H
H
Forgive me if I have misinterpreted the original question, but yes, certainly any writer worth his or her salt should be able to create characters in either gender. Otherwise, the completed work would only cover half of the experience of the human condition, which is what literature is all about.
Granted, the history of civilization has been male-dominated; hence the majority of the literature produced reflects that unfortunate aspect of our social evolution. It's no surprise that so many of the examples of the "world's greatest literature," the highly-touted lists of "Great Books", the Western Canon, etc. were created by "White Male Europeans" [sic] who thought to include few or no female characters -- Moby Dick, for instance, Don Quixote and the hundreds of war stories which necessarily present characters of the male gender.
On the other hand, remember the earliest and perhaps greatest war stories of all time --The Iliad, The Odyssey, and The Aeneid. Homer and Virgil, along with the Greek dramatists drawing on the same source material, created immortal male heroes, but they included spectacularly unforgettable female characters as well: Helen, Dido, Penelope, Cassandra, Electra, just to name a few.
Further along the line, Chaucer and Shakespeare could transverse the literary gender line with ease. What difference does it make whether Lady Macbeth was spawned by a male mind? This is what Keats meant by Shakespeare's "negative capability": "the ability to identify completely with his characters, and to write about them with empathy and understanding." (Oxford Companion to English Literature, p.689.)
Likewise, T.S. Eliot was aware of necessity of submerging the self (one's own personal history, presumably including one's gender) in order to create a work of art. We see this in a section of "The Waste Land," with the reference to Tiresias, "old man with wrinkled dugs," indirectly alluding to that mythological figure's seven-year stint as a woman after he'd been given the transexual operation --along with being struck blind --by a goddess. He doesn't appear in the poem by accident; Eliot employs several voices in the work, including several female ones.
The point is a writer can --and should--create characters of the sex opposite his or her own. The ability to do so stems not from personal experience but rather through a finely-honed active imagination, not to mention assiduous observational skills.
If the original poster feels intimidated about writing from the standpoint of the opposite sex, it's her perogative not to do so. But to assert that it can't be done by anyone else is flat-out misguided.
Last edited by AuntShecky; 03-13-2013 at 03:18 PM.
H this one is better : !Originally Posted by hillwalker
Hand this one
if not
do you need an ice pack?
it may never try
but when it does it sigh
it is just that
good
it fly
I can't be on this side of the world and not meet you!
Before sunlight can shine through a window, the blinds must be raised - American Proverb
Good luck with that. Does your travel insurance include cover for unintentional murder committed when exasperated beyond belief by the indigenous population?
H
Male lead characters written by men writers help the female gender to grasp what men are about and vice versa...We emancipate and intellectualize understanding through reading stories and writing them. I thought you of all people understood this.
You are assuming that everyone interprets things as you do... which I can quite certainly assure you is not so. Characters in literature are literary inventions... fictions. I cannot say that reading has led me to a greater understanding of women... or men.
All characters in stories should be about how to strive to succeed that way one can demonstrate that they could.
There are no "shoulds" in art.
I see no reason why the author/artist "should" limit himself/herself to characters based upon the writer's gender, race, nationality, gender preference, age, species, etc... any more than the author/artist should limit himself/herself to narratives/subject matter drawn from his or her everyday life. Art quite frequently employs fiction. As an artist I'm far more interested in painting women and fictional settings/narratives than I am in painting myself, my den crammed with books, or my daily drive to work. These things don't interest me in the least as a subject matter for art.
As others have suggested, there are any number of unforgettable female characters that have been created by male writers, including Anna Karenina, Lolita, Helen, Dido, Penelope, Cassandra, Electra, Lady MacBeth... and I might add Salome, Hester Prynne, the Wife of Bath, Scheherazade, Nana Coupeau, Emma Bovary, Madelaine de Maupin, Milady de Winter, Lulu (Wedekind) etc... If you find that you prefer or need to remain true to the reality of your own real-life experience... that is fine for you... but don't assume it is true of everyone else... or that it "should" represent some ideal of "best" approach to writing.
