Hatrack River Writers Workshop: the PC question about weake female characters

This is topic the PC question about weake female characters in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by Zero (Member # 3619) on :

Okay being a young male I find it difficult to understand women, less yetw rite from their perspective. As such in my novels I have few scenes from their points fo view. They are still intricate characters but they are few/non-existant in the headstrong-fighter type roles, they are also less explored and less developed.

Am I asking to have my book burned because of an inequality amongst my cast? I also have a shortage of minorities. Does this cast an unwanted light on my writing. I am neither cheuvenist nor racist... sometimes I hate trying to understand all the social politics around me.

Posted by Crotalus (Member # 2345) on :

Some of that will come with age and experience. Some of it is not as hard as you think. Humans are humans. There are many things that the two sexes have in common; the desire to be loved and understood, to make a difference, to belong. Start with what you know, then extrapolate what you don't. After all, you don't have to be a serial killer in order to use one as a POV character.

For example: I am a son and a brother, so I could already write believably about family relationships before having a wife and children. However, I also believe that my writing has deepened in regards to the dynamics of those relationships, now that I am married and a father. At least I hope so.

At any rate, don't wait until you fully understand something before you start writing about it. Just make the motivations believable enough and the reader will buy it. Also, you have to actually write to get good at writing. If you wait until you have adequate understanding of the female psyche before you write from a female POV then you never will. Heck, sometimes I don't even understand why I do the things I do. Which simply means that I am human. ;-)

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

If you can't write women or minorities, it is better to leave them out than to write them, IMHO.

Most men who write female characters tend to do one of two things:

1. A man in a woman's body.
2. A stereotyped, weak or flighty woman.

For that matter, most women who write male characters tend to do one of two things:

1. A woman in a man's body.
2. A stereotyped, macho man.

Minorities are worse. I can tell if you don't understand minorities if you try to write about them and you don't really know. It will sound more prejudiced.

This doesn't entirely excuse you from writing these characters. You will particularly have to write women in most stories and you should try to do a good job. I suggest reader literature WRITTEN BY WOMEN for an insight into the way their minds can work.

Posted by ChrisOwens (Member # 1955) on :

At one point in my life, I understood women. Then I got married.

Posted by hoptoad (Member # 2145) on :

I don't really believe that stuff about men not understanding women nor about women not understanding men. Bit of a crock really.

Why do we assume that any writer understands something, anything, about anyone else?

We pretend to know, but we just make it up. We create simulacra from woodpulp and ink.

What woman on earth would get another woman to read over her story to see whether the female characters were convincingly female? None, they assume they know and vice versa for male writers doing male characters. We just assume we know because we are men (or women) and must know, mustn't we?

Truth is we only know what it is like to be us.

I have read many stories where the male characters are not convincingly men but they were written by males and others written by women where the female characters are not convincingly female.

Most characters that are unconvincing males or females are usually just plain unconvincing. That's the heart of the problem.

[This message has been edited by hoptoad (edited August 07, 2006).]

Posted by Sara Genge (Member # 3468) on :

Hey, I don't understand women OR men. Most of us don't get half of what goes on around us, we make up the reasons after we see the conclusion to the story or the scene. We fill in the gaps of our ignorance with reasons, motives, desires etc that we make up.
This makes writing much easier than living. Writing you are always right, as long as you go back into the story and fill the logical gaps with a likelly explanation. It's fiction after all, if you justify it well enough anything can happen. So, your female protagonist sounds and acts like a guy... that's because she's an alien pretending to be human (or something, my humour is lame, i know)
Living, however is the real challenge. Half of the time people are reinventing themselves and claiming they were consistent all along. They change the rules on you and then expect you to adapt. We all do this in real life, it's only fiction that has to be consistent.
Ok, back to serious stuff: the differences between any two human beings are always greater than the difference between men and woman in general. (Big numbers tend to minimize the difference) Dunno who said that, but it sounds correct.
I'd recomend reading stuff written by woman or, even better, having friends who are female and hanging around with them. Your female characters will stop being abstractions. At the beginning you'll model them off the women you know, after a while, you'll just make up convincing characters on your own.
I started hanging around with a group of guys a few years back, did wonders for my male characters.

Posted by Doc Brown (Member # 1118) on :

Your female characters don't need to be convincing in their femininity. They just need to be interesting and convincing as characters.

If you are intimidated by this, then create some characteristic from your imagination. Consider the female characters from Frank Herbert's Dune. Lady Jessica, Princess Irulan, and the Reverend Mother were wonderful chracters, but not ordinary women. By creating the Bene Gesserit, Herbert gave himself a situation wereby he could write convincing characters, yet the reader really cannot tell how well he understood the 20th centruy women around him. One might even make an argument that Herbert didn't understand women at all, yet his books still sell by the bazillions.

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

quote:
What woman on earth would get another woman to read over her story to see whether the female characters were convincingly female? None, they assume they know and vice versa for male writers doing male characters. We just assume we know because we are men (or women) and must know, mustn't we?

