This is hitting the nail on the head: “Of course the problem is not that women only write about women stuff. But the perception that women write for women and men write for everyone is foundational to these readership discrepancies.” 👏 And it’s the same bias for race too.
Appreciate this ongoing noodling of the issue, Sara! Aligned, I was listening to (another) podcast recently about “are men ok/what is wrong with men?” where they mostly meant cis/het white men and it has all been making me a bit frustrated that these conversations seem to be leading us in a circle back to these same men being at the center? I feel frustrated that while the problem seems important to identify that it’s hard to talk about it without feeling like we’re still putting this demographic at the center. Discussions like yours are nuanced in that, they’re hoping to encourage the centering -or at least exposure- (through reading) to other identities but we’re still having to focus on the dominant demographic in the process. It makes me feel a little batty 😵💫 I don’t really have a question, and I definitely don’t have an answer. Maybe I just dream of a world where we don’t have to constantly consider the white cishet male of it all???
This is such a complex issue. One aspect not much discussed is which books by women men do read and why? What is the correlation between men reading a book by a woman and that book being considered literary or serious or worthy of an award? Is there pressure on women writers to try to attract male readers, and does that shift how they write? When I was young chances of women authors being taken seriously by male readers, and not just white cis/het but pretty much any men at all, was slim. Joan Didion. Susan Sontag. It felt to me like they were writing within a deliberate constraint that made their work exempt from the accusation that they wrote for women and it was therefore okay for men to read. I didn't blame them. Straight is the gate. These constraints about what woman-authored books men might read is as narrow as ever yet there is more opportunity to be rewarded for it with prizes, et cetera—the goodies. This worries me about how it shapes women's ambitions. I know this is a sidebar, but it is about what men will deign to read!
This is such a fantastic read! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts! My husband and I had a whole conversation about this as we read your piece together. And it has definitely opened my eyes to how I want to guide my two little boys in their reading choices as they grow up.
This is hitting the nail on the head: “Of course the problem is not that women only write about women stuff. But the perception that women write for women and men write for everyone is foundational to these readership discrepancies.” 👏 And it’s the same bias for race too.
Appreciate this ongoing noodling of the issue, Sara! Aligned, I was listening to (another) podcast recently about “are men ok/what is wrong with men?” where they mostly meant cis/het white men and it has all been making me a bit frustrated that these conversations seem to be leading us in a circle back to these same men being at the center? I feel frustrated that while the problem seems important to identify that it’s hard to talk about it without feeling like we’re still putting this demographic at the center. Discussions like yours are nuanced in that, they’re hoping to encourage the centering -or at least exposure- (through reading) to other identities but we’re still having to focus on the dominant demographic in the process. It makes me feel a little batty 😵💫 I don’t really have a question, and I definitely don’t have an answer. Maybe I just dream of a world where we don’t have to constantly consider the white cishet male of it all???
This is such a complex issue. One aspect not much discussed is which books by women men do read and why? What is the correlation between men reading a book by a woman and that book being considered literary or serious or worthy of an award? Is there pressure on women writers to try to attract male readers, and does that shift how they write? When I was young chances of women authors being taken seriously by male readers, and not just white cis/het but pretty much any men at all, was slim. Joan Didion. Susan Sontag. It felt to me like they were writing within a deliberate constraint that made their work exempt from the accusation that they wrote for women and it was therefore okay for men to read. I didn't blame them. Straight is the gate. These constraints about what woman-authored books men might read is as narrow as ever yet there is more opportunity to be rewarded for it with prizes, et cetera—the goodies. This worries me about how it shapes women's ambitions. I know this is a sidebar, but it is about what men will deign to read!
This is such a fantastic read! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts! My husband and I had a whole conversation about this as we read your piece together. And it has definitely opened my eyes to how I want to guide my two little boys in their reading choices as they grow up.
It's so strange that Portnoy's Complaint is considered "universal" while All Fours is "women's fiction."