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Changing role models
Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 08:32 amI had used to want to be Tina Turner when I grew up. But now?
Now, I think I want to be Momma Gkika.
Now, I think I want to be Momma Gkika.
I'm not a bad girl; I'm just drawn that way
Tuesday, March 1st, 2011 12:47 pmOver on Dear Author a couple weeks ago, Heather Massey took up the subject of the Extraordinary Heroine, and asks the musical question Is The World Ready? She notes, among other things, that some Urban Fantasy and Romance heroines are introduced as "strong" -- which is to say, The Author Says So -- but then goes on to act in ways that are. . .somewhat less than strong. It's an interesting read, and you should read it; the comment thread meanders somewhat, but, eh -- that's what comment threads do.
Now, I've been thinking about Heather's article, and about some of the comments, and I wonder if it is true that readers would prefer their heroine to be "nice" rather than competent. I'm not a subscriber to the whole Girl Nice Game*, and on the whole I find I prefer people, whether they live in so-called Real Life, or inside a book, to be interesting. If a character is hard-nosed, well, then -- there you have it. She'll act in a hard-nosed fashion, which may not be, particularly, nice or pleasant, but ought, at least if the author is doing her job, interesting and provocative to the reader.
Full disclosure, one of the commentors in the thread brought up the. . .fascinating reader review of Carousel Tides in which Kate is described as "repulsive." Obviously, if I had thought Kate was repulsive, I couldn't have managed having her in my head for a little over a year, but I will agree that she's not nice.
So, discussion question! How do you prefer your heroines? Strong or nice? Is strong vs. nice a false dichotomy? Can a nice girl be strong? Can a strong girl be nice? For more than one date?
__________________
*Girl Nice Game is the game played by militantly sweet females; it has at its core a balance sheet toothier than any Liadens: I'm nice to you, so you HAVE to be nice to me. See "When You're Good to Mama" for clarification of this concept and its workings.
Now, I've been thinking about Heather's article, and about some of the comments, and I wonder if it is true that readers would prefer their heroine to be "nice" rather than competent. I'm not a subscriber to the whole Girl Nice Game*, and on the whole I find I prefer people, whether they live in so-called Real Life, or inside a book, to be interesting. If a character is hard-nosed, well, then -- there you have it. She'll act in a hard-nosed fashion, which may not be, particularly, nice or pleasant, but ought, at least if the author is doing her job, interesting and provocative to the reader.
Full disclosure, one of the commentors in the thread brought up the. . .fascinating reader review of Carousel Tides in which Kate is described as "repulsive." Obviously, if I had thought Kate was repulsive, I couldn't have managed having her in my head for a little over a year, but I will agree that she's not nice.
So, discussion question! How do you prefer your heroines? Strong or nice? Is strong vs. nice a false dichotomy? Can a nice girl be strong? Can a strong girl be nice? For more than one date?
__________________
*Girl Nice Game is the game played by militantly sweet females; it has at its core a balance sheet toothier than any Liadens: I'm nice to you, so you HAVE to be nice to me. See "When You're Good to Mama" for clarification of this concept and its workings.
Agents of Change and Stories About Everypeople
Thursday, November 27th, 2008 10:26 amObligatory Notice: The below is a Babble; it is not a scholarly treatise and ought not to be treated as such.
So, yesterday, Steve and I went out to breakfast -- accidentally, out to breakfast, the house power having knuckled under to the force of the wind on the overnight. And one of the things we talked about, over our coffee and other tasty things, was the vigilante hero in SF. Very often in genre, the motivator for the hero is A Death -- of a spouse, of a beloved sibling, a parent... Very often, it seems as if A Death is the only motivator. Looked at in the light of those folks who say (but do they really?) that they want stories about "Mrs. Brown" -- i.e., the "normal" (whatever that means) middle aged lady who lives downstairs, the problem of genre heroism becomes even trickier. What would motivate Mrs. Brown to cease her comfortable existence, leave her cozy apartment, her cats and her grandkids, and embrace heroism? Heroism is messy; it hurts; very often people -- at least, the person you were before -- fail to survive it. In fact, heroism is not ordinary, therefore a story about heroism is extraordinary.
Steve thought that maybe Getting Fed Up, or Witnessing an Injustice might impel someone into heroism. There's something there, though I wonder if such change-points would compel most genre readers. In the Liaden Universe(R), there is a character I think of as a hero because they refused the annihilation of worlds as their solution and took the longer, slower, non-violent course. Readers think this character is a wimp at best, and lost to honor at worst, because they're not doing anything. Kinda funny, that.