Beware of the man with just one book. -Ovid
The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.- Mark Twain
My Blog: Of Delicious Recoil
http://stlukesguild.tumblr.com/
hillwalker night you're talking.What do you know about insurance? Pray do tell.
it may never try
but when it does it sigh
it is just that
good
it fly
Lol. Don't worry, I'll make sure I'm heavily medicated on the day and let my smartphone translate the parts I don't understand
Before sunlight can shine through a window, the blinds must be raised - American Proverb
Delta40 let's fix something.
it may never try
but when it does it sigh
it is just that
good
it fly
Let's trust to fate and the Underground
Before sunlight can shine through a window, the blinds must be raised - American Proverb
I agree with H and think that is once more a fake issue to deviate the main point: get on writing, "reams of it" if possible (paraphrasing S.King), what effectively and straightly may brings us to something (finishing a good story, a novel if we are lucky and rack ourselves brains on the blank pages, etc...)
However I consider the "how" is as importnt in literature as "what and why". A personal, effective, shooking even style could be considered the your best firm.
Deviating the main subject but, anyway...
Last edited by jayat; 03-14-2013 at 08:53 AM.
Absolutely haha
it may never try
but when it does it sigh
it is just that
good
it fly
Please allow me to reiterate:
Or as the great Yogi once said: "You can observe a lot just by watching."The point is a writer can --and should--create characters of the sex opposite his or her own. The ability to do so stems not from personal experience but rather through a finely-honed active imagination, not to mention assiduous observational skills.
This should read ''the point of a writer is'' to create what is not.The point is a writer
Yes yes that we are all capable of . There is no doubt we can all do that. We are all able to create opposites because it is easy to copy what is not the same as us and so naturally we create our opposite ie characters of our opposite sex. That is an already established component of the human capacity to adapt.can --and should--create characters of the sex opposite his or her own.
What I am saying let's create our same because it is the most difficult one simply because we are not able to see ourselves and therefore studying ourselves by ourselves is a harder task. It is the typical easily said then done scenario.
So to go back to the OP I think writers need to delve into themselves and create their own counterpart. In order to explore fully who we are we are to imagine and that is the hardest bit. But there is a reward and that is to get to approach ourselves in a different manner and that is through words. Call it the eternal monologue only with writing.
IT is easy to imagine what we see and because we see it we distort because we do not understand what we see because we have not understood ourselves yet. catch24 meaning of life.The ability to do so stems not from personal experience but rather through a finely-honed active imagination,
I think it not the place for a writer to observe. It is the place for a writer to write and think about or he or she is writing. The less observation and the better for it. That is my approach the less I know of others the more I know of me.not to mention assiduous observational skills.
I am not sure this is as assidious as it looks.Or as the great Yogi once said: "You can observe a lot just by watching."
To watch is to entertain the mind with ideas that are not ours . To oberve is to see what is ours in comparison to what is not. In other words to observe is to compare our knowledge against another and if the findings are dissimilar then ours is. The observed irrelevant. What remains is our relevance that defines who we are. The more we stick to our guns and the more we stand for what we believe which ultimately makes us who we are. We may Unforgive errors but we talented for what is our knowledge. It is not to be omitted on the ground of watching au contraire it solidifies what we already know is right and makes us stronger for it.
Last edited by cacian; 03-14-2013 at 05:19 PM.
it may never try
but when it does it sigh
it is just that
good
it fly
We are all able to create opposites because it is easy to copy what is not the same as us and so naturally we create our opposite ie characters of our opposite sex. That is an already established component of the human capacity to adapt.
What I am saying let's create our same because it is the most difficult one simply because we are not able to see ourselves and therefore studying ourselves by ourselves is a harder task.
So you don't think that literature/art has more than a few examples of strong male characters invented by male writers (or strong female characters invented by female writers) that have elements of the autobiographical or self observation?
Beware of the man with just one book. -Ovid
The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.- Mark Twain
My Blog: Of Delicious Recoil
http://stlukesguild.tumblr.com/
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