Give me some female eccentrics!

A very good friend of mine came to stay with me recently. She is Spanish. I tend to get on with Spanish people. Maybe because of my love of exaggeration. Besides I like having her to stay as she tends to make sweeping pronouncements.

Over breakfast:

"You are the greatest writer since Cervantes!!!"

(Coy) "Oh I don't think...I can't possibly - You really think so?"

"Yes!"

"Oh ok." I return to my Weetabix. (After all, who am I to question her?)

She tends to come at things from a slightly different angle than I do. Leaving the theatre after watching The Barbaric Comedies (a Spanish play) I asked her what she thought.

"Dwarves," she said. "It needs more dwarves." (Our other Spanish friend agreed.)

But what we do have in common is our general hatred of the blandness of women's culture and we spent most of the weekend happily shouting about how oppressed we are, whilst our oppressors quietly sipped their beers in the corner and tentatively discussed mobile phones.

We resolved to kick ass and do something about it. Why is it that films of the 30s had terrific wise-cracking beautiful-ugly good-bad iconic female characters played by the likes of Mae West, Bette Davis, Katherine Hepburn or Joan Crawford - and yet now we are hard pressed to find a single interesting Hollywood female role?

My friend claims female liberation has gone backwards. But I wonder if it is the opposite in some ways, that this is, in fact, part and parcel of the fact of women's greater liberation in the West. That the characterful woman was a fantasy of a time when roles were limited and now that women are top of the tree educationally and more economically independent, the independent unconformist wise-cracking woman is less of a draw. That the fantasy is now about girliness: clothes, shoes, bags, plastic surgery.

Which is why I don't get on with a lot of chicklit. Not for all the silly snobbish reasons usually metered out but because in so many the woman must conform to some sort of bland normality, whether she diets and loses a bit of weight, finds herself and get a few more clothes, gives up drink, finds a man...In men we admire the extremes, with women, we expect the extremes to be ironed out along with the hairtongs.

Even the ironic voice of Bridget Jones seems to have be ironed out by the reinterpretation of those who came after to confirm what it originally seemed to satirise.

Where are the female eccentrics? Where are the characters, the nutters, the fruitloops, the charismatic weirdos?

Why isn't the message of chicklit ever "be totally eccentric, keep goats, grow a beard and smell". That's the kind of role model I'm looking for.

Comments

[Emily]

I couldn't say whether or not there are any goat-keeping beard-growing weirdos in adult chicklit, but there are plenty of eccentrics in YA chicklit, plenty of messages about being unique, standing out from the crowd, carving your own path, etc.

[The Mock Duckling]

You know, that's interesting. I was asking Leena (great fan of chicklit) about that the other day and we were wondering if there was a difference between YA and adult because I was reading a YA book and really enjoying it and thinking it was really the sort of thing I should have read as a teenager...

Is there is difference between YA and adult? Are the aspirations slightly different at different ages?

Come and tell me, people. Am I wrong? Direct me towards the eccentric stuff please!!!!

[lisa]

"Where are the female eccentrics? Where are the characters, the nutters, the fruitloops, the charismatic weirdos?"

They're in PRT! Heehee.

[The Mock Duckling]

LOL! Err, much as I love Mary - chicklit? Eh?

[lisa]

Well, er, it's kind of chick lit. Female main character who gets progressively stronger... (we'll gloss over the rest)

Psycho chick lit maybe?

[ireneintheworld]

ever read 'lulabye' by chuck palahniuk? pretty strange and wonderful, but it was a while ago and i couldn't say that i remember if it sits in this argument. worth a look girls.

i love to think i live the right life: i'm not on a diet; don't shop or choose labels; wear and do what i want; make outrageous statements because they are my opinion; never look in a mirror if i can help it; and don't really care what i look like - as long as i'm clean enough... i don't have to be pristine; i am so laid-back i'm practically horizontal and can afford to be kind and sympathetic to almost everyone - except teenagers of course.

yes, long live the mad old women in every side of life.

irene x

[The Mock Duckling]

I'm going to be a mad old woman. What else is the point of getting old if you can't be eccentric and do what you like and say what you like.

In fact - hell, what am I waiting for?

Irene, you're an inspiration as always. x

[Catherine Czerkawska]

Just read this after I had emailed somebody about a story they had written that - although a really wonderful piece of writing - had tapped into all my worst fears to do with old age, and conforming to expectations and loss of independence. It made me think about how I would like to finish up, and I thought anything but in one of those hideous hideous chairs in care homes. I want to be an eccentric old woman, with a small house in Italy, with a small overgrown garden, where I could sit in the sun with a cat on my knee, and have the neighbours bring me food and wine from time to time.
But your reflections on the lack of iconic female characters in film at least were extremely interesting. I wish that it was true that this was part and parcel of women's liberation in the west, and related to 'girly' fantasies, and I'm sure that's part of it, but I'm not entirely convinced that it's the whole reason, mainly because so few films these days even tap into or reflect those fantasies - I found an excellent article about this online - http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,1540660,00.html
It makes pretty disturbing reading and her solutions are radical, but will anyone be listening?