There is one HUGE problem with this -- I can almost always identify the gender of the author through the writing, without having been told in advance.

I agree that no one really understands anyone else, though.

Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :

I relate.

My first big-break story is from a female POV. But in my current WIP, I kept finding that my female PoV characters were boring and too stereotypical. I took a friend's suggestion: I moved them to bit-part status, and I did a sex change on a major male character. She ends up being more interesting as a woman than as a man. Is she still at heart a man? Well, no. It actually became easier to write parts of her action with her being female. I recognize that as a danger, though.

I haven't read Robt Jordan, but I have heard that he's PC because although all his major female characters are strong, um, [w]itches -- so they're strong. I don't like that solution. I want some variety.

Posted by authorsjourney (Member # 3569) on :

The most important thing (in my mind) is this: if you have a character who consistantly acts at odds with generally "normal" people of his/her sex, social class, race, etc. etc. it must be explained. Everyone is somewhat different, but if your character deviates from the accepted norms for his/her position in society, it will seem fake unless adequately explained.

Other, more minor excentricities are easier for the reader to overlook. I think I lot of authors worry about this more than they need to. As someone already said, most people really are pretty similar under the superficial surface.

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

Wbriggs -- Jordan's MAIN female characters are strong and that makes sense because if they weren't strong, they would not be of the power or in a position to change the world -- and it's a world changing kind of story. So it's not that all the women in his world are strong, it's that all the ones worth following are strong. There are some peripheral characters that are more stereotypical, even flighty, and plenty of reference to normal village women.

The type of story you're telling will have a lot to say about what kinds of characters are represented. In the novel I sold, the main character starts off as somewhat depressed and undergoes some changes to boost her self confidence. It works in the story I'm trying to tell, but if I tried to put her in the middle of an epic struggle for the fate of mankind, I'm afraid she'd get squashed before she had a chance to feel better baout herself.

Posted by Sara Genge (Member # 3468) on :

Christine: how do you do that? I'll admit, I do that too, but I don't know why I know. I hope it's not female intuition, I'm sick of THAT little trick. Ignore that, I'm being stupid today.

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

I don't know exactly how I know the gender of the author. There have been many attempts at computer programs that pretend to predict the gender of an author...we've had them posted around here in the archives and we have fun with them but they are not as accurate as I am. I take that to mean that there isn't a programmable and predictable pattern to it.

Female intuition, though? Nah...more like *human* intuition.

I also know *I* sound like a woman when I write. I use that. Maybe some of my men sound like women in men's bodies but I do, at least, have my husband and dad take a look at them to make sure they don't sound like sissies.

Posted by pantros (Member # 3237) on :

Writing women is not hard.
Read a few books written by women and you will be able to write from a woman's PoV.

But, even women write about women as stereotypes. Avoid Mercedes Lackey as a lesson in writing from a gender perspective. All of her MC's, especially in her early work, have vague gender identities.

For fantasy, read Sara Douglas and pay attention to the parts about Azhure or Faraday. Robin Hobb's Mad ship series also has a good example of the female PoV.

Contrast this to David Gemmel, whose writings are so masculine that I have yet to find a woman fantasy fan who enjoys his work. His few female characters are very oversimplified.

Or, you could learn about women by spending time with them and talking to them. That's pretty much how I do it.

Posted by thexmedic (Member # 2844) on :

While this OSC writing class thing is about dialogue, I think it has bearing on this discussion:

http://www.hatrack.com/writingclass/lessons/1998-08-14-2.shtml

Posted by sholar (Member # 3280) on :

My husband claims one of my male characters is clearly written by a female because of his relationship with his brothers. When he tried to pin it down, he kept mentioning his own relationship with his brothers. But my character was inspired more by my brothers who have a lot more issues. Since other reviewers didn't mention it, I figured it was just a matter of everyone having different experiencees in life.

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

sholar: This is true and it is something you have to watch out for. I also get a lot of people telling me that my men aren't "macho" enough; but not all men are macho and neither are all my male characters so I don't understand this comment! If someone could explain it...

Posted by Zero (Member # 3619) on :

quote:
Or, you could learn about women by spending time with them and talking to them. That's pretty much how I do it.

HAHAHA! COme now give me some credit.

Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :

I'm often drawn to write about women---but what I know about women, you could fit into a thimble and still have room for what I know about computers...

Posted by Zero (Member # 3619) on :

I like the witicisms [wd?] I am finding here everywhere. Good stuff!

Posted by JOHN (Member # 1343) on :

Write the character don't think too much about the race or sex. Write the character first the rest will come to you as you get more comfortable with them.

JOHN!

Posted by Louiseoneal (Member # 3494) on :

Just don't make them like the female character in the Spiderman movie, and I'll forgive almost anything. That movie was ruined for me because all she knew how to do was scream, cry, and look good in wet clothes.

