The Spanking Writers

On the Northern Line, after a work dinner on Wednesday evening, I found myself sitting next to a smartly-dressed gent who was studying handwritten notes from his English language classes. I couldn’t help but wonder what they’d been teaching him, and glanced at the words neatly listed against their Arabic equivalents.

Here’s the extract that caught my eye:

Pretty bad

Very bad

Awful

Utterly disgraceful

I rather liked the idea of the next class, in which he’d doubtless be taught the implements and number of strokes that apply for each level of misbehaviour.

I read a review a while back a marvellous-sounding tome about women in ancient Rome. Sadly I’ve lost the article, so can’t recall the book’s name, but there must surely be a chapter on ‘Discipline and Punishment’?

Take the case of the slave girl, near-naked and chained in the marketplace, who bit a potential new owner as he carefully inspected her. As a senator, he’d take up his right to administer her whipping himself – in full view of the other traders, customers and girls.

Or the case of the emperor’s daughters. He’d hire a new tutor for them, and would tell her to be strict with his girls if they erred. She’d teach them well and they’d study diligently; she’d spared the rod as a result. Yet the emperor would learn that his girls had played truant one day, going to watch some procession in the Forum. “How many strokes of the birch did you give each of them,” he’d ask of the tutor. “They’re good girls, sir; I scolded them and they seemed very penitent,” she’d reply. Needless to say, once the emperor had whipped his daughters, he’d give the tutor the same number of strokes in total as the two girls had taken.

The men in each story, would of course be in positions of absolute power: the senator who’d bought a girl from the market (for he’d surely take her home after whipping her); the emperor ruling without challenge. And in each case, that offers further potential for one’s imagination to run riot – for there’d be little that the slave or the tutor could do were their master to close the door and decide that the flogging was a mere prelude to the pleasures they wished and intended to take…

Perhaps it’s a good thing I didn’t track down the book. I fear the reality might have disappointed, rather…

I closed the bedroom door firmly behind me: “I thought I told you to face the wall with your hands on your head?”

She started to mumble an explanation, but I interrupted: “No excuses. I shall punish you for your disobedience, after I’ve dealt with the issue we were due to address.”

Soon, she was over my knee, skirt lifted, the spanking far harder than she would ever have expected the first time I punished her. I talked softly but firmly, expressing my disappointment in her.

I pulled down her knickers, baring her; tears fell as the punishment continued – bottom, thighs, bright red now. No pause for breath; no mercy; this was deserved.

Afterwards I bade her hand me a cane and bend over the end of the bed: “And now you need to learn the consequences of not following instructions.” Six strokes, hard, marking her, making her howl. And then a hug, holding her tight, the events that had caused her to be punished now forgiven if not yet entirely forgotten.

I like my dreams sometimes…

A large hall: oak beams, rafters. To the side, four girls. Naked. Tied from the rafters with thick rope, their wrists tightly bound, stretched high above their heads.

A gentleman would walk over and untie one of their number. He’d lead her across the room to his colleagues, and her punishment would begin – in plain view for the other girls. When they’d finished with her, she’d be led back, re-tied. The next girl would be selected.

Only, they wouldn’t work in a strict rota. No girl would know when it would be her time to be chosen – she might wait out for three turns, or she might watch just one of her friends being beaten before she was led forward again. No girl would know what would befall her when she was selected – they’d all be caned, be whipped across the back, be tied to the table to have the fronts of their thighs striped, be strapped to the punishment horse to be birched. But not necessarily in the same order.

When each of them had been subjected to each ordeal, their eyes would be covered, blindfolded so that they were quite unable to see. And the screams of the first of their number from whatever was being done to her across the room would fill the others with dread, before she was brought back, sobbing, and tied amongst them whilst they paused and decided who to take next.

–

I think my imagination’s getting darker, you know. I think it’s a rather good thing: I hope the trend continues during the year  ahead!

I’m rather fond of the story behind the “Keep Calm and Carry On” poster that’s become so prevalent in recent years – partly because of the sentiment, and partly because it owes its place in modern popular culture to its rediscovery by Barter Books in Alnwick, one of very favourite places.

So many variants of the poster now exist that I thought there must be an easy way to generate one’s own “Keep Calm” posters online – and, lo and behold, there is. So, here are a couple of my takes on the old classic:

I’d love to see your suggestions for versions of the slogan – and I’ll make up a poster with the best idea received in the comments and add it to the post!

