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The Female Man
Group Reads 2020
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January 2020 Group Read 1of2: "The Female Man"
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Jim
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Dec 23, 2019 03:36AM
The Female Man by Joanna Russ is one of the two books we're reading this month. It won a Nebula Award & is cited as a classic of feminist literature as well as having influenced William Gibson.
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I started it a few years back to keep up with all Monthly reads in different groups and now n the middle. TBH I'd have dropped it if now for the fact that I try to read all H/N winners. The flow of text is very hard to follow, there is "I", which seems the author, but her interaction with the world is strange and sometimes it's other characters... too high brow for me
I just found this very confusing and had no idea who the I was most of the time. The feminist tone was so strident that it made feminism look ridiculous, especially the character Jael.
I gave it two stars and that is generous.
You all are not making me enthusiastic to start this ... ^^'
The Female Man has been on my list for a long time but my library doesn't have it. I'll have to buy it. Maybe I'll wait to see if it gets a more positive reaction.
It's a fast read and really strange, Gabi. I was around during the times she is writing about so I know where she is coming from-women weren't treated equally-but the world she creates is an extreme reaction to the situation.
Mod
But, I have read two other stories by her that I liked. I think for this month I will try a few more of her stories, or her essays, and add my thoughts here.
I loved the story Souls. I'm not alone. It won a Hugo and Locus award and was a finalist for a Nebula. It is the story of a Nun defending herself from a Viking invasion, and specifically defending herself from rape using the only tool available to her: her voice. Whether you'd consider it Science Fiction is up to you.
It is available in an old double-book along with Houston, Houston, Do You Read?, by James Tiptree, which is also a feminist story and also worth reading. (This one is in outer space, so definitely SF!)
It is also in Extra (Ordinary) People.
There is another of her stories in Dangerous Visions, which we are also reading this month. So you can discuss that story here or on the other thread.
I don't want to discourage anyone from trying "Female Man". But feel free to discuss other Russ stories, or other related stories, here if you wish.
The Female Man was one of my favorite novels of the 1970's when I began reading sf. This could have been because I was introduced to Russ through her short stories, which I found fascinating alongside Le Guin and Tiptree, Jr. The Female Man was hyped as Russ' master work, so that probably influenced my initial impression. I agree that, in retrospect, it does not hold up as well as it could. This is true of the other Russ novel I was impressed with, And Chaos Died. But the novella Souls, coupled with a classic Tipree in the Tor "Doubles" series, Souls/Houston, Houston, Do You Read?, together with just about any short story I could find by her, still makes her a great sf writer IMHO, and one of the seminal sf authors of my early sf reading days.
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Ed wrote: "Yeah, I agree that "Souls" is great. It doesn't seem like SF to me. Not even really Fantasy. More like historical fiction, but whatever it is, it is great!"Yeah, the sf is implied and when it finally arrives appears as a fantastic vision imposed upon reality.
I read part I and so far it is okay. The jumpy structure works for me.
I found the sections about the separate female characters not too confusing, but I am not sure about the narrator is invisible at times. Who is she? As for her feminism-I was a teenager in the 60s and most of the girls in my high school classes were going to either work or get more education after graduating high school. And we all had a generally positive attitude about our futures.
I found Russ's feminism got more irksome as the book progressed- I sure hope this book is a satire!
Rosemarie wrote: "I found the sections about the separate female characters not too confusing, but I am not sure about the narrator is invisible at times. Who is she?."Roughly in the middle of the book it is answered (view spoiler). However, more than once "I" jumps characters, and mean Jeanine's mother, Janet and other characters. The technique is interesting, but for me its more of a show-off instead of a plot
Thanks, Oleksandr. I think the author was trying to hard to be innovative and couldn't quite pull it off, since it worked sometimes, but not always.
I've read it around part 4 and so far I would say it has been a so-so experience for me. Some parts are interesting (like the parts about Whileaway) but overall the style really doesn't do it for me. Some chapters really feel random. I mean usually I get what is happening but it feels some chapters don't matter at all. They're extremely short but even at that they're feel pointless and just there. (Like part 4 chapters VI or VIII for example)
I finished the book and here is my rambling review (it spoilers a little, but no more than annotation here on GR): https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I'm in my final throes and just want it to be over. It had a good beginning, but from around half time it turned boring, boring, boring … I'm having such difficulties to stay focused.
This book had good moments that fizzled out....
For those of you not familiar with Bible characters, Jael was a woman who lured a general from an opposing army into her tent and killed him while he was asleep by hammering a sharpened tent peg into his head.
