It's Frustratingly Rare To Find A Novel About Women That's Not About Love

Why It's So Hard To Find Novels About Women That Aren't About Love

I came of age without a literary soulmate. Growing up, I read every book recommended to me. Nick Carraway's lucid account of the 1920's seduced me. Huck Finn's journey up the river showed me the close link between maturity and youth, and Ray Bradbury taught me to be wary of big government as well as the burning temperature of paper. While the male characters of literature built countries, waged wars, and traveled while smoking plenty of illicit substances, the women were utterly boring.

The assigned, award-winning, cannon-qualified books about women were about women I didn't want to be. Jane Eyre was too blinded by her love for Mr. Rochester, as were all of the Bennet sisters in Pride and Prejudice. Hester Prynne of The Scarlet Letter was too maternal, and no one wants to grow up to be Anna Karenina. These women wanted to get married and have kids. They wanted to whine for 300 pages about a man who didn't want to be with them. They wanted, it seemed, to be supporting actresses in their own stories. Their stories were equally about the men who shaped them as what they themselves wanted.

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