30 Days of Female Characters: Day 28 (AT LONG LAST): scrollgirl

scrollgirl

30 Days of Female Characters: Day 28 (AT LONG LAST)

Apr 18, 2012 02:20

Almost one year ago I posted Day 27 of my 30 Days of Female Characters meme and then never got around to posting Day 28. Well, I've suddenly found myself with time on my hands and so here it is, finally!

Day Twenty-Eight: Favourite female writer (television, books, movies, etc.)

Reading over my previous entries for this meme, I noticed that my Day 25 Redux post listed a whole bunch of novels about women, written by women. As a kid, I hadn't gone out of my way to read women-centric stories out of some desire to be feminist--I'd just wanted more stories about people I could understand, which were girls. Naturally! Boys were generally this other species that I only interacted with on Sundays and alternate Saturdays. (There were boys at school, of course, but they didn't really talk to me.)

It's interesting to note my shift of focus wrt gender over the years. The TV shows/movies I watch, the comics/fanfic I read as an adult almost always have a man at the centre, with most of his relationships being with other men. Even TV shows that attempt to reach parity will inevitably have more men than women on an ensemble, more men as secondary, tertiary, and background characters. And let's not even get started on race...

ANYWAY. That was a long-winded introduction to a list of my favourite authors from my early childhood:

L.M. Montgomery (everything, ever, a hundred times each)
Louisa May Alcott
Laura Ingalls
Ann M. Martin
Lois Gladys Leppard

The only male authors who could compete with the above five were Lloyd Alexander (who died in 2007 and I didn't even know! *sad*) and C.S. Lewis.

My favourite authors from my teen years:

Jane Austen
O.R. Melling
Tamora Pierce/tammypierce
K.A. Applegate
Amy Tan (for The Joy Luck Club more so than for her other novels, I'll be honest)
Jean Auel (though I haven't bothered to read her last one)

Actually, I notice that as the books become more appropriate for older audiences, the women-to-women relationships give way to women-to-men. Romance becomes more important to the story, even if it doesn't overtake friendship entirely. Also, I began choosing books that had more boys in them, like the Animorph series. (Yes, I was reading Animorphs in high school. Alien invasions and morphing powers, come on!)

As much as I love Austen the best now--because let's face it, she's Jane Austen--my child self's soul belongs forever and ever to Lucy Maud Montgomery, OBE.

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feminism, meme:30 days of female characters