But, back to Mrs. Brown... 'way down the years, when I was a tall enough, if not exactly old enough, to read from the adult section of the public library, I fell into a series of books by an author whose name I no longer recall. Edited to Add: Mary Lasswell. The stories concerned three "normal" women -- Mrs. Feeney whose husband had died, leaving her the proprietor of a bar; Mrs. Rasmussen, also a widow, forced by penury to live with her slovenly daughter and abusive son-in-law; and Miss Tinkham, an unemployed piano teacher. All three ladies are long in the tooth and they form an alliance.
Mrs. Feeney sees Miss Tinkham going from door to door in the neighborhood, has pity on her and offers her the spare room in trade for playing piano at the bar. Mrs. Rasmussen, a long-time friend of Mrs. Feeney's gets fed up with her circumstances and also moves in with Mrs. Feeney. Mrs. Feeney recalls that she had always wanted to travel, so the three of them load up Mrs. Feeney's ancient station wagon and take off to have adventures. Wherever they land, they become Agents of Change, righting everyday wrongs, smoothing the path of Young Love, helping a Mexican woman in the country illegally to avoid the Border Patrol, gain a job and her green card...
Clearly, these were stories about Mrs. Brown and I enjoyed them thoroughly when I was thirteen, but they were written as comedies; nobody could take the antics of the three ladies seriously, after all. One wonders how they might play, written "seriously" -- or if they could even be written seriously; or if reader expectation insists that such stories must be comedy.
...and now, back to work
So, yesterday, Steve and I went out to breakfast -- accidentally, out to breakfast, the house power having knuckled under to the force of the wind on the overnight. And one of the things we talked about, over our coffee and other tasty things, was the vigilante hero in SF. Very often in genre, the motivator for the hero is A Death -- of a spouse, of a beloved sibling, a parent... Very often, it seems as if A Death is the only motivator. Looked at in the light of those folks who say (but do they really?) that they want stories about "Mrs. Brown" -- i.e., the "normal" (whatever that means) middle aged lady who lives downstairs, the problem of genre heroism becomes even trickier. What would motivate Mrs. Brown to cease her comfortable existence, leave her cozy apartment, her cats and her grandkids, and embrace heroism? Heroism is messy; it hurts; very often people -- at least, the person you were before -- fail to survive it. In fact, heroism is not ordinary, therefore a story about heroism is extraordinary.
Steve thought that maybe Getting Fed Up, or Witnessing an Injustice might impel someone into heroism. There's something there, though I wonder if such change-points would compel most genre readers. In the Liaden Universe(R), there is a character I think of as a hero because they refused the annihilation of worlds as their solution and took the longer, slower, non-violent course. Readers think this character is a wimp at best, and lost to honor at worst, because they're not doing anything. Kinda funny, that.
But, back to Mrs. Brown... 'way down the years, when I was a tall enough, if not exactly old enough, to read from the adult section of the public library, I fell into a series of books by an author whose name I no longer recall. Edited to Add: Mary Lasswell. The stories concerned three "normal" women -- Mrs. Feeney whose husband had died, leaving her the proprietor of a bar; Mrs. Rasmussen, also a widow, forced by penury to live with her slovenly daughter and abusive son-in-law; and Miss Tinkham, an unemployed piano teacher. All three ladies are long in the tooth and they form an alliance.
Mrs. Feeney sees Miss Tinkham going from door to door in the neighborhood, has pity on her and offers her the spare room in trade for playing piano at the bar. Mrs. Rasmussen, a long-time friend of Mrs. Feeney's gets fed up with her circumstances and also moves in with Mrs. Feeney. Mrs. Feeney recalls that she had always wanted to travel, so the three of them load up Mrs. Feeney's ancient station wagon and take off to have adventures. Wherever they land, they become Agents of Change, righting everyday wrongs, smoothing the path of Young Love, helping a Mexican woman in the country illegally to avoid the Border Patrol, gain a job and her green card...
Clearly, these were stories about Mrs. Brown and I enjoyed them thoroughly when I was thirteen, but they were written as comedies; nobody could take the antics of the three ladies seriously, after all. One wonders how they might play, written "seriously" -- or if they could even be written seriously; or if reader expectation insists that such stories must be comedy.
...and now, back to work