Rosemarie wrote: "For those of you not familiar with Bible characters, ."Thanks, I wasn't aware about that
Mod
It is much easier to read, because shorter and no confusion of "I" with the author. Here is the final paragraph which indicates the original name of "Whileaway":
Sometimes at night I remember the original name of this planet, changed by the first generation of our ancestors, those curious women for whom, I suppose, the real name was too painful a reminder after (view spoiler)
And abandonned it. I am a lazy reader, missing an obvious storyline here.
Mod
The stories in The Zanzibar Cat are all over the place. All of them are more enjoyable than Female Man. Well, maybe one or two is annoying like that, but there are some really charming stories as well. Some SF, some Fantasy, some humor.
There are two editions of the book with not-identical contents. Sadly my edition does not have the story "Dragons and Dimwits or There and Back Again: A Publishers' Holiday or Why Did I Do It? or Much Ado About Magic or Lord of the Royalties or ... or ... or ... "
My review:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
And my review of To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction can be found here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Short version: I liked it. She is smart and funny and writes clearly, though occasionally the pieces don't work well taken out of the original context where they were published.
Mod
"I had turned from writing love stories about women in which women were losers, and adventure stories about men in which the men were winners, to writing adventure stories about a woman in which the woman won. It was one of he hardest things I ever did in my life...."
Seems strange now when the shelves are full of stories with strong female protagonists, but I guess it was hard when writing the first stories of that sort. Russ had pointed out in an essay that if you take many old stories and switch the men and women the stories just wouldn't make any sense. In SF or Fantasy, though, such switches can make sense, and today such stories seem downright normal.
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Of one of her short stories, “When It Changed,” which mourns a lost female utopia, the science-fiction novelist Michael Coney wrote, “The hatred, the destructiveness that comes out in the story makes me sick for humanity. . . . I’ve just come from the West Indies, where I spent three years being hated merely because my skin was white. . . . [Now I] find that I am hated for another reason—because Joanna Russ hasn’t got a prick.” To read “When It Changed” after reading this description is to be a bit let down.
I have to agree with "it is a letdown". It may have been shocking to some back then, but it was totally tame to me today. It doesn't come off as man-hating at all. There is a society of all-women because the men died of a plague. They've become accustomed to that life, so when men come back, they aren't all completely happy about it. That isn't a difficult point to understand.
Here is a Wired article on Joanna Russ you, her readers, might find interesting: https://www.wired.com/2020/02/geeks-g....
I personally have a great deal of respect and more familiarity with Judith Merril's work and her role in SF history. I can't believe Russ felt she could give her advice!
I personally have a great deal of respect and more familiarity with Judith Merril's work and her role in SF history. I can't believe Russ felt she could give her advice!
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I also respect Merrill, but don't have much familiarity with her work. I should probably change that.
Call me Kyk. It's the name my parents gave me. Mr. Butt is my father; grandfather too.
I probably need to read me some Russ one of these days. I was thinking of starting with her To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction.
I probably need to read me some Russ one of these days. I was thinking of starting with her To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction.
Mod
I'm skeptical of that. But Mr. Butt is a bit too close to Mr. Butts, who was director
Trent Harris' dearly departed dog, so I will comply.
That collection of essays contains some gems. But parts of it are hard to understand because they are replies to or reactions to things that happened long ago that I know nothing about.
Ed wrote: "I'm skeptical of that. But Mr. Butt is a bit too close to Mr. Butts..."
My ancestor probably only had one.
The main reason to read that book, I'm thinking, is that there were women who wrote science fiction under male pseudonyms. Have you ever heard of a man writing science fiction under a female pseudonym? Ms. Russ's non-fiction book, I imagine, explains all one needs to know, and maybe even more, to pull it off.
My ancestor probably only had one.
The main reason to read that book, I'm thinking, is that there were women who wrote science fiction under male pseudonyms. Have you ever heard of a man writing science fiction under a female pseudonym? Ms. Russ's non-fiction book, I imagine, explains all one needs to know, and maybe even more, to pull it off.
I read this around 1976, and have no notes I could find, but I liked it a lot: rated 4 stars here, whenever I put it up. I do have a great Russ quote from around then:"The trouble with men is that they have limited minds. That's the trouble with women, too." --Joanna Russ, "Existence" (1975)
She inspired a lot of mixed reactions back then, too. Let's see what her Wikibio says: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joanna_...
A very good-looking woman! She graduated from Cornell University, where she studied with Vladimir Nabokov. She died in Tucson, my old home town, in 2011, but I don't know how long she lived there. She had been ill for (I think) quite some time.
