tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post3844142647196947748..comments2024-03-26T01:10:13.720+00:00Comments on Teach Me Tonight: Quality, Patriarchy and PopularityE. M. Selingerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00426524354823232002noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-44189403334263697822007-03-19T03:09:00.000+00:002007-03-19T03:09:00.000+00:00Hi Sandra,Thank you for your Comment -- firstly, i...Hi Sandra,<BR/>Thank you for your Comment -- firstly, it's comforting to know I was correct when I said (nor am I suggesting that she does), and secondly I appreciate your enlightenment regarding Victorian chivalry. While I am not all that familiar with that subject, I know enough about it to appreciate your portrayal of it (and jeez have we come a long way since then!).<BR/>Thanks again,Sandra!<BR/>BillDr. Bill Emenerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00707755608580620460noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-44600873497163649022007-03-18T18:26:00.000+00:002007-03-18T18:26:00.000+00:00they're not presented in such a way that they read...<I>they're not presented in such a way that they read to me like a deliberate exercise in presenting contrasts in 'femininity' and 'masculinity'.</I><BR/><BR/>I guess it's usually done quite subtly. But since I looked at it in some detail, it tends to jump out for me.Sandra Schwabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496019392789508611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-53554189455463854972007-03-18T18:22:00.000+00:002007-03-18T18:22:00.000+00:00Bill, I'm coming at it from the Victorian chivalry...Bill, I'm coming at it from the Victorian chivalry corner, thanks to the diss I'm writing on dragonslaying and genderroles. There's a great article by Joseph A. Kestner on "The Return of St. George" in the late 19th century. Kestner describes a development in Victorian painting which culminates in stark-naked woman chained to tree (or rock), threatened by evil, evil dragon (or dastardly knight), but - hey-ho - enter our knight in shining armour, who easily slays evil dragon (or the dastardly knight). While at the beginning of this development, the woman is at least clad in the traditional flimsy white dress, she's naked at the end of it in order to emphasize her helpness. Thus, these paintings contrast the naked, helpless, passive body of the female, with the armoured, powerful, active body of the male. In a way this is perpetuated in romance, only the hero's outer armour is replaced by a kind of internalized armour, when his body is described metal metaphoras and similes (steel-gray eyes, bronzed skin, iron-hard muscles, etc.). These almost always occur in relation to the heroine's (softer, smaller) body, thus emphasizing the greater physical weakness of the heroine. Which, of course, often turns out to be deceiving.Sandra Schwabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496019392789508611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-1724179546625676852007-03-18T16:22:00.000+00:002007-03-18T16:22:00.000+00:00Hi Laura,Sorry I haven’t been by lately – I ate so...Hi Laura,<BR/>Sorry I haven’t been by lately – I ate some bad food 48-72 hours ago and haven been a prisoner on the couch. Feeling a little better now though, at least enough to think somewhat rationally.<BR/>Nice blog… raises many issues.<BR/>I am intrigued with Sandra’s Comment… “On with hard male bodies vs. woman's soft curves: this contrast came up in more or less all romances I've read. At the top of my head, I can't remember any romance in which the heroine's soft, small body wasn't contrasted with the hero's tall, muscled body. So initially it would seem that the heroine is the more helpless one.” After 33 years of a private practice, I realize I still think like a psychologist… why does a person’s body structure necessarily have to suggest being or feeling “helpless?” I think she may very well have identified a societal belief, but I don’t subscribe to it (nor am I suggesting that she does). Maybe in my next novel, the heroine will have a soft, small body and be psychologically tough as nails and the tall, muscular hero will be a cowering wimp. And for the record, I’ve seen it many times.<BR/>Cheers,<BR/>BillDr. Bill Emenerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00707755608580620460noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-30770079760804783002007-03-18T04:23:00.000+00:002007-03-18T04:23:00.000+00:00You get this playing up of gender differences even...You get this playing up of gender differences even in slash fanfic and yaoi manga. It's common for one of the heroes to be assigned to the female role and described in very feminised terms, and there's a clear pattern in who gets picked to play the girl. The joke in slash circles is that the older/taller/darker one tops the younger/shorter/blonder one -- and there's a prime example of such on the cover of my yaoi prose novel "Lord and Master".<BR/><BR/>I very deliberately went against this in one of my books, with the one who was in charge being older and more experienced (in a number of ways, not just sexual), but short and blond, and the younger one tall, dark and muscular. And I'll bet that there are people whose mental image of those characters doesn't match the physical description I gave in the book.