Words of a Woman

writing is a beautiful thing to do. Its not just about thoughts but the whole process of processing your vocabulary into an ocean of words is a beautiful thing to do......only immatures and sexists would discriminate against women writers.......full stop

Revathy,
Thanks for an interesting article. Yes, some women write and write very well. Our own editor on Chowk is an excellent example. Then there are women who just copy & paste - just to annoy mankind. :)

too many qoutes and very few points.....sounds like an anthology.....rather then an article

Um, sir/ma`am (I`m sorry I don`t know Revathy`s gender), I have a question: What happened to mythos? People often forget that logos is a progeny of mythos. And it`s understandable when you are a specialist, especially in this day and age. Specialists are too focused and tend to classify a lot. Why do women write? Okay. Why do we pee? Why do we pick our noses? etc. I`m sure you get my point.

I have trouble digesting your article yet I can`t critique it because I don`t know most of the writers you have mentioned here. Your own insight seems weaker than the writers you have quoted. Here`s a quote by Peter Hoeg from Miss Smilla`s Feeling for Snow (courtesy: Saeed-ur-Rehman)

On the gender of desire: It is only what you do not understand that you can come to a conclusion about.

I will also dare to quote Michel Foucalt because I feel it`s relevant too:

Women have always been seen by [heterosexual men] as their exclusive property... Heterosexual men felt that if they practiced homosexuality with other men this would destroy what they think is their image in the eyes of their women. They think of themselves as existing in the minds of women as master. They think that the idea of their submitting to another man, of being under another man in the act of love, would destroy their image in the eyes of women. Men think that women can only experience pleasure in recognizing men as masters

Cheers

Hi Revathy,

Its an interesting topic! Do women feel more intensely than men do?

I do agree with you on that women `express` their emotions more readily than men.

I do not agree that women `feel` emotions more than men do.
For one thing, generalisations along those lines are difficult to defend. Cultural variations must be given credence to.
And for another, emotions cannot be quantified and measured, and is highly subjective.

I do hope you are not trying to gain some sympathy for being a woman yourself!

I think emotions play a far greater role in women`s lives than in men`s, for whatever reason. To be able to regard emotions with wariness, examine them intellectually and then dissect them in prose or poetry, is to have travelled a great distance from being slave to them. I just read about Didion`s latest book, an autobiographical account of this last year when both her husband and daughter died. It is a kind of experiment in dealing with grief, and apparently, according to the reviewer she has managed to detach herself from the intensity of emotion and write with detachment.
I know my piece is about older women writers but they are closer to my generation, possibly than to yours, Kyla. ``Foremothers`` in feminist jargon. Writing is central to a lot of people`s lives, but it doesn`t come easy, does it? Sorry to quote again, but great writers say it so much better. Am reading Orwell whose writing gives me a terrible complex. He says,
``Modern man is rather like a bisected wasp which goes on sucking jam and pretends that the loss of its abdomen doesn`t matter.`` Now isn`t that splendid! Wish I could write, no, think like that!

Hi, Revathy,
I really don`t know whether men/women write/feel differently. Large parts of emotions/thoughts overlap or are the same in both genders. So when a person writes, he/she writes on behalf of all those who think/feel/act like the writer. What`s special, though, is that many women, self included, have to juggle with the minutes and really find time to write. Between boiling milk, monitoring the pressure cooker, fluffing up the rotis and drying out the clothes, one has to filter one`s thoughts and map the outline of a short story. Then, sneak in a couple of minutes between clearing the table and putting away the clothes to sit at the computer and pound in all that one remembers before it escapes the mind. Finally, finally, when a story `happens`, and is seen in print, and brings in feedback....ah, bliss.
Good fun, this writing for theheckofit.
S Jaywant

Revathy,

My comments were underscoring Didion`s intellectualism and aesthetic abiilities. Her preference for the image is less a ``female`` thing to me and more of a modernist device that trancends systems knowledge. She is no less a formidable intellectual regardless of her superficially self effacing comments.

I tend to be wary of efforts that downplay or essentialize women, their gifts and their work.