[Rosy Thornton]

I do agree about the conformism and triviality of a certain strand of clothes-and-diet-and-white-wine obsessed chick lit - and even though it's only part of a broad genre, somehow it's the bit that dominates public perceptions. But the trouble with being eccentric is that there's a fair bit of that, too. Chick lit heroines are allowed to be kooky and zany and do mad things like forget their underwear and get into embarrassing 'scrapes' because that's cute and lovable. Maybe not the beard, but I can see a bit of back-garden goat-keeping fitting right in - and it still being just as air-headed.

But there is also heaps of chick lit out there which does address important issues in women's lives, too - not just luuuurve but friendships and work-life balance and parenthood and infertilty and the biological clock, and illness and bereavement and depression and the rest... But because it is done with a light touch and a few jokes, people lump it all in with the vacuous sex-and-shopping kind of chick lit, and it all gets dissed together.

[Luisa]

I agree with Emily, and also Rosy T! This is a great discussion from a great post. I also found that link Catherine posted fascinating.

I recently watched Waitress, written and directed by the late and mega-talented Adrienne Shelley. It's a light-hearted and funny film with plenty of eccentricity in the female roles. (It's an independent film.) My only quibble with it is that I really thought the 'old man' role should have been an old woman, but maybe that's unrealistic for a society like theirs.

[The Mock Duckling]

"But the trouble with being eccentric is that there's a fair bit of that, too. Chick lit heroines are allowed to be kooky and zany and do mad things like forget their underwear and get into embarrassing 'scrapes'"

Arghh arghh arghh!!!! No no no! This is just the kind of thing that isn't at all eccentric. Just cute and fluffy and with entirely no EDGE and - argh argh argh argh argh!!

No! (Pulling you back from the abyss). Enough.

Luisa,
"the 'old man' role should have been an old woman". Interesting. But why is that unrealistic? Why? i just don't understand.

[Emily]

Hmm, I'm not sure that's entirely fair, MD. If Chicklit is a reflection of women's real lives, and you're not happy with the lack of edge, or you think the kooky bits are too fluffy and cute, well that's really saying something about the readers who love and identify with these books. Which could be interpreted as rather insulting, unless I've totally misunderstood! (Quite possible.) Personally I really enjoy reading about the goat-keeping bearded ones - my taste for women in literature goes more towards the "Prince Rupert's Teardrop" side of things - but in real life I 'get into embarrassing scrapes' and have virtually no edge. *cogs turning* I've totally forgotten what my point was. :)

[The Mock Duckling]

I'm saying that little scrapes does not an eccentric make. Nothing at all insulting to anyone. I just don't buy this theory that chicklit is full of eccentrics. This does not say anything pejorative about either writers or readers of the genre. I quite like Friends. I wouldn't argue it was full of eccentrics though.

I am merely howling at the wind for the lack of inspiring eccentrics for women. And I'm sure Chicklit could do it and i would love it if it did. But perhaps I am missing the point...

[Emily]

Friends is full of quite extreme characters, though - none of them keep goats but they do have a chick and a duck :) I would call Phoebe fairly eccentric, and inspiring - but she also loves shoes. What kind of eccentric are you really after? Other than the beard? ;)

[The Mock Duckling]

Well, in Friends one of them worked for a fashion house. All of them were well-off. All of them were fashion-plates. And all of them ended up getting married and having babies. Now, as I said, I like Friends but no I wouldn't turn to Friends for eccentricity. The kind of eccentricity ( but reality) you would find on The Office or Peep Show or Fawlty Towers or The Royle Family or Nighty-Night.

It is to do with a way of thinking - characters that are extreme or follow their thought processes to ridiculous conclusions -not tame symbols of kookiness like wearing slightly hippyish clothes or inheriting a duck.

I love Lisa Kudrow but I would say, for character, that Lucia in The Opposite of Sex kicked Phoebe's ass and was far more eccentric without even knowing it. (She also ended up married with a baby in fact, but hastily moving on...)

What are the messages of Friends beyond be glamorous, successful, well-off, expensively dressed and preferably American? Hardly reversing the usual messages metered out by...ooo I don't know..99.9percent of the culture?

Hey, but this is a matter of taste and I outlined mine. Perhaps you're right and what I'm really talking about is "cute". But cute never asks questions, does it?

[The Mock Duckling]

Even Black Books - Bernard's eccentric and a total arse and Fran's the sensible one. And her role got downgraded from series one as well.

Love Black Books but just saying...

[Emily]

No, I don't turn to Friends for eccentricity, just to have a laugh! But I don't think those message you mentioned are the only ones. Or that they were all rich and all sold out by getting married and breeding. Or that getting married and breeding is selling out... And I love all those other programmes you mentioned and yes they do show a grittier side of life. But there is a place for Friends, and there is a place for The Office - and why should Friends feel bad about not being The Office? I guess that's what you're saying about Chicklit, isn't it? That you'd like to see it get grittier? Again, I'm slightly at a loss here because I read YA chicklit.

