sexual encounters and ruminate on her parents' divorce.
So far, so good. However, what caused an unbelievable fuzz ten years ago was how it's written. Helen describes her sexual adventures and intimate behaviors in such blunt and detailed ways, that many people ended up feeling purely grossed out by this novel. But people arguing in its defense claimed that that was the point: to show how far from liberation our composed and polished society was, how prude we all were. How women needed this wake up call, this it's-okay-to-talk-about-this. To take on the language of Roche, the underlying message is that we're all just humans - we fuck, we eat, we shit. And maybe there is bravery in screaming that out to a world that is so keen to keep a guard up.
But it's not enough to make a good novel. My main problem with this was that it just wasn't entertaining to read. Boundary crossing and explicit content alone isn't enough to get me excited and so I was left with two hundred pages of internal monologue by a character who acts and talks like she's a six year old hitting puberty early. Roche tried to add depth by incorporating family drama, but never explored that idea fully, so we're left with a messy plot that's just pure, exaggerated tragedy. It's been a while since I've read anything I wanted to end so badly and I am surely not looking back.
The plot of Wetlands is quickly told: Eighteen-year old Helen Memel is in hospital, recovering from an operation. To distract herself, the precocious teen begins to explore her body, recounting her sexual encounters and ruminate on her parents' divorce.
So far, so good. However, what caused an unbelievable fuzz ten years ago was how it's written. Helen describes her sexual adventures and intimate behaviors in such blunt and detailed ways, that many people ended up feeling purely grossed out by this novel. But people arguing in its defense claimed that that was the point: to show how far from liberation our composed and polished society was, how prude we all were. How women needed this wake up call, this it's-okay-to-talk-about-this. To take on the language of Roche, the underlying message is that we're all just humans - we fuck, we eat, we shit. And maybe there is bravery in screaming that out to a world that is so keen to keep a guard up.
But it's not enough to make a good novel. My main problem with this was that it just wasn't entertaining to read. Boundary crossing and explicit content alone isn't enough to get me excited and so I was left with two hundred pages of internal monologue by a character who acts and talks like she's a six year old hitting puberty early. Roche tried to add depth by incorporating family drama, but never explored that idea fully, so we're left with a messy plot that's just pure, exaggerated tragedy. It's been a while since I've read anything I wanted to end so badly and I am surely not looking back.
May 15, 2009
Okay, let’s get this one out of the way. I consider myself a feminist and I do agree that women are held up to ridiculous standards of cleanliness and beauty. I dislike shaving, plucking, flossing, moisturizering, but I do it all despite my dislike of forced standards. I would love to read a book which pushes these boundaries and truly explores what it means to be a woman today; however Wetlands is not this book. It is one of the most disgustingly repulsive and unsettling of books. Reading this book is like trying to avoid eye contact with the creepy man at a party who appears to have some sort of monstrous social disease. Yes, you try to quickly extricate yourself from the situation, but still find yourself inexplicably draw to him. There are some (okay, quite a few) scenes that I am too horrified to visualize, let alone recant here, but here is a fairly modest one to give you all an idea of the gross-out level. At one point, Helen (the heroine) decides that it is a great idea to take some sips from a water bottle and then spit all of it back into the bottle, and then offer a glass of this spit-water to one of her nurses. Her motivation…because it is sort of like French kissing the nurse! I believe that Helen has some very serious mental disorders, which is why I feel compelled to question all the “Wetlands is a modern feminist manifesto” reviews. In my opinion, a more likely comparison is a gross-out version of Girl, Interrupted. However, this book does satisfy one of my main “I-sort-of-like-this-book” criteria…it made me feel something; albeit more unhinged than happy. I love reading books which make me feel sad, angry, loving, enlightened, bitter, etc. just as long as they make me feel something other than bored. I can only recommend this book to those with a strong constitution and possibly an even stronger stomach.
May 6, 2020
I can't recommend this book to anyone. It is disgusting on purpose, in order to provoke. All the disgusting things have absolutely no effect on the story - if there is even a story. In the end the writer tried to create a story, how this girls is just seeking for attention bla bla, divorced parents, how groundbreaking.
Does having divorced parents mean you eat your menstrual blood and boogers? Does it mean you exchange used tampons with a friend and wear it? Does it mean you eat your own and your friends puke? (that last one really made me almost throw up).
We all do disgusting stuff we don't admit, especially as teenagers. I'm am sure there are people that have done (or regularly do) 1 or 2 things this girl is doing. But not all of the 10-15 disgusting things!
I saw some reviews mentioning that it is a "feminist manifesto". Because nothing says feminism like eating puke. There were sexual stuff this girl is into that didn't bother me at all. Maybe this is the feminism the writer was going for? Then remove the parts that are disgusting and have a descent book!
In any case, I will give one or two stars because I will definitely remember this book. And because it tried to have a story at some point, I guess.
If people are liking this book (there are 4 and 5 star reviews) then maybe I can become a successful writer too. Just write anything disgusting that comes into my mind and then call it "provocative". That's so easy...
Does having divorced parents mean you eat your menstrual blood and boogers? Does it mean you exchange used tampons with a friend and wear it? Does it mean you eat your own and your friends puke? (that last one really made me almost throw up).
We all do disgusting stuff we don't admit, especially as teenagers. I'm am sure there are people that have done (or regularly do) 1 or 2 things this girl is doing. But not all of the 10-15 disgusting things!
I saw some reviews mentioning that it is a "feminist manifesto". Because nothing says feminism like eating puke. There were sexual stuff this girl is into that didn't bother me at all. Maybe this is the feminism the writer was going for? Then remove the parts that are disgusting and have a descent book!
In any case, I will give one or two stars because I will definitely remember this book. And because it tried to have a story at some point, I guess.
If people are liking this book (there are 4 and 5 star reviews) then maybe I can become a successful writer too. Just write anything disgusting that comes into my mind and then call it "provocative". That's so easy...
July 30, 2018
Not for everyone but if you like weird shit you’ll like this.
