Shirley Walsh answers “why are people saying Outlander is a rape...”

A Goodreads user asked this question about Outlander (Outlander, #1):

why are people saying Outlander is a rape book?

Shirley Walsh As a device to place the characters in danger, I think it is used a lot. I think one can't dispute that, it is a lot. But, it was chosen to illustrate…moreAs a device to place the characters in danger, I think it is used a lot. I think one can't dispute that, it is a lot. But, it was chosen to illustrate the difficulties Claire would have interpreting what she needed to do to stay safe in the 1740's. The book is about Claire's choices, and what difficulties she'd face not being familiar with the 1740's expectations of women. The greatest danger was that men control everything, and enforce it however they choose. Women are confined in what competencies they can acquire, and which they dare demonstrate. Rape or the threat of, or the threat of the label whore is a familiar tactic, in both the 1740's and now. I don't know what I would have written differently, but perhaps the author also wanted us to believe Claire stumbled into Jamie's arms involuntarily, regardless of his appeal. Do we know how common rape was then ? Probably cannot be known, but it's familiar enough now to make us believe Claire needed to marry Jamie. What is hard to digest, and it took me a while to understand it, is that maleness and it's appeal, has primitive roots. I am married to a fastidious gentlemanly man. Yet.. the mud, the muscles, the ownership thing... has it's appeal. Rape, no, but that physicality of you are not leaving me, yeah. (less)

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