this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2025
226 points (97.1% liked)
Books
6337 readers
297 users here now
A community for all things related to Books.
Rules
- Be Nice. No personal attacks or hate speech.
- No spam. All posts should be related to books.
Official Bingo Posts:
Related Communities
Community icon by IconsBox (from freepik.com)
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
?
When your mate knows your likes and interests, and suggests doing things you like to do unprompted, thats showing deep love. That's hot.
the hottest
But that's not talking dirty. Talking dirty is crude (and sexual). The "Me" is describe some cozy, homebody fantasy.
Making it crude would be going to mom-and-pop bookshop that was retrofitted to sell physical copies of Amazon self-publishers.
The phrase "talk dirty to me" has the meaning you're describing. However, the intended result of talking dirty is to sexually excite your partner with sexually explicit intimate details that you know your partner likes.
So in our example here the "me" is describing an activity he knows the "her" would like: shopping for books/exploration. Further, "me" adds extra details that "her" likes because he has spent time learning her likes/dislikes/interests because he loves her that would further match her desires. That time spent shows a deep romantic commitment "me" has made to "her". Someone showing a deep commitment to you (that you want that affection from them) is extremely attractive. A physical expression of extreme attraction is wanting to have sex with them. So we've reached the same *intended result * as the traditional "talk dirty to me", but we did so in a pleasantly unexpected way.
Lastly, this post has humor it in too, and the element of humor here is "subverting expectations". "Her" says "talk dirty to me" and the audience expects "me" to start describing sexual acts, however he describes the bookstore adventure, which is unexpected for both "her" and us as the audience. Having a good sense of humor is also usually seen as an attractive feature, so "her" is extra into "me" because he demonstrated humor while also reflecting his deep loving commitment to her.
To continue the joke dissection discourse:
That whole scenario is predicated on a deeper background to the "characters" that we cannot assume. However, though I don't agree with it, I'll proceed under the assumption that these two characters have the level of interiority you prescribe them.
Responding to the "humor's subversion of expectations" bit: I get that, which is why I was initially confused/unsatisfied. My expectation was a crude/debauched way of interacting with books. "I'm gonna dogear the pages.", "I creased the book's spine.", etc. What I got felt like a non-sequitur that was a step or two above "* holds up spork *". (I guess people liked that type of joke back then too).
A more nuanced interpretation of the joke than is apparent requires so much relatively heavy-lifting from the audience and/or for the audience to work backward from the decision that "the joke must be competent/fulfilling".
Right, that's way too literal (pun not intended). Too superficial. Too easy.
Yep, there are several leaps of logic the audience must go through to arrive at the author's position. Hence it being much more satisfying when we get the joke. Moreover, there's also a transference of appreciation, and perhaps a bit of envy on the part of the audience that the "her" in this case has such a loving mate that we would all want the same.