March 30, 2008
Charlotte Roche - Heldin meiner Jugend - schreibt ein Buch und ich muss es lesen! Sofort! Es geht in dem Buch um ganz andere Dinge als der blöde Skandal erwarten lässt. Ich konnte es zumindest nicht weglegen und fand das Ende wirklich rührend. Irgendwie wächst einem die Heldin des Buches doch ans Herz. Viele Passagen sind schon eklig und ganz schön.. krank, aber dann auch wieder lustig. Das Buch ist vor allem aber intelligent und ehrlich. Den Mut zu so einem Buch muss man erst einmal haben und es dann auch noch schreiben können. Ich fand es großartig! Danke Charlotte!
May 20, 2013
Este es el típico libro que hubiera querido leer a los catorce años, como cuando leí "Marranadas" de Marie Darrieussecq (también en Anagrama), y me quedé flipando entre tantos cerdos, culos y tetas.
"Zonas húmedas" comenzó gustándome mucho y luego fue perdiendo la gracia, sin embargo tiene momentos memorablemente guarros y divertidísimos.
Si queréis volver a la adolescencia: adelante. Leed a Roche.
"Zonas húmedas" comenzó gustándome mucho y luego fue perdiendo la gracia, sin embargo tiene momentos memorablemente guarros y divertidísimos.
Si queréis volver a la adolescencia: adelante. Leed a Roche.
Read
December 23, 2016There is great praise for Wetlands out there, and very legitimate criticism, but the most-liked negative reviews on GoodReads all read as purposely reductive, and in some cases, unwittingly offensive.
Authors can use immature, unreliable narrators to make their point, and Roche does. The gap between readers’ expectations of a female eighteen-year-old and the character presented by the novel partially illustrates why a book like this is feminist. The “common sense” adage that girls mature faster than boys, which creates expectations that young women behave themselves as little adults while “boys will be boys,” can rob girls of the opportunity to experience their own bodies and development. As soon as they begin to develop secondary sex characteristics, female bodies become a subject of control, fear and shame, and to a greater degree than their male counterparts, girls are forced to distance their sense of identity from the reality of their physical flesh because of how it may make other people feel. Society, represented in Wetlands by Helen’s hygiene-obsessed mother, does not condone women or girls loving or representing their bodies as they are versus how they are made desirable or sterile. Shave your legs. Wear perfume. Buy bras and tampons.
Helen says no: society won’t make her afraid of her own menstrual blood. Whether it is a mature, high-minded, paradigm-shifting rebellion to commit tiny acts of hygiene-terrorism with menstrual blood and pubic hair doesn’t denigrate that it is meant as rebellion in spirit by our troubled young narrator. As is the writing of this book. Perhaps more so than the gross-out passages that describe drinking vomit and genital contact with public toilets, it’s a shock that despite the fact that Helen is proudly unwashed—purposely working semen under her fingernails, wearing exclusively stained underwear, showing off her hemorrhoids to lovers—she still is allowed to enjoy sex, and with multiple partners. Her sexuality isn’t dependent on a sanitized, “pure” presentation of her body for the enjoyment of a male gaze, and she is deliciously free of anxiety or shame when it comes to her experience of sex.
Roche is not implying, as some reviewers are degrading the central message to, that you need to eat your own smegma to be liberated or feminist. But you do need to allow young women to explore their bodies without disgust. The quintessential Helen-as-feminist moment may be her experimentation with the natural variations in her vaginal secretions. “The consistency varies a lot,” she explains during a taste test of her own genitals on route to what she expects to be a casual sexual encounter with an older stranger. “Sometimes it’s like cottage cheese, other times like olive oil. […] Lots of guys prefer cottage cheese. You wouldn’t think so. But it’s true. I always ask in advance.”
Is it true? Who among us knows? Do we ask? Do we even know our bodies well enough to know what to ask?
Helen is immature. Helen is unreliable, admitting herself she suffers from drug-induced amnesia and delusional panics in which she fabricates the smell of gas and the death of her family—I have my doubts, for these reasons, that the conclusion of the novel happens anything like she says it does. But Helen should be allowed to exist without being forced into a one-dimensional idea of what a “good” feminist looks or sounds like. An eighteen-year-old girl can espouse contradictory beliefs. She can be a gutter punk queen, an unapologetic picture of anarchic freedom, and a pathetically lonely child, self-mutilating to get her parents’ attention. At least she experiences herself and her body the way that she is rather than as something inherently repulsive in its natural state.
Roche has partially explained her motivation in writing Wetlands as jealousy: “men have this whole range of different names for their sexual organs, beautifully detailing what state of arousal they’re in, while us women still don’t really have a language for our lust.” This statement has been picked apart—in more scholarly reviews—as, already, an outdated blast-from-the-past. It’s true that the author, like her narrator, is not extensively, obviously informed by a deep reading of feminist history and theory. But there’s something hideously regressive in making that a requirement to join the conversation. To either dismiss the book because it’s “not as shocking as the hype”, or to stamp a “been there, done that” on the cover because the core idea of it has been typed out before only makes it more difficult to represent women’s stories as stories, plain and simple, and not a purely academic or marginal sub-genre of art and fiction dealing with narrow issues only of interest to a few. That kind of thinking is exactly what keeps women’s fiction corralled in its corner of the book store, and “feminism” a dirty word our young female celebrities won’t touch with a ten-foot pole.
The attitude that these kinds of narratives about female sexuality are already blasé, paradoxically, de-normalizes the subject, and it implies a counter-productive competition rather than collaboration between female artists. Helen doesn’t need to be the first female character to masturbate on the page, and Roche doesn’t need to have invented the idea of renaming individual sexual organs with something more personal than the medical terms clitoris and labia (snail’s tails and ladyfingers). These ideas still aren’t in the mainstream to the extent that their male counterparts are. Pointing out they’ve been done before, when they’re still not done very often outside of critically-marginalized erotica, and using that as justification to stop listening, keeps it that way.