Ever since a discussion shortly before Christmas with Kami Robertson, I’ve become rather pre-occupied at regular intervals with images of lasses tied to the mast aboard ship and whipped. There have been stowaways being caught and hauled before the captain. There’ve been girls who’ve masqueraded as boys to run away to sea as crew members, only for their real identities to be revealed.

There was the captain’s girlfriend, serving on board. None of the rest of the sailors knew of their relationship; when she was found guilty of disobeying orders, she was taken before him. He’d have no choice but to deal with her in the traditional way: she’d be stripped, bound with rough rope, flogged with the cat in front of the assembled crew.

Oh, and in non-mast on-board punishments, there was the daughter of a first-class passenger on a liner. Money being no object for her family, there was no reason for her to slip a silver jug into her purse at dinner. The purser noticed; she and her father were called into the captain’s plush quarters. She denied everything; a thorough search of her room turned up the offending article. Her father and the captain would confer: they’d agree not to involve the police when the ship docked, and two dozen strokes of the cane from the officer would precede far more licks of the parental belt back in the privacy of their cabin.

My judicial caning fantasies have always followed a similar pattern: the girl is stripped naked, tied down (for a caning of this severity would be impossible to take otherwise) and whipped without an iota of mercy.

Devious me dreamt up a rather nice little spin on the plot the other evening, though. The girl would be led into the punishment room to find not one, but two cane-wielding officers awaiting her. The regulations might read something like this:

To ensure that a punishment is administered at the fullest strength at all times, and that an officer applying a flogging at no point tires or loses concentration whilst performing his duties, canings will be administered in batches of ten strokes.

Where a sentence comprises more than ten strokes but less than twenty, two officers will be present, each applying an equal number of strokes. Where a sentence exceeds twenty strokes, the two officers shall take turns inflicting batches of ten strokes each at a time, up to the total approved by the court.

Forty strokes, I’m thinking. Ten from the first officer, ten from the next, ten from the first, ten from the second. A short pause between each batch – not long enough for her to relax, but allowing just enough time for the pain of the previous ten to peak and for her to fearfully contemplate the next set.

And not that the officers would in any way compete with each other, to see who’d administer the harder strokes, or who would break her. Oh no. I mean, that first officer – he wouldn’t do everything he could to make sure she was sobbing before he handed over to his colleague, would he?

Amongst many fabulous, thoughtful, generous Christmas and birthday presents, several (inevitably) were of a kinky nature. Ah, but my friends know me so well…

It was one of the vanilla items that prompted the naughtiest thoughts, though. Emma Jane, amongst other lovely gifts, gave me a jigsaw depicting 1970s confectionery. It reminded me of childhood treats, and made me smile so. And it made me think ever-such-wicked thoughts, too.

Two schoolgirls, wearing blazers. In the headmaster’s study, standing next to one another. Sisters, I think, one a couple of years older than the other. Both crying. Hands outstretched.

They hadn’t realised that the newsagent had a mirror with which he could keep an eye on the counter when his back was turned. But the tawsing they were about to receive would teach them the most painful of lessons about stealing sweets on their way home.

Six on each hand, I think. With an XH Lochgelly. And the shame awaiting them of the rest of the school learning of their punishment – and of word inevitably getting back to their parents.

I woke on Christmas morning having had two of the loveliest, most vivid spanking dreams I’ve had in a long while. One involved three prefects and a girl; I rather hope to turn that into a story. The other featured a headmaster and a rather recalcitrant fifth-form girl.

She’d been caught by the police, you see, drinking underage in the local pub – in doing so, breaking a sacrosanct school rule. The constables had returned her to the school premises, taking her to the head’s office to explain what had happened. It had been agreed that no charges would be brought provided the matter was soundly dealt with; assurances to that effect had been accepted.

Now a good headmaster always has his ear close to the grapevine, and learnt later in the day that – far from being ashamed of what she’d done – the lass concerned was positively boasting about her exploits and revelling in the hero status that it seemed to confer. Word had it (quite correctly) that she was to be given a public punishment in assembly the following morning – not something of which she was embarrassed, but more a badge of obstinate honour.

