Feminism Gone Bad
Gilbert and Gubar talk extensively about the “Madwoman,†the “monster,†the “female rage†and my mind draws grotesque images of a messy-haired rag-covered and inevitably wide-eyed creature that storms attics and breaks social orders with the power of its (or hers?) madness and rage. Where is the limit of “healthy†feminism and are we not passing it in our attempts to make up for former injustice toward women writers? It is common, I think, for extreme oppression to recoil into extreme forms of animosity. But if justifiable, constructive, and enlightening feminist criticism serves the sole purpose to attack male writing, we might, ironically, use the same method of reasoning to uncover male texts in the future (not probable, I admit, but it would be interesting). In this sense, Toril Moi’s essay is a valuable response that attempts to mitigate the hot passions brewing under the lid of “The Female Swerve.†Moi also argues the point that, “Gilbert and Gubar arrogate to themselves the same authorial authority they bestow on all women writers†and, asking, “Is it right that women now should take up precisely that masculine position [to speak for women] in relation to other women?†I think authors and critics should be extremely careful with matters as fragile as these.
Lindsay wrote:
I don’t really know what has been imposed on female authors by male authors. I’m not denying that female authors have to conform, but in what ways do they? I have heard that women have been taught or conditioned to write like men. They have to conceal their feelings in the mad woman. Is there such a thing as true unadulterated feminine/ female fiction, where women state there feelings openly. Can you really say this is the way a man writes and this is the way a woman writes?
In one of my other classes we ad to critique an anonymous paper. The some of the women referred to the writer as he and some males referred to them as she. It wasn’t well written. I think I wanted it to be a he because I didn’t like the way it was written and I didn’t want to attribute this poor writing to my one sex. I think a person’s opinion on an anonymous text could play a part in the way we gender it.
Posted 27 Sep 2007 at 2:03 pm ¶
alison wrote:
Tied into Lindsay’s point about personal factors that come into play as we gender a text is a point Savina made in class: a work should not be considered to be feminist just because it’s written by a woman. It can be argued that men have dominated the literature scene for ages, so perhaps it can be argued that it is simply inexperience with female thoughts that causes so many to consider any of them to be radical. If people weren’t against women, would they still perceive female writing to always be against something?
Posted 27 Sep 2007 at 4:17 pm ¶