Heroines

by Kate Zambreno

And in this subsubcommunity of literary blogs I’ve come into contact with through FFIMS, many of us also read and write like girls. It is perhaps not “serious” criticism, but intensely personal and emotional. A new sort of subjectivity is developing online—vulnerable, desirous, well-versed in both pop culture and contemporary writing and our literary ancestors. We write in public (in our blogs, on our Tumblrs, in comments sections on other’s blogs, on Facebook) a new, glib, casual, entirely feminine form of criticism that takes the form at times of heroine-worship. A fan fiction. We read, intensely and emotionally, like Emma Bovaries. We read like girls, often prone to passion and superlatives—passing around books like love letters in the mail. These spaces operate as safe havens to be all sorts of identities at once, to be excessive, to feel and desire deeply.