And so it was that the headmaster sent for the girl late that night, immediately after lights out. Had her brought to his study. Told her that there was no pride to be had in behaving foolishly, as she stood before him defiantly (yet, he noted, trembling more than a little). Listened as she told him that she saw nothing wrong in what she’d done.

He took the heaviest, most severe tawse from his desk drawer; applied it with concentrated vigour to the girl’s bared backside and upper thighs, as she bent tight over his desk. She took the first few searing strokes without a murmur. Whether it was the pain of the strapping – or his disappointed words at her unfulfilled potential – that brought on the tears, neither of them could subsequently judge.

After the twelfth and final stroke, she reached back and clasped her buttocks, pleading her apologies. “I doubt there’d be much hero-worship from the other girls if they could see you now,” the headmaster observed as he returned the strap to its home and told her to pull up her pyjamas and stand. Nothing clever, nothing brave in standing tearful and beaten in front of him. No act of rebellion in accepting the proffered hug: just a contrite girl, ashamed of what she’d done and inspired to do better from that moment on.

This started as a short blog entry, inspired (as are so many) by a dream overnight last night. It half-turned into a shortish story, written in some haste before my house guest awakes this morning. Whatever it is, I rather like the setting. And, actually, more than a story or blog entry, it really would make a lovely scene…

–

A large, comfortable family house in the Home Counties, some time in the 1920s.

Mother, father, two daughters sit at the dinner table. Only, actually, it’s mother, stepfather, daughter, stepdaughter, a year since the marriage. They’re all smartly dressed: Sunday-best frocks; jacket and tie.

The meal over, he tells the girls to clear the table – “Then I want you to do another hour’s schoolwork before bedtime.” And the stepdaughter loses her temper: “It’s Sunday. I’ve worked all weekend. You’re not fair.” She flings her glass of water to the table; it shatters.

A moment’s silence, as they take in what’s just happened, before he speaks: “Go to your room…”

He leaves her there for a goodly while, giving her time to contemplate, for anger to give way to remorse – and dread. “I’ll always treat you as my own daughter,” he’d said when she’d moved in, and he’s been good to his word ever since: caring, kind, loving. And when they’ve transgressed – either of them, both of them? He’s treated them the same then, too – across his knee, the spankings equally hard and the cuddles afterwards equally heartfelt.

But there’s one punishment he’s not yet had to use on her…

He climbs the stairs, knocks on the door of the room that his girls share, waits for her open it. She lets him in, avoiding eye contact, standing small and downcast before him.

“I hardly need to say that that was completely unacceptable.”

“I know. I’m sorry…”

“You crossed a line there, into behaviour that leaves me no choice but to punish you severely. I’d like you to go downstairs; apologise to your mother and sister; clear up the mess you’ve made. And then join me in my study…”

She knows at once what he means by that. His study. Where the thick crook-handled cane rests next to the desk. Unused on her – but not, since her arrival, on her sister, whom she’d consoled as best she could after six deserved strokes for being given a detention at school.

She composes herself as best she can after he’s left. Takes deep breaths. Tries to summon up the courage to face what’s to come; finding no courage at all, she heads downstairs anyway. Her mother: distant, matter-of-fact, as she listens to the apology. Her sister, holding her hand and whispering good luck. The table at long last cleared, the dishes washed and dried; the shards of glass carefully packed into a cardboard box.

And then there’s nowhere left to hide.

She knocks, is called in. Hears of his shock, his disappointment: “I thought better of you than that.” Hears how he intends to teach her a sound lesson. Watches, as he positions a wooden chair in the centre of the room, as he then picks up the cane. “Bend over, and put your hands on the seat of the chair. And bare your bottom.” She complies, tears welling up in her eyes. “I’m so sorry to have let you down…”

“You’ve let yourself down. And it can’t happen again. Won’t happen again: I’m going to give you twelve strokes of the cane.” Twelve carefully-measured stripes, each weal perfectly parallel to the others. Each drawing a sob, some lifting her involuntarily to her feet to clutch at her striped buttocks, dancing on the spot in pain until she can bend forward to take more.

He intersperses his clear count of the number of strokes with an explanation of why she’s there: of how much he loves her; of how he wants her to do well, to make him and her mother proud; of how she must control her temper; of how he hopes she’ll learn from her punishment. And when he’s finished, he holds his sobbing girl close to his chest, taking his pocket handkerchief to dry her tears, and telling her again how much he loves her.