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-36032731067139086372007-03-18T01:39:00.000+00:002007-03-18T01:39:00.000+00:00One of my favorite romances is LaVryle Spenser's S...One of my favorite romances is LaVryle Spenser's <I>Spring Fancy</I>. I particularly enjoy it because the heroine is very fit--she and the hero play a lot of raquetball together and she is a physical therapist. There is a line I'm going to have to paraphrase told from the hero's POV: something like, "her muscles were so hard under her skin. He didn't understand how anyone could prefer feminine softness to what he was feeling now." I love the book for many reasons, but it's stood out in my mind as almost the first time I read a book that focused entirely on the heroine's beauty through fitness, rather than on the beauty of her feminine curves and softness. <BR/><BR/>Which is not to say that I don't love Laura Kinsale's zaftig heroine in <I>Seize the Fire</I> and how the hero adores her precisely for her curves, especially for the curve of her stomach, which I find particularly romantic and erotic, for some reason.<BR/><BR/>Just random thoughts created by your comments.Sarah S.G. Frantzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10413768227099945783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-75220166792225729472007-03-17T23:59:00.000+00:002007-03-17T23:59:00.000+00:00At the top of my head, I can't remember any romanc...<I>At the top of my head, I can't remember any romance in which the heroine's soft, small body wasn't contrasted with the hero's tall, muscled body</I><BR/><BR/>That's really interesting. I've definitely come across it in some romances, particularly where it's constantly emphasised, but it's the emphasis which made it jump out at me. I don't remember it happening in my favourite romances. I'm not saying that my favourite romances don't contain comments about the characters' physiques but as far as I can recall, they're not presented in such a way that they read to me like a deliberate exercise in presenting contrasts in 'femininity' and 'masculinity'.<BR/><BR/>When I read a romance in which the reader is constantly reminded of the hero's hard maleness and the heroine's soft femaleness it makes me think that<BR/><BR/>(a) the author is making some point about the differences between the sexes (i.e. it's not just about these two characters and how they happen to look).<BR/>(b) there may be a later point made about the triumph of the heroine, in a way which makes me think of <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_feminism" REL="nofollow">cultural feminism</A>.<BR/>(c) it comes across to me as rather aggressively heterosexual, because of the way the male and the female are attracted by their physical differences (even if they later find that they share some emotional characteristics).<BR/><BR/>I'm maybe not making myself very clear. I suppose it's that for me, when difference is emphasised and the heroine's triumph is framed in terms of 'power over men' it makes me think of a gender war, and although the two may ultimately share some characteristics, the <I>ways</I> in which they are manifested are still gendered so that 'female strength' is shown to be different from 'male strength', for example.<BR/><BR/>Like I said, though, I don't get this sense from all romances. But it's just that, a sense: I've not studied it in detail as you obviously have, so I haven't got any concrete examples to back this up. Hmm. Off the top of my head, I have a feeling that in Heyer's <I>The Grand Sophy</I>, this isn't something that happens, for example. And there is a difference between (a) the heroine noticing that the hero is taller than her, or being attracted by the fact that he looks different from her and (b) a constant repetition of how these differences relate to masculinity/femininity. The 'male nipples' is an example of this, because the reader already knows the hero is a man. So why do we need to be told that he has 'male nipples'? It feels like there's a point being made here and it's not just a description.Laura Vivancohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00906661869372622821noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-77368875123571021162007-03-17T22:56:00.000+00:002007-03-17T22:56:00.000+00:00my bad. I was reading too fast.No, it wasn't you r...<I>my bad. I was reading too fast.</I><BR/><BR/>No, it wasn't you reading too fast, it was me assuming it was clear when it wasn't. Of course, it was obvious to <I>me</I> because I knew what I was trying to say ;-) That's one of the things I like about the comments - I get to elaborate on all the points that weren't clear in the initial post. It makes it feel like presenting a paper at a seminar and getting feedback from the other people present.<BR/><BR/><I>RE: hard male body vs. woman's softness: Ha! This is the starting point of my paper for the Newcastle conference.