Authors can use immature, unreliable narrators to make their point, and Roche does. The gap between readers’ expectations of a female eighteen-year-old and the character presented by the novel partially illustrates why a book like this is feminist. The “common sense” adage that girls mature faster than boys, which creates expectations that young women behave themselves as little adults while “boys will be boys,” can rob girls of the opportunity to experience their own bodies and development. As soon as they begin to develop secondary sex characteristics, female bodies become a subject of control, fear and shame, and to a greater degree than their male counterparts, girls are forced to distance their sense of identity from the reality of their physical flesh because of how it may make other people feel. Society, represented in Wetlands by Helen’s hygiene-obsessed mother, does not condone women or girls loving or representing their bodies as they are versus how they are made desirable or sterile. Shave your legs. Wear perfume. Buy bras and tampons.
Helen says no: society won’t make her afraid of her own menstrual blood. Whether it is a mature, high-minded, paradigm-shifting rebellion to commit tiny acts of hygiene-terrorism with menstrual blood and pubic hair doesn’t denigrate that it is meant as rebellion in spirit by our troubled young narrator. As is the writing of this book. Perhaps more so than the gross-out passages that describe drinking vomit and genital contact with public toilets, it’s a shock that despite the fact that Helen is proudly unwashed—purposely working semen under her fingernails, wearing exclusively stained underwear, showing off her hemorrhoids to lovers—she still is allowed to enjoy sex, and with multiple partners. Her sexuality isn’t dependent on a sanitized, “pure” presentation of her body for the enjoyment of a male gaze, and she is deliciously free of anxiety or shame when it comes to her experience of sex.
Roche is not implying, as some reviewers are degrading the central message to, that you need to eat your own smegma to be liberated or feminist. But you do need to allow young women to explore their bodies without disgust. The quintessential Helen-as-feminist moment may be her experimentation with the natural variations in her vaginal secretions. “The consistency varies a lot,” she explains during a taste test of her own genitals on route to what she expects to be a casual sexual encounter with an older stranger. “Sometimes it’s like cottage cheese, other times like olive oil. […] Lots of guys prefer cottage cheese. You wouldn’t think so. But it’s true. I always ask in advance.”
Is it true? Who among us knows? Do we ask? Do we even know our bodies well enough to know what to ask?
Helen is immature. Helen is unreliable, admitting herself she suffers from drug-induced amnesia and delusional panics in which she fabricates the smell of gas and the death of her family—I have my doubts, for these reasons, that the conclusion of the novel happens anything like she says it does. But Helen should be allowed to exist without being forced into a one-dimensional idea of what a “good” feminist looks or sounds like. An eighteen-year-old girl can espouse contradictory beliefs. She can be a gutter punk queen, an unapologetic picture of anarchic freedom, and a pathetically lonely child, self-mutilating to get her parents’ attention. At least she experiences herself and her body the way that she is rather than as something inherently repulsive in its natural state.
Roche has partially explained her motivation in writing Wetlands as jealousy: “men have this whole range of different names for their sexual organs, beautifully detailing what state of arousal they’re in, while us women still don’t really have a language for our lust.” This statement has been picked apart—in more scholarly reviews—as, already, an outdated blast-from-the-past. It’s true that the author, like her narrator, is not extensively, obviously informed by a deep reading of feminist history and theory. But there’s something hideously regressive in making that a requirement to join the conversation. To either dismiss the book because it’s “not as shocking as the hype”, or to stamp a “been there, done that” on the cover because the core idea of it has been typed out before only makes it more difficult to represent women’s stories as stories, plain and simple, and not a purely academic or marginal sub-genre of art and fiction dealing with narrow issues only of interest to a few. That kind of thinking is exactly what keeps women’s fiction corralled in its corner of the book store, and “feminism” a dirty word our young female celebrities won’t touch with a ten-foot pole.
The attitude that these kinds of narratives about female sexuality are already blasé, paradoxically, de-normalizes the subject, and it implies a counter-productive competition rather than collaboration between female artists. Helen doesn’t need to be the first female character to masturbate on the page, and Roche doesn’t need to have invented the idea of renaming individual sexual organs with something more personal than the medical terms clitoris and labia (snail’s tails and ladyfingers). These ideas still aren’t in the mainstream to the extent that their male counterparts are. Pointing out they’ve been done before, when they’re still not done very often outside of critically-marginalized erotica, and using that as justification to stop listening, keeps it that way.
April 19, 2009
Congratulations, Charlotte Roche. "Wetlands" is officially the least impressive book from the most-hyped category that I have read in recent history. I'm embarrassed that I got sucked in by the chatter: the fans fainting at readings, the "most controversial ..." plaudits, and the promises of shocking prose. I actually lifted my hungover body off the couch to immediately drive to a bookstore.
Now, the only good thing I have to say is, at least it only took three hours to read.
The novel is set in a hospital where Helen is about to have surgery on her butthole after a shaving incident. While she is laid up, she decides this is a good time to get her divorced parents back together and she plots how she can use said butt injury to her advantage. In the interim, she thinks about her life and all the sex she has and that time she got so high with her friend that they actually drank each other's puke because some of the pills they had popped went undigested. And she has a crush on a nurse that begins when she asks him to photograph her wound after surgery.
Helen wages a personal war against the tampon industry by making her own, and in fact leaves one of these crafts behind in the elevator of the hospital. Helen also likes to eat her own scabs and snot -- and all sorts of other things not found on any sort of menu.
Where to begin. Where. To. Be. Gin. First of all, Helen is an awful character. She is manipulative and immature and a sociopath. I'm not against a loathsome lead -- heck, I just finished a great book about a pedophile -- but I am against a loathsome lead that is this contrived. Helen is shocking for shocking sake. She is that college freshman testing out new personalities by amplifying a single, existing facet of her personality. She is Helen: Anal-sex having, booger eating, and hygiene-hating. Don't like her? Well, that probably means you aren't a feminist. [Insert sarcasm here:].
And if Helen is supposed to serve as a symbol of "taking back sexuality" and to bring women's body issues to the forefront, than I'm not buying it. Being sexually adventuresome is not some sort of fast-track for fem-street cred. A character championing more positive body issues wouldn't hang out with a dude who just wants to shave her.
Not to mention that "Wetlands" is so poorly written that it shouldn't be allowed to make any sort of statement about anything. [Although, this may be the fault of the German to English translation. Perhaps Roche never intended to use the word "pussy" upward of 50 times:].
