That Damnable Glass Ceiling?

http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/82930/VIDA-women-writers-magazines-book-reviews

In the first few hours after this article appeared online in The New Republic, one of my friends posted it to my Facebook page, and two others sent me text messages telling me about it.  All three knew I would have strong opinions about these "shocking" statistics, and it seems fitting that I should address those opinions in my blog.

First, I should say that these statistics are no more shocking to me than the fact that there is a literary glass ceiling at all.  Obviously there is one, and it doesn't take an article in the venerable New Republic to teach me what I've known for years.  Back in 1998, when the Modern Library released its controversial list of the 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century, featuring just nine books by female authors, the reality of a glass ceiling sank in pretty fast.  I don't think anyone is suggesting that a list needs to be divided equally between the genders, but nine books by women in a century that boasted Margaret Atwood, Harper Lee, Dorris Lessing, Toni Morrison, Flannery O'Connor, and Virginia Woolf?  Come on, Modern Library, get real.

There are certainly those who will find these statistics surprising, upsetting, unjust.  There are others who will be indifferent.  And, finally, there are those who will claim it doesn't matter, like Peter Stothard, editor of the Times Literary Supplement, who is quoted in the above-mentioned article as saying he "refused to make a fetish" of having an equal number of male and female literary contributors to his publication.  His comment puts things in perspective and gets to the heart of the issue for me:

Literature should be judged on its inherent qualities, review space should be devoted to the most important books, and lists of "the best" should be based on books' merits, not gender, race, or what not of the authors.  However, we need to ask ourselves, as this article does, who is making these decisions as to quality, importance, merit, etc.  And, more importantly, what defines quality, importance, and merit for our present day society.  I believe the problem of gender bias is in some ways a modern phenomenon.  Disagree?  That's fine, but please remember that the 19th Century British Novel did not discriminate against women.  In fact, it was a pretty even playing field as far as gender neutrality (equality?) goes, with Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte, George Eliot, and the poets Christina Rossetti and Elizabeth Barrett Browning taking pride of place alongside Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, William Makepeace Thackeray, and Anthony Trollope.  And this is not just in retrospect.  Although Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights was not a hit at the time, Charlotte's novels were very successful, George Eliot sold well and was critically acclaimed, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning was even more popular than her husband Robert in their heyday.

So if 19th century Britain could produce an equal playing field, just what the heck is wrong with us in the 21st Century?  Whenever a list of "the greatest whatever's of all time" comes out, whether in literature or music, you'll find that women are underrepresented.  So we must ask ourselves, is this because we actually feel that men have produced more works of quality?  Or is it that the people making these decisions, and these lists, are primarily men?  I have to say no to both of these questions.  I just can't accept that anyone who reads seriously, or listens to music passionately, could legitimately claim that men consistently produce better work.  I'm sure as heck not saying that everything needs to be 50-50, but nine novels out of 100 is appalling.

Let's look at another list: in 2005, Time Magazine picked the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.  Their list was considerably better than the Modern Library's, with 20 novels by women and 80 by men.  Still, though, something seems amiss.  As for the people making the decisions, well, the above-mentioned article shows us that the majority of book reviewers are male, but I'm not willing to let women off the hook completely.  When Rolling Stone magazine chose the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003, their list was heavily skewed toward male singers and male-fronted bands, but the panel of judges included a significant number of women, ranging from singers like Shirley Manson of Garbage (a renowned feminist) to journalists like Elysa Gardner. 

These issues are weighty, and they cannot be condensed to soundbites.  However, they are obviously problematic to many people, otherwise articles like this one in the New Republic would not be written, and prizes like the Orange Prize (given to the best full length English-language novel written by a woman in any given year) would not have been created.  Some cry foul at the existence of the Orange Prize, claiming that if women want to be judged equally, on their own merits, then an award devoted only to female authors is unjust.  However, it's a double edged sword: until female authors are treated equally, given the same amount of review space, nominated for prizes with the same frequency as their male counterparts, then why shouldn't an award exist to honor the wonderful books that are falling by the wayside?

I have noticed a certain discrimination myself, as a lifelong avid reader, one that manifests itself in a few different ways.  For example, when asked to list some of my favorite authors, I might reply, off the top of my head : "Joyce Carol Oates, Stephen King, Anne Tyler, Sue Miller, John Irving, Toni Morrison, and Ian McEwen."  I have, in fact, rattled off this very list before, and gotten the response (more than once): "Wow, you read a lot of female authors."  Well, no.  I just provided a cursory list of favorites that includes four females and three males.  Somehow, though, this is interpreted as reading "a lot of female authors."  Same situation arises when people look at my vast CD collection.  "Wow, Shane, you like a lot of female singers."  Yes, I sure do.  And a lot of male singers, too.  Why is it that people feel the need to mention the number of females as some sort of oddity?  Is it because I'm a man?  Certainly, if someone said they read John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Brad Thor, Patricia Cornwell, and Robert Crais, the response would not be "Wow, you read a lot of male authors."  Come on, people, you know I'm right about this one.

The other thing I've noticed, somewhat disturbingly, is that people (both men and women) feel perfectly comfortable saying "I don't read female authors."  I have heard this three times in the past year, from two men and one woman.  As an avid reader, I cannot even conceive of ruling out an entire gender and denying myself a wealth of good reads, but to each their own.

I guess the reason this article in The New Republic bothers me so much is that part of me wants literature to be the place where true equality really does exist, where writers of both genders, all races, different religious beliefs, social classes, and sexual orientations change lives through the power of the written word.

This blog has been all over the map, and I have a lot more that I could say.  However, it's a complicated issue and one that reflects certain biases and issues that exist in society at large.  Since I'm feeling tired, I will let someone else speak.  This is a quote from a review of Sue Miller's The Lake Shore Limited, written by a male reviewer, that appeared in The Washington Post when the book came out last year.  It summarizes so much of what I feel, and it warms my heart that this man is writing reviews read by thousands of people:

"There are several contenders (Anita Shreve, Gail Godwin), but Sue Miller might be the best poster child for the poison condescension bestowed by the term "women's literature." She didn't publish her first novel, "The Good Mother" (1986), until she was in her 40s, but since then she's been prolific and popular (another mark against her), writing about families and marriages, infidelity and divorce -- what we call "literary fiction" when men write about those things. Last year, a grudging review of "The Senator's Wife" in That Other East Coast Newspaper claimed that Miller's novels "feature soap-opera plots," a mischaracterization broad enough to apply to any story that doesn't involve space travel or machine guns."

Hats off to you, Mr. Ron Carlson.  May you continue to review great books for many years to come!