[Luisa]

Ah, you asked why I say the old man being an old woman in Waitress would be unrealistic. I just meant because in a society like the one the film focused on, there are probably very few women with status like that, and the money to own an entire restaurant. I still would have liked to see a woman in that role, though. I loved the film, though!

[mary]

Rosy, I think I'm exactly on your wavelength with this. I'm not a big fan of chick-lit either, it's not my thing. For me it's just too prescriptive. The faults of the heroines are always cute and laughable ones like being scatter-brained, being hopeless with money or whatever but they never have truly deep faults. I'm not sure that 'good' (my definition) female characters are necessarily eccentric or zany but they have a very distinct separateness, they are very much themselves and don't define themselves in terms of other people. Somehow I don't even like the supposedly eccentric people in chick-lit like the stereotypical outrageous gay friend of the heroine or the battleaxe of a female boss/ mother-in-law or whoever. It seems to me that a lot of the female characters in chick-lit have one metaphorical eye on the mirror as if asking 'how is this coming across?'

[The Mock Duckling]

Mary - again what a thought-provoking comment. You put your finger on something that bothers me but I couldn't think of what it was. Exactly. Eccentricity is not done for someone else's sake. It is not "cute" "look at me".

Aside from this issue, I was reading an article today about feminism. And was struck by how concerned everyone was/is about image. That the image of feminism is one of armpit hair and dungarees which puts people off. In fact this seems to be far more important to people than things like countries with terrible laws against women or the amount of violence suffered across the world.

Of course, Bridget Jones satirises this wonderfully in a scene where her feminist friend starts yelling in a pub and the rest of them shrink down in their seats in case the men in the room assumed they were feminists and therefore unattractive...

We can't allow our female characters to be extreme and unaware for the same reason. They have to be kooky and attractive and very very unthreatening.

Which brings me full-circle to Emily again and grittiness. No, I'm not necessarily talking about grittiness at all. But you can't have it both ways ;) on the one hand Chicklit claims to be about real women's lives. On the other hand it purports to be escapism. I put it to you that most of it (not talking YA here not the whole caboodle but certainly the majority of what I've read in the genre and I do have to say that some things under the heading make no sense there as far as I'm concerned) is about aspiration. And so much of that seems to be about looks and clothes and men. As is Friends of course. If it were real lives - it would necessarily be more gritty, if it were real escapism surely SURELY it could go to town and be so much more extreme and different? Freed from all those restraints? No?

[Emily]

Escapism can be as simple as reading about someone else's life - so it can be 'real' and 'escapist' at the same time, I'd have thought. I'll have to trust you on the 'most of it being about aspiration' point, because I'm not familiar with it (where are the Chicklit readers in this discussion?! I am not even on a side, I'm just whittering as usual!!). A recent example of a character I really admired - admired the author for creating her as well - is Bindy Mackenzie in 'Becoming Bindy' by Jaclyn Moriarty (again, YA chicklit). Bindy is fairly unattractive, extremely nerdy, totally unaware and really quite rude, as well as other more endearing qualities (she means well!). And though she does go on a journey of self-discovery in the novel, she emerges still Bindy - not a beauty queen, still a nerd, slightly nicer but essentially herself only happier because she's let down her defences regarding her peers and made some friends (not boyfriends, I hasten to add). I thought that was brave, and totally right. I'd have hurled the book across the room if she'd turned up at the prom all gorgeous and bagged the school hunk.

[The Mock Duckling]

LOL Emily. Yes, I'm reading a YA book at the mo which I'm really enjoying and haven't read one for...ooooo years. I am quite interested in the difference actually. Also, you do know to take me with a pinch of salt when I'm generalising, don't you? I mean I don't really understand the term "chicklit" especially as it now seems to be used for any book with a woman in. I also think it could be terrific altogether as a genre if it challenged stuff rather than seeming to confirm all that stuff. If it had the particular sort of messages I'm looking for I'd have no complaints at all...but I haven't found that one yet and I have looked...but I know it is a wide genre and maybe I've just picked up a certain sort that is widely available rather than really searched stuff out. So the point is in THEORY I'm all for. Just like I can love Romantic COmedies if they have a little bit of edge or something. But so often they too seem so bland...

[Emily]

Yes the term does seem to be used very widely now. Is Kate Long chicklit, for example? I read and loved her 'Queen Mum', which I thought was very real and gritty, just the right amount of humour, superb style and very relevant (well, it felt very relevant to me) - but no goats, still :)

Do you think these messages you are looking for are readily available in other genres?

[The Mock Duckling]

Well I don't see KateL as cl. Nor RosyT. So maybe I'm stuck in the 90s ;) I don't know, the problem with this is that we can start playing about with the edges of the definitions and make it work with either argument. It really wasn't supposed to be a chicklit bashing post btw. I only said I find I don't get on with a lot of it because of the messages. And that is just me being truthful. But that doesn't mean that it can't or doesn't exist without different messages I suppose. But I haven't found it yet.

Hmm. I don't know if I have found a lot of female eccentrics anywhere though. I'm not just talking books but television, comedy, film. Yes, I know there are the odd example. But - you know - in a celebratory kind of way. I would love that. :)