First learn to walk; then learn to run.
Now, the only good thing I have to say is, at least it only took three hours to read.
The novel is set in a hospital where Helen is about to have surgery on her butthole after a shaving incident. While she is laid up, she decides this is a good time to get her divorced parents back together and she plots how she can use said butt injury to her advantage. In the interim, she thinks about her life and all the sex she has and that time she got so high with her friend that they actually drank each other's puke because some of the pills they had popped went undigested. And she has a crush on a nurse that begins when she asks him to photograph her wound after surgery.
Helen wages a personal war against the tampon industry by making her own, and in fact leaves one of these crafts behind in the elevator of the hospital. Helen also likes to eat her own scabs and snot -- and all sorts of other things not found on any sort of menu.
Where to begin. Where. To. Be. Gin. First of all, Helen is an awful character. She is manipulative and immature and a sociopath. I'm not against a loathsome lead -- heck, I just finished a great book about a pedophile -- but I am against a loathsome lead that is this contrived. Helen is shocking for shocking sake. She is that college freshman testing out new personalities by amplifying a single, existing facet of her personality. She is Helen: Anal-sex having, booger eating, and hygiene-hating. Don't like her? Well, that probably means you aren't a feminist. [Insert sarcasm here:].
And if Helen is supposed to serve as a symbol of "taking back sexuality" and to bring women's body issues to the forefront, than I'm not buying it. Being sexually adventuresome is not some sort of fast-track for fem-street cred. A character championing more positive body issues wouldn't hang out with a dude who just wants to shave her.
Not to mention that "Wetlands" is so poorly written that it shouldn't be allowed to make any sort of statement about anything. [Although, this may be the fault of the German to English translation. Perhaps Roche never intended to use the word "pussy" upward of 50 times:].
First learn to walk; then learn to run.
July 29, 2008
Ich wollte das Buch eigentlich überhaupt nicht lesen. Nachemd es jetzt meine Frau gelesen hat, habe ich es dann doch getan.
Jetzt frage ich mich, warum so ein Hype um das Buch gemacht wurde.
Letzen Endes ist es die Geschichte einer jungen Frau, die unter ihrer Erziehung und der Scheidung ihrer Eltern leidet.
Das Ganze wird angereichert mit zum Teil drastischen Beschreibungen, was man so mit Körperöffnungen und allen menschlichen Ausscheidungen so anstellen kann.
Wer dem etwas abgewinnen kann, der wird von dem Buch begeistert sein.
Ich war nach einiger Zeit von der Beschreibungen um Körpersäfte und Körperöffnungen nur noch angeödet.
Und mit Personen, die ihren Körper vorsätzlich verletzen
kann ich überhaupt nichts anfangen.
Ich kann dem Buch nichts abgewinnen.
Jetzt frage ich mich, warum so ein Hype um das Buch gemacht wurde.
Letzen Endes ist es die Geschichte einer jungen Frau, die unter ihrer Erziehung und der Scheidung ihrer Eltern leidet.
Das Ganze wird angereichert mit zum Teil drastischen Beschreibungen, was man so mit Körperöffnungen und allen menschlichen Ausscheidungen so anstellen kann.
Wer dem etwas abgewinnen kann, der wird von dem Buch begeistert sein.
Ich war nach einiger Zeit von der Beschreibungen um Körpersäfte und Körperöffnungen nur noch angeödet.
Und mit Personen, die ihren Körper vorsätzlich verletzen
kann ich überhaupt nichts anfangen.
Ich kann dem Buch nichts abgewinnen.
February 21, 2013
Creo que aún no estoy lista para esto que llaman posporno feminista. Así que no sé qué opinar de Zonas húmedas. Es curioso, grotesco y muy visual. Quizás más de lo debido porque hubo partes en donde sentí que quería cerrar los ojos (como cuando estás viendo una película de terror) Sin embargo, así es, hay un sin embargo, la voz femenina me cayó muy bien. Tanto que si existiera Helen sería su mejor amiga. Entonces, estoy como a medias.
July 13, 2014
I liked it.
I know I am far in the minority, but still: I liked it. I thought it was honest, I thought it was funny, I thought it was sad. And it was completely unsentimental. Since I am quite sentimental myself, this was very refreshing. Yes. I liked it very much indeed.
I know I am far in the minority, but still: I liked it. I thought it was honest, I thought it was funny, I thought it was sad. And it was completely unsentimental. Since I am quite sentimental myself, this was very refreshing. Yes. I liked it very much indeed.
August 1, 2010
Nun ja, Provokationen sind in der Literatur nicht neu, von daher hat Charlotte Roche damit keine neuen Wege beschritten. Warum um dieses Buch nun so ein Spektakel gemacht wurde, kann ich in keiner Weise nachvollziehen.
Gottseidank habe ich dieses Buch zum Lesen geliehen bekommen – ich hätte mich geärgert, für so einen Schmarren knapp 15 Euronen hingeblättert zu haben.
Wir leben, denke ich, in einer aufgeklärten Zeit, bei dem das Thema Sex einem von Werbeplakaten, aus Magazinen und Fernsehspots entgegen protzt, so dass es zu den Normalitäten des Lebens zählt. Sex sells… Brauchen wir wirklich noch Aufklärung, was Themen wie Analsex, außergewöhnliche Sexpraktiken oder Intimrasur und -hygiene betrifft?
Die Protagonistin des Buches, Helen Memel – gerade 18 Jahre jung und an Sexerfahrungen reicher als manch 70-Jährige, liegt wegen einer missglückten Arschrasur mit einer Analfissur an ihrem mit Hämorrhoiden geplagten Hintern im Krankenhaus und beginnt nun den geneigten Leser mit ausschweifenden Ekelkuriosa zu attackieren, die Ihresgleichen suchen. Sie hasst Frauen, die ihren natürlichen Körpergeruch mit Edelparfüms übertünchen, benutzt selbst nur ihr Smegma, um sich ‘männergeilmachenden’ Wohlgeruch hinter die Ohren zu zaubern. Intimhygiene ist ein Fremdwort. Es sollte reichen, wenn „frau“ sich unten alle paar Tage mal säubert, um den Geruch, der Männer den Verstand rauben soll, nicht wegzuwaschen.
