Strong Female Protagonists
A writer sent this link to one of my writing lists with the statement that they are having difficulty selling a book with a strong female protagonist. That just surprises me. Both the writer’s experience and the article.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/magazine/02FOB-wwln-t.html?emc=eta1
“Little girls these days have lots of real-life role models, lots of ways they can be in the world, but they still have precious few larger-than-life heroes, especially in the all-important realm of fantasy, where they spend so much of their free time.”
Ginormica
Now, I don’t know where the writer has been sending the manuscript and I haven’t seen any of the responses, and I believe him. But still, it surprises me. I don’t know. I’m probably not reacting to the whole article or on full information.
I’m not surprised that it is difficult to bring forward female superheroes into the current population because I’m sure so much would need to be rewritten, but new heroes? I think they’re out there.
I would love to see Marvel do a Origins:Kitty Pryde based on the Kitty Pryde/Wolverine mini-series. That would be awesome.
I probably am just not seeing this problem because I never did. Even when I was a kid, my female action figures were always as bad ass as my male action figures and often played as big a part in rescuing themselves as my hero did. In fact, it was probably hero rescues girl, but gets caught himself, girl rescues hero, they live happily ever after. Granted, there were fewer female action figures.
Of course, I know not everyone thinks like me and I get a pass because I am a white male. I can say I was reminded of that yesterday riding in the elevator. The door opened and two guys got in and I heard one say “if that had happened we wouldn’t have a black president now.” Out of context that doesn’t sound good or intelligent. I can’t imagine what would lead to it. I suppose it was just a reminder that there are some things that I am never faced with.
Don’t mind me. I’ll just continue to live in my world where people are all the same and everyone knows my name.
