McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Writing from a different gender perspective
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Shecky on October 14, 2009, 04:24:26 PM ---I'm most curious as to what Harriet thought of her husband's female characters, given all the great things I've heard about her.
--- End quote ---
So far as I know, she was his first and most intense beta-reader, so I can but presume they had her approval; precisely what he was actually trying to do with them remains opaque to me.
Aludra:
--- Quote from: Kali on October 14, 2009, 04:16:31 PM ---Jim writes women well in all his books. Murphy, Charity, Molly... All feminine, all complete characters with their own strengths and weaknesses.
Male author who writes women VERY poorly? Robert Jordan. Snivelling, sniffing, bitchy, snotty, conniving, whiny, and horrible. There isn't a woman in the entire series (or at least as far as I read, which was the first four or maybe five, I think) I could either identify with, or could ever imagine wanting to know. I'd smack them all senseless. Hated the lot of them, and the female characterizations are one of the biggest reasons I stopped reading the books. I can only conclude that Robert Jordan has never met a strong, competent, kind, loving woman in his entire life. They're all mean and sly and hateful, judging by the women in his books.
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Hmm.. You're a better person than I am clearly, because I identified with the snivelling, the sniffing, the snotty, (I've got allergies, you know), the bitchy (Oh, I can be a mean bitch, but I'm subtle), the conniving (ahem, sex as a method for behavior alteration, I does it), whiny (my tantrums are grade A) and the horrible. I am also a myriad of good things as well. I think that if you can relate to Alanis Morsiette's "I'm a bitch, I'm a lover" song, then you should be able to relate to Jordan's females.
Shecky:
There's a part of me that wonders whether Jordan was making a comment on the common position in our quasi-patriarchal society that "men are all the same" by making the WOMEN largely the same in his world's society (which happens to lean closer to the matriarchal than does ours)...
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Shecky on October 14, 2009, 04:41:00 PM ---There's a part of me that wonders whether Jordan was making a comment on the common position in our quasi-patriarchal society that "men are all the same" by making the WOMEN largely the same in his world's society (which happens to lean closer to the matriarchal than does ours)...
--- End quote ---
Could be.
I wouldn't presume to speak for either of them or claim to know them at all well, but they did come across as both being old-fashioned Southerners of a context where gnder distinctions are more fundamental than they are in my worldview.
Shecky:
--- Quote from: neurovore on October 14, 2009, 04:46:53 PM ---Could be.
I wouldn't presume to speak for either of them or claim to know them at all well, but they did come across as both being old-fashioned Southerners of a context where gnder distinctions are more fundamental than they are in my worldview.
--- End quote ---
That's the impression I've been gathering. To be honest, Jordan reminds me a bit of the accounts of Heinlein: old-fashioned gentleman kind of person.
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