Ich las auf literaturcafe.de zu diesem Roman: (Zitat): ‘Charlotte Roche schreibt witzig und schlau wider alle Tabus, gegen die Konventionen des perfekten Frauenkörpers der Hochglanzmagazine. Und darum ist »Feuchtgebiete«ein Buch, für das man auf dem sauberen Buchmarkt dankbar sein kann.’
Den perfekten Frauenkörper der Hochglanzmagazine und dessen herbeiersehnten Niedergang macht Charlotte Roche dann in ihrem Buch auch zum Thema und wie Frau wieder zu sich selbst finden soll… eben wieder ganz Frau ist. Nun denn, liebe Damenwelt, sei dankbar für ein Buch, dass euch endlich mal ‘witzig und schlau’ klar macht,
dass ihr…….
… das Rasieren lästiger Körperbehaarung wieder denen überlasst, für die es ursprünglich erfunden wurde… den Männern. Heute ist ‘frau’ wieder up to date, wenn sie unter den Achseln, an den Beinen und im Intimbereich einem Gorilla ähnelt und man(n) sich durch dschungelartigen Bewuchs kreatiner Hornfäden kämpfen muss, um an das Ziel seiner Träume zu gelangen. Hat ja was Animalisches… und was ist schöner als animalischer Sex… wenn man(n) das Gefühl bekommt, mit einem Neandertalerweibchen zu poppen. Haben die sich doch schon immer gewünscht. Back to Basic…
… Boss woman, Chanel oder Kenzo mal schnell vergesst. Einmal Finger in die mindestens fünf Tage ungewaschene Muschi tauchen und ab hinters Ohr mit dem Smegma… soll Wunder bewirken und kostet nix. Zum Vergleich: Boss woman = 53,95 €
… OBs nicht braucht. Klopapier zur Nudel gerollt und reingestopft ist billiger und gleichzeitig könnt ihr somit der amerikanischen Wirtschaft ein Schnippchen schlagen. Wie – erklärt euch das Buch.
… natürlich nicht vergesst, die selbstgebauten Klopapierbomben nach Gebrauch da zu entsorgen, wo es nötig ist, die Menschen aufmerksam zu machen, dass übertriebene Hygiene krank macht und nur der Kontakt mit Keimen und Bakterien abhärtet. Also raus mit dem voll gesogenem Teil und ab damit aufs Treppengelände oder sonstwohin… euch wird schon was einfallen – seid kreativ.
… auf öffentlichen Toiletten bitte einmal mit der (natürlich tagelang ungewaschenen) Muschi über die gesamte Toilettenbrille wischt. Immer schön kreisen. Hat auch den Vorteil, dass diese Prozedur die Beckenbodenmuskulatur trainiert, mit der man, wenn es nach dem Buch ginge, Nüsse knacken sollte. Teilt eure Keime und Bakterien mit anderen, seid nicht so selbstsüchtig.
… zur Körperausscheidungsrecyclerin mutiert – Exkrementophilie oder Mukophagie sind angesagt. Eiterpickel,Popel, Smegma, Mitesser, Blutkrusten usw… bitte nicht entsorgen sondern oral recyceln. Soll auf Männer auch unglaublich erotisierend wirken, bei einem stilvollen Dinner einer Dame gegenüber zu sitzen, die anstatt des Entrées genussvoll ihre Nasenausscheidungen verschlingt… nach dem Motto: ‘Der Schluck aus der Nase ist die Auster des kleinen Mannes’ (A. Schopenhauer).
… angetrocknetes Sperma bitte nicht entfernt. Im verkrusteten Zustand eignet es sich hervorragend als „Sex-andenken-kaubonbon“ abends vor der Glotze.
… wenn ihr Hämorrhoiden habt, diese kunstvoll als Liebestester einsetzen könnt. Einfach von eurem Geliebten bereits nach der ersten oder zweiten Sexnacht verlangen, euch in Hündchenstellung von hinten oral zu befriedigen, so dass seine Nase bei diesem Akt direkt im Blumenkohl am Popo verschwindet. Vorzugsweise sollte es sich hierbei natürlich um außen liegende Hämorrhoiden handeln… das verstärkt den Effekt.
… nette Spielchen spielt, die verbünden: Man begebe sich mit der besten Freundin auf Toilette… zupfelt kunstvoll den (natürlich selbstgebauten) Tampon heraus und vollzieht mit der Freundin quasi eine Menstruationsblutsbrüderschaft. Sie nimmt deinen Tampon, du ihren. Hat auch den Vorteil, dass es nicht schmerzhaft ist gegenüber der alternativen Blutsbrüderschaft. Einziges Manko: Du musst menstruieren, wenn sie auch menstruiert. Aber das sollten beste Freundinnen schon hinbekommen.
USW…
Fazit: Dieses Buch trägt keine Botschaft und auch die Handlung kommt zu kurz. Ich bin mir sicher, dass dieses Buch keinen Verleger gefunden hätte, wäre die Autorin nicht die bekannte Charlotte Roche. Dass dieser Schmöker in den Medien fast als Ratgeber für Frauen angepriesen wurde, nicht dem Hochglanzimage zu folgen, sondern wieder ganz Frau zu sein und zu dem zu stehen, was man ist und tagaus tagein so produziert, finde ich schon beinahe peinlich. Hier wurde einfach nur versucht, mit wirklich dümmlichen Provokationen und Versuchen, beim Leser Würgereflexe durch Ekelprosa auszulösen, Geld zumachen. Und der Versuch ist geglückt. Werbung ist heutzutage bekanntlich alles. Derart Provokantes ist aber nicht neu, und von daher verstehe ich den Rummel um ein Buch nicht, das keinerlei Nachricht an mich rübergebracht hat, keine spannende Geschichte erzählt. Bereits ab 1782 schrieb ein Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade Bücher, die einem die Nackenhaare sträuben ließen…Frau Roche hat die Provokation und den prosaischen Ekel also nicht erfunden.