</I><BR/><BR/>Ah, so this is partly what “Revised Damsels-in-Distress: The Heroines of Modern Historical Romance” is going to be about. I'm looking forward to it.Laura Vivancohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00906661869372622821noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-28659524159716626022007-03-17T22:50:00.000+00:002007-03-17T22:50:00.000+00:00Ooops. Pushed the Enter button too fast.On with ha...Ooops. Pushed the Enter button too fast.<BR/><BR/>On with hard male bodies vs. woman's soft curves: this contrast came up in more or less all romances I've read. At the top of my head, I can't remember any romance in which the heroine's soft, small body wasn't contrasted with the hero's tall, muscled body. So initially it would seem that the heroine is the more helpless one. However, at least in most historicals I've read, this first impression was proven to be wrong in the course of the story, and the protagonists achieved a relationship in which they were both equal partners.<BR/><BR/>What I meant with "characteristics of the hero" are things like courage, a sense of adventure, curiosity, daring, etc.Sandra Schwabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496019392789508611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-13448284748858949562007-03-17T22:37:00.000+00:002007-03-17T22:37:00.000+00:00I wasn't saying that romances give the heroines ex...<I>I wasn't saying that romances give the heroines exactly the same type of power over men as Victorian chivalry did. </I><BR/><BR/>Oh, I see; my bad. I was reading too fast.<BR/><BR/>RE: hard male body vs. woman's softness: Ha! This is the starting point of my paper for the Newcastle conference. :)Sandra Schwabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496019392789508611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-83664800751541505832007-03-17T22:07:00.000+00:002007-03-17T22:07:00.000+00:00Yes, you certainly did comment on this last time w...Yes, you certainly did comment on this last time we discussed Victorian chivalry, Sandra, and it was very interesting.<BR/><BR/>I wasn't saying that romances give the heroines exactly the same type of power over men as Victorian chivalry did. Rather, I'm using that as an example to suggest that 'power over men' isn't always an intrinsically feminist or radical thing to argue for. Krentz was saying that 'Romance novels invert the power structure of a patriarchal society because they show women exerting enormous power over men' but it seems to me that in the past women have been portrayed as having 'enormous power over men' but in such a way that it didn't invert the power structures of a patriarchal society. In other words, if Krentz wants to say that the type of 'power over men' depicted in romance is subversive of patriarchy, I think she needs to go a bit further and give a more precise definition of the type of power she's talking about (e.g. its extent, source and scope).<BR/><BR/>Also, I don't think that all romances are the same in their portrayal of the 'triumph' of the heroine. Some romances use the 'power over men' type of triumph for the heroine in ways which seem to me to reaffirm traditional gender roles. There are romances where the rake/playboy is changed because of the love of (and intercourse with) the virgin/chaste woman. She's pure, he's in need of redemption. He finds her so irresisible that he wants to please her so that she will be 'his'.<BR/><BR/>And re 'she is often given the same characteristics as the hero', again I'd agree that this is true for some romances, but I also think that there are others where the differences between the hero and heroine are emphasised: they're the ones where his hard male strength, flat male nipples etc are constantly contrasted with her soft curves, her rounded womanliness etc.Laura Vivancohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00906661869372622821noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-40371556258326821542007-03-17T21:39:00.000+00:002007-03-17T21:39:00.000+00:00The idea that women exert 'enormous power over men...<I>The idea that women exert 'enormous power over men' is at the heart of Victorian chivalrous ideals</I><BR/><BR/>I'm sure I must have already commented on this when you first blogged about it, Laura. :) IMO, the big difference between Victorian chivalry and gender relations in romance today, is that in Victorian chivalry the woman is passive (she's tied naked to a tree to wait for the knight in shining armour to slay the dragon) and she only exists for man; her goodness shall heal him, redeem him, while her vulnerability and passivity allow him to display his might. Victorian chivalry was indeed primarily used to emphasise traditional genderroles. <BR/><BR/>In romance, by contrast, the heroine becomes active and, as Penelope Williamson points out in her article in <I>Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women</I>, she is often given the same characteristics as the hero. A nice example of this can be found in Gaelen Foley's <I>Lady of Desire</I>: when the heroine first meets the hero, he is described as a lion (with the heroine in a situation of powerlessness). By the end of the book, it is the heroine who saves the hero and while doing so, she stands on the roof of a building -- looking like a lioness.Sandra Schwabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496019392789508611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-42389874923760745242007-03-16T14:41:00.000+00:002007-03-16T14:41:00.000+00:00I loved your post, Laura. Sorry it took me so lon...I loved your post, Laura. Sorry it took me so long to get to read it. ::sigh:: Life has exploded.