I like a lot of anime flicks' female characters. They might beat the crap out of someone or shoot a gun the size of a cannon, but you'll find them griping about their boyfriends or giggling with other women a scene later. That's extreme, because instead of having one stereotype, they blend them, but it's still better than all-kill or all-giggle.

As an exercise, you could always think of a female you know really well, put them in your character's shoes, and try to figure out what they'd do and what they'd think about it.

Posted by hoptoad (Member # 2145) on :

quote:

There is one HUGE problem with this -- I can almost always identify the gender of the author through the writing, without having been told in advance.

Go on test it out. I bet you're fifty:fifty
Granted, fifty:fifty can sometimes feel like "almost always".
(PS: 3-7 out of ten is usually considered within the realm of law of averages.)

Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :

quote:
all she knew how to do was scream, cry, and look good in wet clothes.

For a lot of young guys, that's enough. Us older types look for a little more...

Posted by tchernabyelo (Member # 2651) on :

I mostly write from a gender POV opposite to my own. Only one story of mine has ever been picked on (by, I think, two critiquers) that the character felt "wrongly gendered".

I can only echo a lot of what has been said here already. Don't think about trying to write a "convincing woman" or a "conovincing man", becauyse you'll probably end up with a stereotype. Just think about making your characters three-dimensional, rounded, realistic people. Then they'll be accepted by a reader, even if they're atypical.

Regarding David Gemmell (who died recently); yes, I don't think he wrote many convincing female characters, but I do know at least one female fan of his work.

One final note. This topic crops up (not just in writing circles, but in Fantasy Role-Playing) on a regular basis. A lot of people seem to be very nervous about whether they can write a character of the opposite sex. However, no-one ever bothers to discuss whether people can write an elf, or a dwarf, or a talking horse, convincingly... they just go ahead and do it.

And that's the best advice. Just go ahead and do it.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

Well, the thing with elves and talking horses is that you aren't trying to sell stories to people who actually have a lot of experience with them.

If you don't understand women, then try making that part of your POV character's appeal. Go ahead and show him as someone who's always a little confused about what exactly the women around him really mean by the things they do and say. Chicks dig that

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

Actually, by "almost always" I mean *almost* *always*.

I haven't ratd my successes but I'd say 9/10.

quote:
Just don't make them like the female character in the Spiderman movie, and I'll forgive almost anything. That movie was ruined for me because all she knew how to do was scream, cry, and look good in wet clothes.

Are you serious? Spiderman is my favorite of the superhero movies in part because I liked the female character. Yeah, the wet t-shirt was for all the teenagd boys out there. (And teenagd boys at heart.) but she screamed at appropriate times -- when there was nothing she could do as opposed to screaming in lieu of real action. She tried her hardest to climb back up on that balcony, too. In the second movie, she tries to fight the bad guy at the end. Also, she was smarer than most of the other women -- she figured out who Spiderman was and he wears a mask. Lois Lane just had the distraction of tights! I'm not saying she was awesome or anything, but really as far as superhero women go, she was the best.

Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :

Yeah, MJ was always sort of off the curve when it came to superhero girlfriends. Then again, so was Spidy himself.

Posted by TMan1969 (Member # 3552) on :

Well, when I write female characters I try to draw from my experience. I have three daughters and have worked with some memorable people. I incorporate some of their personalities into a character. For example on the MC in "Captain Space" is a female and she is based loosely on my wife. But most assuredly, I have oodles more to learn wrt to writing about them - for me the most difficult thing to do is draw one (female that is).

Posted by Louiseoneal (Member # 3494) on :

quote:
Are you serious? Spiderman is my favorite of the superhero movies in part because I liked the female character. Yeah, the wet t-shirt was for all the teenagd boys out there. (And teenagd boys at heart.) but she screamed at appropriate times -- when there was nothing she could do as opposed to screaming in lieu of real action. She tried her hardest to climb back up on that balcony, too. In the second movie, she tries to fight the bad guy at the end. Also, she was smarer than most of the other women -- she figured out who Spiderman was and he wears a mask. Lois Lane just had the distraction of tights! I'm not saying she was awesome or anything, but really as far as superhero women go, she was the best.

She was more tolerable in the second one than the first, I do admit that. But give me Laura Croft over MJ any day (or better yet, the chick in Alien vs Predator).

If people kept tossing me over the edge of high buildings, I'd go looking for the darn spider who bit my boyfriend and offer it an arm. That way, I'd be able to look after my own self. Yeah, I know, trying to acquire super powers never works out too well in comics, but what the heck? It has to be better than dangling from a ledge, screaming bloody murder and waiting for my boyfriend to show up.

This attitude is almost certainly why I'm single, and likely to stay that way forever.

Posted by TMan1969 (Member # 3552) on :

Louiseoneal - attitude and fortitude is why I married my wife, even though somedays I think maybe it would be nice if she was quiet - but I wouldn't change her for the world.