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ParappaTheDapper -> RE: Is there a Male writing style and a Female writing style? (6/3/2011 8:12:59 PM)
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I was really hoping you'd post in this thread! I've noticed you're a writer who is both earnest about the craft and generally insightful! You've also been one of the people who has made my brief time here so enjoyable so far.
Your answer pretty much matches my own intuitions and experiences. The point about noticing the way men communicate with men and women communicate with women is quite resonant! I strongly suspect part of the reason there seems to have been a more distinctly "Female voice" and "Male voice" 150 years ago or more (which, let's face it, is roughly where Naipaul's consciousness is when it comes to gender questions) is that men and women were so terribly segregated from each other socially.
A couple of the first counterexamples that came to mind when I read Naipaul's comments were Mary Shelley and George Eliot. Both of these women were very socially progressive for their eras and both of them were influenced by (and in turn were influences upon) talented male friends and lovers. Frankenstein in particular is famously a product of maybe the most glamorous impromptu "writers group" ever in the form of Percy, Mary, Byron and John Polidori cooped up on a rainy night on Lake Geneva shooting the shit with each other about the art of ghost stories and macabre writing.
Similarly, when I think of the paragon of the "Female Voice" I think of Jane Austen, whose nonliterary life is famously typical for the daughter of minor gentry of her era. She was a gifted seamstress who supervised the servants and largely seems to have spared those around her from her brilliant and acerbic wit. Her devotion to her family and family duties was touching, chaste, and pious and I've always thought it led to that sublime contrast in her writing that allowed her to alternate between a wit every bit as cutting as Swift or Thackeray and a beautifully light touch in describing characters and settings.
At the end of the day I think you're right, the literary voice is shaped in such large part by a combination of the individual talent (genius, for a lucky few!) and by the observation of the kinds of interactions between people that present themselves most intimately to a given writer on a daily basis. Observing social interactions is such a crucial part of the symbiosis in which the world offers itself up to artists so that artists can recreate it into something sublime.
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ORIGINAL: sunshinemiss
Hello Parappa (and everyone)
I hope you won't mind if I take a "writer's" view of this question. I find that there are certainly different ways men and women communicate, and there are ways men communicate with each other and women communicate with each other. In order to be a writer, a good one anyway, one must go beyond personal experience and view the world, see the little idiosyncracies of people. This is what being a writer is - observe and then paint the picture with words. The observation is through one set of lenses - our own. Female and male are only one part of that. (Thank goodness!) A great joy in my life is the writers group where we share our work and each person gives feedback to the others. Sometimes this very topic comes up. I wrote a scene in which two men were talking, and I had it spot on... almost. All the guys were like, "ah, sunshine, men will tease each other about x, y, and z if they are alone - even during a serious conversation." That was an eye opener.
Do men and women have different writing styles? Each person has their own. Are we influenced by our gender? Sure... that and a million other factors.
On a personal note, it's a pleasure having you here. Your topics are always interesting. Thank you for bringing such fabulosity to the boards.
best,
sunshine
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