- Sheryl WuDunn on the greatest challenge of our time: gender imbalance (and why women and girls are the key to ending poverty).
Weekend reader - links, because they’re worth it
I have a picture of a very gaunt, greasy-haired Nick Cave pasted into an old journal somewhere, in recognition of my love for The Ship Song and Breathless, but this excellent article is making me question my devotion. Maybe he is just a mysoginist soandso?
The 2010 Ernie Awards for most s-xist language are out, with Tony Abbott taking out the Silver Ernie for comments like, “what the housewives of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing,” and “Are you suggesting to me that when it comes to Julia, no doesn’t mean no?”
The interwebs are full of debates about mysoginy and the bias of book reviewers to male authors. Which made me pay attention to the idea that s-xism doesn’t exist anymore, just stupidity,
In all my years of reading about it, tearing open those naughty sealed sections in magazines, watching that show about s-x with Sophie Lee from the early nineties, and everything in between, I had never come across a ‘how to’ guide for girls on losing your virginity to another girl. Until now.
I grew up here, and was sad to read my childhood stomping ground described so hopelessly:
As I rocketed along the M4 in search of a suburb so obviously bad they couldn’t even give it a colour, under an equally monotone sky, I felt sure I was doomed.
But that doesn’t mean I want to hate on rich people like this guy.
The 23rd September is Social Media for Social Good Day
Could you travel the world with no check-in baggage?
FYI, I might have to move to Denmark just so I can have a Bicycle Butler. It would only be made 100 times better if I owned this bike.
A poem called Kevin the f-cked up gold fish, how can I resist?
p.s. Like links? Here are some more.
p.p.s Paul McCartney was wrong about abattoirs and glass walls and vegetarianism…
Male authors are just, you know, better
I own a copy of the wonderful book 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. It remains one of the best gifts I’ve received as an adult (thank you Roslyn!), despite the fact that it is terribly, disappointingly flawed, as all lists are.
First, the love. If it were not for this book acting like my personal reading reference guide at 2am when I should be sleeping, but instead am flicking through the glossy pages, full of desire for words yet unread, I would not be reading Edmund White’s perfectly titled The Beautiful Room Is Empty.
Similarly, I may have been duped into trying to toil through more Salman Rushdie than I have. To those of you who actually enjoyed Midnight’s Children - I can only assume our literary tastes are at opposite ends of the spectrum.
This book of books, this catalogue of lust, is the kind of thing I use as a more manageable form of google - a search with an end - a place where I don’t become overwhelmed because my options are finite.
What I passiontaly dislike about it though, is that it falls into the trap being heavily debated at the moment by the literati on the interwebs - it is undeniably dominated by male authors.
When it comes to books considered to be literature - books written by men get reviewed more, get more positive reviews when they are reviewed, and male authors are more than twice as likely to get a second book reviewed, at least when it comes to the New York Times Book Review, arguably the industry’s most prestigous reviewing forum.
My much loved book-list-book suffers from the same problem, which makes me angry and sad and guilty for not burning my bra (figuratively of course, they’re expensive).
You should read what The Slate and The Rumpus have to say about the issue. And then you should go and read fiction by women.
Just to start, you could try Lionel Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin, or Janice Galloway’s The Trick is to Keep Breathing or Joan Didion’s The White Album
What are your recommendations for women’s literature?