Her NY Times obituary has a quote from this book that is entertaining: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/08/ar...
Perhaps I'll take a look at the free copy Jim turned up, to refresh my memories. But the Whileaway stories are the ones that stick in my mind, decades later. Well, doh: this is one! So I'll look: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?4...
Ed wrote: "I've been reading some of her other stories and some of her non-fiction thoughts on SF.The stories in The Zanzibar Cat are all over the place. All of them are more enjoyable than F..."
I haven't re-read it yet, but her "When it Changed" (1972), from Again Dangerous Visions is here:
http://future-lives.com/wp-content/up...
Impressive that I remember the opening lines so well, 50 years on! Helluva writer.
Gregg wrote: "Speaking of The Female Man:https://www.newyorker.com/books/under...
Second thanks. I may have to dig up the Gwyneth Jones book: another writer I sometimes like (the cat book! DIVINE ENDURANCE) and sometimes don't. OK, mostly don't. And DE didn't stand up to re-read. So, maybe?
Ed: "It may have been shocking to some back then, but it was totally tame to me today. It doesn't come off as man-hating at all. There is a society of all-women because the men died of a plague. They've become accustomed to that life, so when men come back, they aren't all completely happy about it. That isn't a difficult point to understand."Heh. I'll have to reread this, and "compare & contrast" to Tiptree's "Houston, Houston", a story I LOVED when it was new, but got kinda tired of. Been quite a few years now, & I'm almost sure I still have a copy of it around....
It does sound like Russ was something of a "take no prisoners" reviewer!
And I just realized this was the January 2020 book! Well, I'm asynchronous. Deal with it. 🗓 😇
There's no problem commenting on old threads. It's encouraged.
I like the fact that threads stay open, since we can't always get the books right away. It is really hard to believe that I read the book slightly over 6 months ago-it feels a lot longer.
The book was a product of its time. Looking back on it, I get a sense of confusion and anger. I wasn't fond of the book, mainly due to the really confusing writing idea. Often I had no idea which character was doing what.
Thanks, guys. I still plan to re-read it, since any novel that sticks in my mind 50 years later has got something going for it. My how time flies!You guys read the free short that goes with it? Same thing, instant familiarity after 50 years! Though that one I likely reread more recently (like, 30 years ago?) Heh.
Speaking of a book from childhood (well, YA) that I reread & still liked a lot: "The Flame Trees of Thika" by Elspeth Huxley (yes, that family),https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
"Great stuff. Her memoir is from the early years of the Kenya colony — her parents’ new farm was one of the first established in that area, and the hinterlands were still pretty much as they were before the Europeans arrived. ..." Most highly recommended. Your library very likely will have it. Setting as exotic as any SF or fantasy -- but real!
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I think I enjoyed a TV adaptation when I was a kid.
Ed wrote: "Peter wrote: "Speaking of a book from childhood (well, YA) that I reread & still liked a lot: "The Flame Trees of Thika" by Elspeth Huxley ..."I think I enjoyed a TV adaptation when I was a kid."
Hayley Mills played the young Elspeth, I think. She's the cover-girl on the current reprint of the book.
Here's a wonderful quote from her NYT obit:In a scene from “The Female Man,” Janet Evason, who inhabits an idyllic future on Whileaway, a planet without men, visits Earth, where she is promptly hustled onto a television talk show. A dialogue unfolds between Janet and the master of ceremonies:
MC: I — Miss Evason — we — well, we know you form what you call marriages, Miss Evason, that you reckon the descent of your children through both partners. ... I confess you’re way beyond us in the biological sciences. ... But there is more, much, much more — I am talking about sexual love.
JE (enlightened): Oh! You mean copulation.
MC: Yes.
JE: And you say we don’t have that?
MC: Yes.
JE: How foolish of you. Of course we do.
MC: Ah? (He wants to say, “Don’t tell me.”)
JE: With each other. Allow me to explain.
She was cut off instantly by a commercial poetically describing the joys of unsliced bread.
😁 ❤️ 😻 🤡 🏆
The SF Encyclopedia entry http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/... really makes me regret not having read a word by her yet. Clearly she's going to live through her work long past her time.
The Evolution of Science Fiction
Books mentioned in this topic
The Zanzibar Cat (other topics)To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction (other topics)
The Adventures of Alyx (other topics)
The Zanzibar Cat (other topics)
To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Trent Harris (other topics)Joanna Russ (other topics)
William Gibson (other topics)