Gottseidank habe ich dieses Buch zum Lesen geliehen bekommen – ich hätte mich geärgert, für so einen Schmarren knapp 15 Euronen hingeblättert zu haben.
Wir leben, denke ich, in einer aufgeklärten Zeit, bei dem das Thema Sex einem von Werbeplakaten, aus Magazinen und Fernsehspots entgegen protzt, so dass es zu den Normalitäten des Lebens zählt. Sex sells… Brauchen wir wirklich noch Aufklärung, was Themen wie Analsex, außergewöhnliche Sexpraktiken oder Intimrasur und -hygiene betrifft?
Die Protagonistin des Buches, Helen Memel – gerade 18 Jahre jung und an Sexerfahrungen reicher als manch 70-Jährige, liegt wegen einer missglückten Arschrasur mit einer Analfissur an ihrem mit Hämorrhoiden geplagten Hintern im Krankenhaus und beginnt nun den geneigten Leser mit ausschweifenden Ekelkuriosa zu attackieren, die Ihresgleichen suchen. Sie hasst Frauen, die ihren natürlichen Körpergeruch mit Edelparfüms übertünchen, benutzt selbst nur ihr Smegma, um sich ‘männergeilmachenden’ Wohlgeruch hinter die Ohren zu zaubern. Intimhygiene ist ein Fremdwort. Es sollte reichen, wenn „frau“ sich unten alle paar Tage mal säubert, um den Geruch, der Männer den Verstand rauben soll, nicht wegzuwaschen.
Ich las auf literaturcafe.de zu diesem Roman: (Zitat): ‘Charlotte Roche schreibt witzig und schlau wider alle Tabus, gegen die Konventionen des perfekten Frauenkörpers der Hochglanzmagazine. Und darum ist »Feuchtgebiete«ein Buch, für das man auf dem sauberen Buchmarkt dankbar sein kann.’
Den perfekten Frauenkörper der Hochglanzmagazine und dessen herbeiersehnten Niedergang macht Charlotte Roche dann in ihrem Buch auch zum Thema und wie Frau wieder zu sich selbst finden soll… eben wieder ganz Frau ist. Nun denn, liebe Damenwelt, sei dankbar für ein Buch, dass euch endlich mal ‘witzig und schlau’ klar macht,
dass ihr…….
… das Rasieren lästiger Körperbehaarung wieder denen überlasst, für die es ursprünglich erfunden wurde… den Männern. Heute ist ‘frau’ wieder up to date, wenn sie unter den Achseln, an den Beinen und im Intimbereich einem Gorilla ähnelt und man(n) sich durch dschungelartigen Bewuchs kreatiner Hornfäden kämpfen muss, um an das Ziel seiner Träume zu gelangen. Hat ja was Animalisches… und was ist schöner als animalischer Sex… wenn man(n) das Gefühl bekommt, mit einem Neandertalerweibchen zu poppen. Haben die sich doch schon immer gewünscht. Back to Basic…
… Boss woman, Chanel oder Kenzo mal schnell vergesst. Einmal Finger in die mindestens fünf Tage ungewaschene Muschi tauchen und ab hinters Ohr mit dem Smegma… soll Wunder bewirken und kostet nix. Zum Vergleich: Boss woman = 53,95 €
… OBs nicht braucht. Klopapier zur Nudel gerollt und reingestopft ist billiger und gleichzeitig könnt ihr somit der amerikanischen Wirtschaft ein Schnippchen schlagen. Wie – erklärt euch das Buch.
… natürlich nicht vergesst, die selbstgebauten Klopapierbomben nach Gebrauch da zu entsorgen, wo es nötig ist, die Menschen aufmerksam zu machen, dass übertriebene Hygiene krank macht und nur der Kontakt mit Keimen und Bakterien abhärtet. Also raus mit dem voll gesogenem Teil und ab damit aufs Treppengelände oder sonstwohin… euch wird schon was einfallen – seid kreativ.
… auf öffentlichen Toiletten bitte einmal mit der (natürlich tagelang ungewaschenen) Muschi über die gesamte Toilettenbrille wischt. Immer schön kreisen. Hat auch den Vorteil, dass diese Prozedur die Beckenbodenmuskulatur trainiert, mit der man, wenn es nach dem Buch ginge, Nüsse knacken sollte. Teilt eure Keime und Bakterien mit anderen, seid nicht so selbstsüchtig.
… zur Körperausscheidungsrecyclerin mutiert – Exkrementophilie oder Mukophagie sind angesagt. Eiterpickel,Popel, Smegma, Mitesser, Blutkrusten usw… bitte nicht entsorgen sondern oral recyceln. Soll auf Männer auch unglaublich erotisierend wirken, bei einem stilvollen Dinner einer Dame gegenüber zu sitzen, die anstatt des Entrées genussvoll ihre Nasenausscheidungen verschlingt… nach dem Motto: ‘Der Schluck aus der Nase ist die Auster des kleinen Mannes’ (A. Schopenhauer).
… angetrocknetes Sperma bitte nicht entfernt. Im verkrusteten Zustand eignet es sich hervorragend als „Sex-andenken-kaubonbon“ abends vor der Glotze.
… wenn ihr Hämorrhoiden habt, diese kunstvoll als Liebestester einsetzen könnt. Einfach von eurem Geliebten bereits nach der ersten oder zweiten Sexnacht verlangen, euch in Hündchenstellung von hinten oral zu befriedigen, so dass seine Nase bei diesem Akt direkt im Blumenkohl am Popo verschwindet. Vorzugsweise sollte es sich hierbei natürlich um außen liegende Hämorrhoiden handeln… das verstärkt den Effekt.
… nette Spielchen spielt, die verbünden: Man begebe sich mit der besten Freundin auf Toilette… zupfelt kunstvoll den (natürlich selbstgebauten) Tampon heraus und vollzieht mit der Freundin quasi eine Menstruationsblutsbrüderschaft. Sie nimmt deinen Tampon, du ihren. Hat auch den Vorteil, dass es nicht schmerzhaft ist gegenüber der alternativen Blutsbrüderschaft. Einziges Manko: Du musst menstruieren, wenn sie auch menstruiert. Aber das sollten beste Freundinnen schon hinbekommen.
