Female Authors

[sojourner]

And Woolf is conspicuous by her absence.

Nah, she's been mentioned quite a few times, once by myself. Although she has been referred to as an affectionate 'Ginny' rather than her full name...

 

[foo]

not meaning to put a spanner in the works but this thread brings home something i find a bit depressing. female authors are still 'other'. if you notice any thread on here about books, it's nearly always dominated by male authors.

i have several well-read men friends who, when i ask them if they ever read books by women, always respond. 'yeh well i've read a bit of Jane Austen/Brontes' because they had to at school or something...

i dunno what i'm trying to say here really.....

it's heartening to see me bro and OrangUtan pitching up though!

edit: (ignore me, this is one of my wee bug-bears which might not even be well founded and i don't want to ruin this lovely enjoyable thread)

 

[sojourner]

not meaning to put a spanner in the works but this thread brings home something i find a bit depressing. female authors are still 'other'. if you notice any thread on here about books, it's nearly always dominated by male authors.

i have several well-read men friends who, when i ask them if they ever read books by women, always respond. 'yeh well i've read a bit of Jane Austen/Brontes' because they had to at school or something...

i dunno what i'm trying to say here really.....

it's heartening to see me bro and OrangUtan pitching up though!

edit: (ignore me, this is one of my wee bug-bears which might not even be well founded and i don't want to ruin this lovely enjoyable thread)

But the heartening fact is that this otherness is balanced by the fact there is a 5 page thread about female writers. I think most of the contributors are female but I couldn't swear to it. I didn't for instance know bruise was your bro - thought bruise was a girl - probably cos he liked so much stuff by female writers - which says a lot eh?

Interesting foo. How come we as women (in what seems to be larger numbers than men) get into/hear of female writers? And is there such a thing as female literature, that taps into a female psyche? Ow, my head hurts - I've got a horrible cold and can't think straight but I've just thought of fuckloads of answers and even more questions at self

 

[foo]

yeh i know. but i have noticed over a long time, that women seem to read male and female authors quite happily yet a lot of men, only read male authors.

the fact that most of the contributors on this thread are female is actually part of what i find frustrating. i want men to read our words, and be interested in our perspective too dammit!!! and if female literature taps into the female psyche then why do i (and many other women) enjoy reading male literature?

oh i dunno, i'm getting a cold too, and my head hurts. it's a friend's birthday celebration tonight - a friend i've had for 30 years so i'll stir me stumps and stop being a grumpy cow.

what the above has got to do with this thread i have no idea...

get some lemsip down you love x

 

[foo]

oh yeh, bruise is my big brother.

great ain't he?

 

[sojourner]

yeh i know. but i have noticed over a long time, that women seem to read male and female authors quite happily yet a lot of men, only read male authors.

the fact that most of the contributors on this thread are female is actually part of what i find frustrating. i want men to read our words, and be interested in our perspective too dammit!!! and if female literature taps into the female psyche then why do i (and many other women) enjoy reading male literature?

oh i dunno, i'm getting a cold too, and my head hurts. it's a friend's birthday celebration tonight - a friend i've had for 30 years so i'll stir me stumps and stop being a grumpy cow.

what the above has got to do with this thread i have no idea...

get some lemsip down you love x

I think it's a very interesting thread idea...but may be derailed quite easily and descend into a bunfight One for when we're both well enough to conduct a calm and eloquent debate maybe? I've just took the last lemsip capsule, but am helping it along with a glass of rioja

Hope you have a top night foo

 

[Fez909]

I started this thread for the very reason that all the threads and discussions everywhere are always about male authors. I realised that I am one of these people who just reads male authored books. But it's not a conscious (sp?) thing with me. I just tend to read the classics, of which, there aren't too many written by woman.

This will make me sound sexist, but here we go: Probably because I haven't read any books by woman, I had a preconception that they tended to deal with the more...errr, personal side of a story; lingering on feelings and thoughts, and intricasies (sp?), rather than the wider picture, and facts and other 'manly' things. I'm obviously wrong about this, as the thread proves.

But I knew I'd be wrong, anyway, or else I wouldn't have started the thread. I think(?)