<BR/><BR/>Part of the Austen issue is that in the biggest way that counted, she was recording one of the most important social changes of her era and dealing with its implications. One could argue that the rise of the companionate marriage has had greater implications and effects on society than the other more violent and obvious revolutions of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. She didn't need to look out her window to see the soldiers to write about something incredible changing in society. Looking in the drawing room, she was recording the differences between the marriage between Charlotte Lucas and Mr. Collins--a type of marriage that has basically a thousand years of precedent to say that it will be the best kind of marriage--and the marriages of Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy or Jane and Mr. Bingley, marriages based on the relatively new concept of love and love alone, chucking all other, more socially acceptable considerations. Revolutionary indeed.<BR/><BR/>Anyway, in some respects, the debate about "literary merit" and what's "good" and what's "trash" seem ridiculous to me. Defoe was trash when he wrote. Shakespeare was a hack. Who is to say we're not going to be studying King and Roberts in 400 years.Sarah S.G. Frantzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10413768227099945783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30203557.post-51485998829706931532007-03-15T09:37:00.000+00:002007-03-15T09:37:00.000+00:00I've just heard about a recent exchange of views o...I've just heard about a recent exchange of views on Jane Austen in <I>The Times</I> which illustrates two different readers' preferences and how that makes them assess her novels very differently, so I thought I'd mention them here.<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article1500229.ece" REL="nofollow">Celia Brayfield is a novelist who found</A> herself<BR/><BR/><I>in my very first editorial conference at an immaculately feminist publishing house, being firmly told to cut the Second World War scenes in my novel because they didn’t belong in “books like this”. Every popular woman writer I know has had the same experience of being cut down to Austen size.</I><BR/><BR/>I can hardly see how this is Austen's fault, but Brayfield seems to think that things could have been so much better<BR/><BR/><I>Had Jane ever looked out of the window, she would have seen her starving country neighbours herding into slums. Had she read of the molecular theory that preoccupied scientists, or joined the philosophical fight to the death between reason and romanticism? Reformers debated </I>A Vindication of the Rights of Woman<I>, the feminist polemic by Mary Wollstonecraft, a weaver’s daughter who was politicised by all the horrors of unwed poverty that Austen’s heroines are so frantic to avoid.</I><BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/libby_purves/article1505942.ece" REL="nofollow">Libby Purves responded in defence of Austen</A>:<BR/><BR/><I>The accusation of ignoring her era’s history is common enough, but misguided. Poverty is not ignored; it is not dwelt upon probably because it was ubiquitous, and even daft Emma spends a lot of time helping cottagers. The most telling descriptions are the Portsmouth scenes in Mansfield Park, with dirt and sluttishness and a rough drunk father to remind Fanny Price what happens if you marry without judgment. This is as stark as any modish fictional slumming of today: starker, because closer to home. As to foreign wars, fringe characters vanish into them and sometimes die; if we are honest, that is all that most of us would know of wars today, if you discounted television pictures watched from a sofa. [...]<BR/><BR/>But here we come to a wider modern error: the self-important belief common among writers that their work is worth nothing unless it plonkingly takes on current “issues”.</I><BR/><BR/>Brayfield's opinion also sounds rather like a re-run of the comments Leon Wieseltier, the literary editor of <I>The New Republic</I> made, as reported by Maureen Dowd in a piece which criticised chick lit and was, in turn <A HREF="http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/index.php/weblog/beating_maureen_dowds_dead_horse/" REL="nofollow">criticised by, among others, the Smart Bitches</A>. Wieseltier had apparently said that: <BR/><BR/><I>“These books do not seem particularly demanding in the manner of real novels,” Leon said. “And when we’re at war and the country is under threat, they seem a little insular. America’s reading women could do a lot worse than to put down ‘Will Francine Get Her Guy?’ and pick up ‘The Red Badge of Courage.’”</I>Laura Vivancohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00906661869372622821noreply@blogger.com