USW…
Fazit: Dieses Buch trägt keine Botschaft und auch die Handlung kommt zu kurz. Ich bin mir sicher, dass dieses Buch keinen Verleger gefunden hätte, wäre die Autorin nicht die bekannte Charlotte Roche. Dass dieser Schmöker in den Medien fast als Ratgeber für Frauen angepriesen wurde, nicht dem Hochglanzimage zu folgen, sondern wieder ganz Frau zu sein und zu dem zu stehen, was man ist und tagaus tagein so produziert, finde ich schon beinahe peinlich. Hier wurde einfach nur versucht, mit wirklich dümmlichen Provokationen und Versuchen, beim Leser Würgereflexe durch Ekelprosa auszulösen, Geld zumachen. Und der Versuch ist geglückt. Werbung ist heutzutage bekanntlich alles. Derart Provokantes ist aber nicht neu, und von daher verstehe ich den Rummel um ein Buch nicht, das keinerlei Nachricht an mich rübergebracht hat, keine spannende Geschichte erzählt. Bereits ab 1782 schrieb ein Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade Bücher, die einem die Nackenhaare sträuben ließen…Frau Roche hat die Provokation und den prosaischen Ekel also nicht erfunden.
May 27, 2019
I thought it was Night. I thought it was Lolita. I was wrong. This monstrosity is THE HARDEST THING I'VE EVER READ.
I cannot comprehend what the publishers were hoping to achieve, except disgusting the hell out of as many people as possible. There's no plot. What genre is this even- Contemporary? Humor? Erotica? Feminist literature? Mental Health? Horror? Non Fiction? I'm as clueless as you are.
The torture begins when the protagonist- Helen Memel, needs surgery to treat anal fissures. She decides to extend her Post-Op stay as much as possible because it's an opportunity to bring her divorced parents back together. Alone in a hospital room, bored to death, she finds ways to 'entertain' herself.
"I just can’t keep my fingers off anything on my body. I find a use for everything."
Helen is fascinated by the human body. She wants to fuck everything- literally and figuratively. The concept of hygeine is foreign to her. She doesn't wash, doesn't flush and doesn't believe in tampons. At the tender age of 18, she's explored every crevice of her body and ingested every bodily fluid imaginable- the dirtier, the better; tastes best if it comes out of someone else's body.
Helen apparently doesn't believe in logic either. There's a chapter where she mentions that it's her lifelong dream to have a child of her own. What did she do to fulfil that dream? She got herself sterilized the day after she turned 18. Then, she goes on for 4 pages about how she molests avocados so she could have their babies instead. What even?
"You definitely want to take the toothpicks out before you put it inside you."
Gee, thanks. I was definitely thinking of trying that at home.
As for the writing style, Roche seemingly has just one strategy- make everything as detailed as you can. EVERY THING. For instance:
"I pop the aluminum cherry of the little milk container by sticking a hole in it with the plastic tube stuck to the side of the box. I turn the box upside down and squeeze the milk into the bowl until the box is empty."
(I think I can visualize someone opening a freaking milk container without your assistance, Charlotte, thank you very much.)
Write like that for 208 pages; add in every vomit-inducing sexual activity you can imagine featuring a girl in a hospital room and you have Wetlands.
"A lot of brain cells die on days like that."
I get the point the author's trying to make- People shouldn't be afraid of their own bodies. Everyone excretes. Sweat, pus, menstrual blood- they're all normal secretions. There's no need to be ashamed, even though we've been taught otherwise. I get it. But you can't write a novel based on that alone. You need plot, substance and character development. You need to be able to make readers feel emotions other than absolute repulsion.
Helen did have a traumatic childhood, but that's never properly explored. It's just mentioned casually once and then forgotten about till the very last chapter.
To sum it up, for me this book was pointless, nauseating, atrocious and a complete waste of resources. It's not even erotic, just pure gross. Reading this was anything but pleasurable. Gift it to your enemy. Use it as a torture device. Make your children read it if you don't want them to have sex for the next 10 years.
Quoting the author herself:
"Okay, okay. Who even wants to know? Besides me. I know."
Helen darling, do us all a favour, will ya? Please take your smegma perfume, avocado pits, mushroom pizza with surprise toppings and puke cocktails. Take it all and SHOVE IT UP YOUR CAULIFLOWER SHAPED ROSETTE.
(An activity that I'm pretty sure you'll enjoy thoroughly.)
I cannot comprehend what the publishers were hoping to achieve, except disgusting the hell out of as many people as possible. There's no plot. What genre is this even- Contemporary? Humor? Erotica? Feminist literature? Mental Health? Horror? Non Fiction? I'm as clueless as you are.
The torture begins when the protagonist- Helen Memel, needs surgery to treat anal fissures. She decides to extend her Post-Op stay as much as possible because it's an opportunity to bring her divorced parents back together. Alone in a hospital room, bored to death, she finds ways to 'entertain' herself.
"I just can’t keep my fingers off anything on my body. I find a use for everything."
Helen is fascinated by the human body. She wants to fuck everything- literally and figuratively. The concept of hygeine is foreign to her. She doesn't wash, doesn't flush and doesn't believe in tampons. At the tender age of 18, she's explored every crevice of her body and ingested every bodily fluid imaginable- the dirtier, the better; tastes best if it comes out of someone else's body.
Helen apparently doesn't believe in logic either. There's a chapter where she mentions that it's her lifelong dream to have a child of her own. What did she do to fulfil that dream? She got herself sterilized the day after she turned 18. Then, she goes on for 4 pages about how she molests avocados so she could have their babies instead. What even?
"You definitely want to take the toothpicks out before you put it inside you."
Gee, thanks. I was definitely thinking of trying that at home.
As for the writing style, Roche seemingly has just one strategy- make everything as detailed as you can. EVERY THING. For instance:
"I pop the aluminum cherry of the little milk container by sticking a hole in it with the plastic tube stuck to the side of the box. I turn the box upside down and squeeze the milk into the bowl until the box is empty."
