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View Poll Results: Do you generall prefer to read books by authors of you own gender? | |||
I'm a woman and prefer to read books by women authors |
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17 | 8.17% |
I'm a woman and prefer to read books by men authors |
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4 | 1.92% |
I'm a woman and there is no clear gender bias to the authors I read |
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64 | 30.77% |
I'm a man and prefer to read books by men authors |
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26 | 12.50% |
I'm a man and prefer to read books by women authors |
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4 | 1.92% |
I'm a man and there is no clear gender bias to the authors I read |
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86 | 41.35% |
My gender is undetermined, and I read books primarily by women authors |
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0 | 0% |
My gender is undetermined, and I read books primarily by men authors |
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1 | 0.48% |
My gender is undetermined, and there is no clear gender bias to the authors of the books I read |
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6 | 2.88% |
Voters: 208. You may not vote on this poll |
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#136 |
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I have not read the book. But I did see the movie and I didn't really care much for the movie. Is the book that much better then the movie?
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#137 |
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#138 | |
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Quote:
Don't ALL writers (male and female) have a "message" to deliver? Why are we reading books if the authors aren't communicating messages to us? If you're using message to refer specifically to a feminist message, well, I personally strongly disagree with the suggestion that many women writers are proselyting a feminist agenda to the point that "harms the book". As for Margaret Atwood, "The Robber Bride" and "The Handmaiden's Tale" are two of my favorite books. I re-read both at least two or three times a year. I've also read "The Blind Assassin". One of the things I love most about these books is that the men are reasonably irrelevant. The focus of her books is on women and their relationships with each other, maternal, sororal, and oppositional. Men show up to be foils for the female characters, and then are shoved back into whatever cupboard they hide in when their scenes are over. I don't find it "feminist"...just a reflection of what women are really like. I *don't* actually spend every moment of my day thinking about the men in my life, and my most influential relationships are female. It's nice to have a writer who understands this and tells interesting stories from a similar mindset. I don't know if you're male or female (I didn't bother to check ![]() |
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#139 |
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I'm afraid that this question has never occurred to me to ask of myself, so I cannot answer it. When I read a book, I care about the writing in the book, not the gender of the author.
Now it is true I suppose that my favorite authors (Roger Zelazny, Walter Jon Williams, Neal Stephenson, Hal Duncan and a few others) are male, but so far as I can determine, that's purely coincidental. I'm just as happy reading Ellen Kushner or Jane Yolen as I am Charles de Lint or Jim Butcher. |
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#140 | ||
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I don't like an author trying to force their opinions on me, whether I agree with them or not. Of course it's worse if I don't agree. When I get the feeling the authors has a "message" to deliver, it means they are trying to force their political opinions into the story, regardless of whether they fit or not, and without subtlety. Suggesting is one thing, voicing an opinion once in a while is OK, but not if it's taking over the story. Quote:
Last edited by FlorenceArt; 09-18-2010 at 04:37 AM. |
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#141 | |
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#142 | ||
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For example, wouldn't a romance novel's message be: no matter how independent (or not) a woman may be, marrying some guy and having his babies is the only way to true fulfillment? I guess I should add something about being "in love" in there, but really the books aren't about love. They're about sex and marital harmony. I think every fiction book has a message. Quote:
It also happens to relate really well to this topic (probably because both books and roleplay are story-driven). The original article seems to have gone missing, but here's a tiny link to my Google Document archive of it in PDF: http://tinyurl.com/2ebdgbr I think it would be really constructive if a female writer would read it over and possibly write a sister essay on how to design effective female characters in fiction. The roleplay article is more than a little heavy-handed in the delivery, but the fundamental points are spot-on. Getting back to Margaret Atwood, I find her (close to) unique in how strongly she writes in a feminine (rather than feminist) voice. The only other writer I've found is Ann-Marie McDonald (also Canadian). I think in some sense all readers have gotten used to the idea that female characters can be subordinate to male characters (not in a relationship sense, but in how they shape the development of the story). It's not "shocking" for anyone to read books where female characters are props for the male characters. But it's incredibly rare to switch the roles and have the males as peripheral characters while the entire story revolves around the social and sexual politics of the females. |
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#143 | ||
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A very, very interesting study on this feedback loop is Susan Faludi's book Backlash. It's old but still extremely relevant I think. I guess we'll never agree on this, since we don't have the same definition of a message ![]() Quote:
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#144 |
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I usually read male authors mainly because of genre, however lately more female.
Recently I read an autobiography, "Cherry" by Sara Wheeler. Great book. I like thrillers, future, present and past are all fine by me. Historical fiction, mystery, crime and non-fiction. I also liked Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire. I'm looking for more. |
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#145 | |
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#146 |
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Well, the discussion was (and is) interesting. Forum polls don't mean a thing anyway, as far as statistics go
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#147 |
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#148 |
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I do think the discussion is interesting. But as I pointed out earlier, the genre you read will dictate the chances of most authors being male or female.
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#149 | |
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Quote:
It's OK, Ea. The only well done poll I've seen on MR is my Pet Poll. ![]() Seriously, the poll question, "Do you general prefer to read books by authors of you own gender?" was fine. This isn't a classroom, and some leeway can easily be given. Designing a poll here is not easy. There is, apparently, no means of editing a poll. You create it and there it is. No changes possible. You english is fine. Much better than the English! ![]() To your question. I don't "prefer" one or the other. The author that started me reading for pleasure was Andre Norton. Ann Rice was my favorite for a while. Elizabeth Moon was another author who helped to fill my book shelves. But I no longer care for fantasy, and never could read more than a page or two of "Romance". And what ever the total percentage of female writers there are, I'm willing to bet that a very large number of them write to those two genres. And probably "Paranormal Romance", which I avoid like the plague. Another genre I rarely read any more is Detective/Mystery. That too, probably has a fair number of women authors. ![]() So in the end, it's not that I prefer one, or the other. It's the fact that fewer women write in the genres I now prefer. Just as JSWolf said. |
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#150 |
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Exactly. This is why I didn't answer the poll. It is not that I *prefer* female authors, it is just that they tend to dominate the genre I read -- paranormal romance and urban fantasy. Though as you move more toward urban fantasy, you will find more male authors. Men just don't do romance or don't do it that well. Even m/m romance is mostly written by women.
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