Oh, and it's nice to be able to join in to my thread. Sitting back and watching everyone recommend me stuff is good, but I couldn't contribute! Itchy fingers

 

[sojourner]

I started this thread for the very reason that all the threads and discussions everywhere are always about male authors. I realised that I am one of these people who just reads male authored books. But it's not a conscious (sp?) thing with me. I just tend to read the classics, of which, there aren't too many written by woman.

This will make me sound sexist, but here we go: Probably because I haven't read any books by woman, I had a preconception that they tended to deal with the more...errr, personal side of a story; lingering on feelings and thoughts, and intricasies (sp?), rather than the wider picture, and facts and other 'manly' things. I'm obviously wrong about this, as the thread proves.

But I knew I'd be wrong, anyway, or else I wouldn't have started the thread. I think(?)

Oh, and it's nice to be able to join in to my thread. Sitting back and watching everyone recommend me stuff is good, but I couldn't contribute! Itchy fingers

Ah, the 'classics'. But you're getting into a whole aside there - one of the reasons I chose the degree I did as a mature student was cos I detested the idea of the literary 'canon'..that whole white male middle class thing.

I don't think you sound sexist actually, or perhaps that's cos you have been honest about it. Great thread btw

 

[Fez909]

Yeah, the best solution is to admit to anything and people think you're nice...No matter what "ist" it is

Thanks for making it a great thread. May cost me a bit in either Sterling or library-hours though.

 

[sojourner]

May cost me a bit in either Sterling or library-hours though.

Worth every penny Have you decided what you're going to read first, or at all?

 

[May Kasahara]

Song of Solomon, without a shadow of a doubt, closely followed by The Bluest Eye

God, I loved The Bluest Eye. Sula was my favourite, although this was when I was about 12 or 13 and raiding my mum's bookshelves - can hardly remember anything about them now, except that they were pretty intense and enjoyable reading experiences. I should reread them all, and catch up with what she's done since really.

The only Pat Barker novel I've read so far is Blow Your House Down, which is absolutely superb - thrilling like a live wire touched to an exposed nerve. Chock full of humanity too. I've suggested the Regeneration trilogy (is that the name of the trilogy?) as one of my book club picks, but it hasn't come up yet

Must come back and read the rest of this thread later.

 

[Orang Utan]

I don't especially go out of my way to read fiction written by women but I do read a fair bit I suppose. Nowhere near 50/50 though. There are certain books by women that I tend to avoid I have to say. Stuff like Kate Atkinson and family sagas and most of the stuff that my mum sends me but that's definitely to do with preconceptions about a certain kind of fiction. I guess the female (and male) authors I admire are those who demonstrate a refreshing and wise outlook on humanity and those that come from outside of your normal perspective have the most to teach you.

 

[sojourner]

I I guess the female (and male) authors I admire are those who demonstrate a refreshing and wise outlook on humanity and those that come from outside of your normal respective have the most to teach you.

Sound post OU

I don't favour male or female writers, I just get excited by new ideas, or deeper investigation of existing ones...wrapped up in seductive writing (you know what I mean by seductive writing)

 

[trashpony]

I don't especially go out of my way to read fiction written by women but I do read a fair bit I suppose. Nowhere near 50/50 though. There are certain books by women that I tend to avoid I have to say. Stuff like Kate Atkinson and family sagas and most of the stuff that my mum sends me but that's definitely to do with preconceptions about a certain kind of fiction. I guess the female (and male) authors I admire are those who demonstrate a refreshing and wise outlook on humanity and those that come from outside of your normal perspective have the most to teach you.

Interesting. You see, I reckon you might enjoy Case Histories.

She is a really good writer imo - not a trad family saga in sight!

 

[Orang Utan]

Interesting. You see, I reckon you might enjoy Case Histories.

She is a really good writer imo - not a trad family saga in sight!

Maybe, I made a snap judgement after reading the first 50odd pages of Behind The Scenes... Just couldn't get into it. Was a bit 'considerably more Yorkshire than thou' if you know what I mean

 

[baldrick]

heh, does anyone remember the Women's Room by Marlyn French?

hehehehe, yeah haven't re-read it though, it's been probably 10 years since i picked it up. very much of it's time iirc, but nevertheless said a lot of stuff that no-one else was prepared to say.