(I think I can visualize someone opening a freaking milk container without your assistance, Charlotte, thank you very much.)
Write like that for 208 pages; add in every vomit-inducing sexual activity you can imagine featuring a girl in a hospital room and you have Wetlands.
"A lot of brain cells die on days like that."
I get the point the author's trying to make- People shouldn't be afraid of their own bodies. Everyone excretes. Sweat, pus, menstrual blood- they're all normal secretions. There's no need to be ashamed, even though we've been taught otherwise. I get it. But you can't write a novel based on that alone. You need plot, substance and character development. You need to be able to make readers feel emotions other than absolute repulsion.
Helen did have a traumatic childhood, but that's never properly explored. It's just mentioned casually once and then forgotten about till the very last chapter.
To sum it up, for me this book was pointless, nauseating, atrocious and a complete waste of resources. It's not even erotic, just pure gross. Reading this was anything but pleasurable. Gift it to your enemy. Use it as a torture device. Make your children read it if you don't want them to have sex for the next 10 years.
Quoting the author herself:
"Okay, okay. Who even wants to know? Besides me. I know."
Helen darling, do us all a favour, will ya? Please take your smegma perfume, avocado pits, mushroom pizza with surprise toppings and puke cocktails. Take it all and SHOVE IT UP YOUR CAULIFLOWER SHAPED ROSETTE.
(An activity that I'm pretty sure you'll enjoy thoroughly.)
January 16, 2013
We compulsively hide from one another the tiny disgusting things our bodies continuously do, as if we aren't bags of blood and mucous and decomposing food and fecal material. Are we innately loathsome, crawling with bacteria and futilely attempting cleanliness, or should we accept and embrace the earthiness of our shared humanity?
Whatever.
Helen examines, and subsequently orally consumes, most of her excretions, from vaginal discharge to vomit. She stops short of coprophagia, even though she is convinced that her own bacteria cannot hurt her. She trades used tampons with friends. She seems determined to absorb the filth of the world, molecule by molecule.
Why do we cry until tears stream down our faces and into our mouths but shudder at the thought of letting snot do the same? Why is it okay to sneeze publicly but not urinate?
Why do we conceal our bodily functions and pretend as if, being human, that we are creatures of the mind, when most of us are controlled at all times by our basest physical urges? eat. sleep. defecate. copulate. masturbate.
There is a place for books like Wetlands. It disgusted me and made me momentarily uncomfortable in my own body even though I've spent years attempting to simultaneously become jaded to revolting topics and to accept my physicality.
Whatever.
Helen examines, and subsequently orally consumes, most of her excretions, from vaginal discharge to vomit. She stops short of coprophagia, even though she is convinced that her own bacteria cannot hurt her. She trades used tampons with friends. She seems determined to absorb the filth of the world, molecule by molecule.
Why do we cry until tears stream down our faces and into our mouths but shudder at the thought of letting snot do the same? Why is it okay to sneeze publicly but not urinate?
Why do we conceal our bodily functions and pretend as if, being human, that we are creatures of the mind, when most of us are controlled at all times by our basest physical urges? eat. sleep. defecate. copulate. masturbate.
There is a place for books like Wetlands. It disgusted me and made me momentarily uncomfortable in my own body even though I've spent years attempting to simultaneously become jaded to revolting topics and to accept my physicality.
March 3, 2013
I happened upon this book while shelving in the fiction section at work. The comment on the front of the book about it being "explicit" caught my eye, and so I decided to peruse it while on my break. I ended up checking the book out and staying up late to finish it.
Honestly, I'm not sure what I expected. The first line of the book is about hemorrhoids. Not really something you want to read about. I can't say I liked this book, I can't even say I hated it. It just is what it is. In all seriousness, this book is a train wreck. It's a disgusting bloody mess and you know you shouldn't look at it, but you can't help it. Your eyes just keep getting drawn back to it.
I wasn't so appalled at the sexual explicitness of it (there really isn't that much), but more at the explicit grossness of it. Bleck. I don't care what she says, hygiene is a good thing. I also don't want to know what you stick in yourself or what you might eat that happens to come out of your body. Nasty.
There were some parts that actually had me laughing out loud though, kind of in a Laurie Notaro-ridiculousness kind of way. In the end, we do realize Helen has a bit of a human side, knowing her feelings about what her mother did, although how she left the hospital room was a bit unnerving. I think Helen is a character that could probably use some intensive therapy.
Honestly, I'm not sure what I expected. The first line of the book is about hemorrhoids. Not really something you want to read about. I can't say I liked this book, I can't even say I hated it. It just is what it is. In all seriousness, this book is a train wreck. It's a disgusting bloody mess and you know you shouldn't look at it, but you can't help it. Your eyes just keep getting drawn back to it.
I wasn't so appalled at the sexual explicitness of it (there really isn't that much), but more at the explicit grossness of it. Bleck. I don't care what she says, hygiene is a good thing. I also don't want to know what you stick in yourself or what you might eat that happens to come out of your body. Nasty.
There were some parts that actually had me laughing out loud though, kind of in a Laurie Notaro-ridiculousness kind of way. In the end, we do realize Helen has a bit of a human side, knowing her feelings about what her mother did, although how she left the hospital room was a bit unnerving. I think Helen is a character that could probably use some intensive therapy.
June 29, 2014
There's something oddly relaxing about hearing someone describe themselves in this amount of detail. There's no skirting around or euphemisms to pretty it up. Her psychological makeup is another matter, which is a much mirkier. It takes a bit of a strong stomach to get through this, but it's no worse than american Psycho's insane levels of detail, and far less troubling...it's the body. It's a young, slightly intense, woman's train of thought as she deals with a horrific memory and a longing for a better way ahead. I enjoyed this despite wincing for the first half. By the rest, I think I was immune. If more books included this sort of detail at all, then it wouldn't seem so strange. Think I might even miss Helen...and I hope she doesn't go around stealing glasses off people's faces anymore, because that really did make her an asshole...!
So, in short, really, really don't read this while eating, and accept that basic bodily functions form an important part of the narrative.
So, in short, really, really don't read this while eating, and accept that basic bodily functions form an important part of the narrative.
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