Quote:
Originally Posted by VydorScope
Do you find that MALE authors can do a good writing form the FEMALE perspective?
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I'll bite.
I think,
in theory, anyone can write any type of protagonist. And I could name quite a few authors who write very good, well-characterized opposite-gender characters.
I think,
in practice, it's a rare male author who can really nail a female perspective. And nothing hurls me out of my reading more than hitting a female viewpoint that is a collage of stereotypes cobbled together by a male author who apparently didn't think he needed to challenge his own assumptions about women while writing.
(Note that same-gendered characters can also be poorly written, and thus this phenomena is not limited to male authors writing female characters or vice versa. This is particularly endemic to "chick lit" -- I have no joke seen all kinds of stereotyped assumptions about women, especially from new authors, who think that "zany chick lit" means that the woman should behave in a completely random, chaotic manner without rhyme or reason.)