 

[trashpony]

Maybe, I made a snap judgement after reading the first 50odd pages of Behind The Scenes... Just couldn't get into it. Was a bit 'considerably more Yorkshire than thou' if you know what I mean

Case Histories is nothing like Behind the Scenes which is a bit twee I think

 

[foo]

I started this thread for the very reason that all the threads and discussions everywhere are always about male authors. I realised that I am one of these people who just reads male authored books. But it's not a conscious (sp?) thing with me. I just tend to read the classics, of which, there aren't too many written by woman.

This will make me sound sexist, but here we go: Probably because I haven't read any books by woman, I had a preconception that they tended to deal with the more...errr, personal side of a story; lingering on feelings and thoughts, and intricasies (sp?), rather than the wider picture, and facts and other 'manly' things. I'm obviously wrong about this, as the thread proves.

'ello welcome to your own thread

i find this post honest, and bloody refreshing!

 

[sojourner]

I forgot about this thread til Ruti 'liked' my post on the front page. Great thread Fez!

 

[Fez909]

I forgot about this thread til Ruti 'liked' my post on the front page. Great thread Fez!

I was looking through it yesterday because of the Maya Angelou news. You recommended her on the very first page. I bought the book but haven't read it yet. Got some great books from this, though...I even read some of them

Charlotte Perkins - Yellow Wallpaper
Margaret Atwood - Handmaid's Tale
Emily Bronte - Wuthering Heights
Sylvia Plath - Bell Jar
Dauphne de Maurier - Rebecca
Shirley Jackson - The Lottery

Were all good Especially the Bell Jar. I was depressed when reading it which wasn't good for my state of mind but helped me empathise with her a lot more than I might have done. Was devastating.

Need to get around to reading le Guin's Dispossessed sometime. Although I should to get around to reading something, anything, at the minute

 

[D'wards]

Wot no Agatha Christie?

Yes her stuff is dated, but then it is nearly a century old. The three best, imho are;

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
Murder on the Orient Express
Ten Little Niggers oops offensive Ten Little Indians oops offensive And Then There Were None

 

[maya]

Charlotte Perkins - Yellow Wallpaper
Margaret Atwood - Handmaid's Tale
Dauphne de Maurier - Rebecca

I'll second those... (Rebecca is not my favourite du Maurier novel tbh, but all her books are good- there's lots of betrayal and deception in her books, it's unsettling and very uncomfortable to read.)

I'd like to add:

Nella Larsen- ’Passing’ (1929).
African american female author, the central theme in the novel is a woman passing for white in a racist society, but it's also about close friendship and sexuality... it has a modern feel to it, you wouldn’t know it was written in the 1920s unless somebody told you.

Ann Quin- 'Berg'.
Opening sentence: "A man called Berg, who changed his name to Greb, came to a seaside town intending to kill his father..." This book is difficult to describe, you'll have to read it for yourself to understand what I mean I think... it's unusual.

Djuna Barnes- 'Nightwood'.
Dense, poetic, dark.

Karin Boye- 'Kallocain'. (1940)
Dark dystopian novel about government mind control (by 'truth drugs') and rebellion by a swedish modernist lesbian poet who wrote loads of brilliant poetry (some of it is translated, but in translation the words are never quite the same), edited a successful literary magazine with lasting cultural impact then commited suicide by walking out into the woods.

Anne Carson- 'Eros the bittersweet'.
Poetry. (Blurb: 'Anne Carson lives in Canada.')

 

[Ceej]

*glances at bookshelves*

Lots of female crime writers - I do love a good murder - just the ones I can see - Mo Hayder, Val McDermid, Margaret Murphy, Ann Cleves, Patricia Cornwall, Alex Barclay, Denise Mina, Chelsea Cain, Elizabeth George, Tana French, Ruth Rendell, Sue Grafton. No shortage in the crime genre. Not so much in the more literary corner - Jhumpa Lahiri, Sylvia Plath, Joan Aitken, Donna Tartt, Maggie O'Farrell, Carol Shields, Maya Angelou.

The boys in primary school don't like reading books by 'girls' - the girls don't seem too bothered. Maybe it's something we don't grow out of?

 

[quimcunx]

Lots of very old threads being bumped recently.

Maya Angelou would be a timely recommendation.

Whoever wrote Pop Joan
Whoever wrote The Floating Brothel IIRC not fiction, not even sure it was a woman.
Val McDermid
Isabel Allende
Toni Morrison