I hate ``Cold Mountain`` aaaaaaaaarrrrrrghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!( :- To hell with ``accountancy``.
You chowkies have pathetic taste as far as movies are concerned.If quoting other writers is called writing then anyone can become a great writer overnight.I have reserved this technique for emergency situations ;-).I can also compile the list of male or female writers from a couple of anthologies in my possession as a proof of my ``literacy`` level but i have to bring aaloo, teenday, anday, tamatar from the nearby convenience store.
You just have to seperate good writers from hypochondriacs putting their anxieties and frustrations in words, painting doomsday scenarios, scaring the shit out of the poor ``readers`` thus help spreading the panic and despair lurking their own lives.All good writers have a ``feel good`` index as far as readers are concerned and stand out as gems among the heaps of garbage being produced or published both electronically and in print on daily basis.It is the ``persuasive`` writers, who try to push certain vested interests or political motives are to be avoided if possible.I read for entertainment and learning rather than to become a pawn in the hands of words juggler.

joy!!! bangla

There would not necessarily be any knowing that A.S. Byatt is a woman if one didn`t look at the picture and read all the feminine pronouns inside the dust jacket. Many, perhaps most women, write in a markedly different way than men. I have no problem with that, as such, but I don`t think it`s true across the board.

Which is only to make a point, not really to disagree. I found, though, reading your article, Revathy, that most of the women you were quoting seem .... old? I mean, of a different generation. Of the generation of women`s lib and bra burning, maybe a little after. I think there`s a generation after that has different struggles, struggles that aren`t necesarily about the value of women`s writing, but, as Saminasha pointed out, the value of writing at all. (Which you addressed in your reply, I realise.)

But what I`m connecting it to I guess is a different struggle and a different triumph. I have found, in my experience of women belonging to various arts in Pakistan in particular, and S. Asia in general, that there is a new empowerment that comes from a) being female at all and b) not giving a damn about existing paradigms. Not even a celebration of the feminine, but more like a celebration of the power to write. So I have trouble identifying with the archetype you`re talking about, the one that has to struggle to enter an existing mainstream. I feel that there`s a lot of noise being made by women now and whoever hears it tends to bend them stream around them (us?).

Or maybe I`m over-romanticizing, or over-dramatizing.

Revathy,

I do read your writings with admiration.
However I do not understand why female understanding of the world should be so markedly different from a males perspective, so as to find it difficult to write, as you say.

Its amazing how much hidden talent we possess to write. I for one, never knew I would write a passage, let alone an essay.
And then Modis Gujarat happened. My gut really revolted. That gave me the impetus to write.

My `writings` are even today limited to the `cursed` subject of `god` and religion. In fact I can write without thinking twice when it comes to these two topics. I wonder if I ll ever get over these topics. I do hope that someday my passion would be taken away to write for a worthier cause than this cursed joke of our times. But I doubt it.

Gopal,
very good writing.
you are right women don`t get encourgement to write.
I think the best way is to write and don`t revise.let the ideas go as they come.
I wish i could write.

Hey Saminasha and Jawahara,
Thanks for your comments. Saminasha, writing about desi writers, men or women would need a whole new article or articles. I know my family sniggered when I said I wanted to write, probably because I was such a dud where important things like math and science were concerned! One begins writing almost furtively, under cover of darkness as it were and attempts to work one`s way into the light with an almost defiant stance. Clarity comes with writing, one is fighting obscurantists, orthodoxy, to subvert prevailing cobwebs. Am I being at all clear?
Love Didion, love all women who struggle to write. Even if it is just diaries or jottings on scraps of paper, it is an attempt to pin down consciousness in concrete form.
Revathy

Interesting. It`s also interesting that women spend so much time on the internal, whether it`s the home, family, feelings and that men are writers of the external. Personally I love `em both but I know how central writing is to my life. Is it because I am a woman? Or is it just because it`s me?

Also, am surprised you didnt bring up the terrible struggles desi women writers encounter from their fams, communities and countries in writing the unthinkable...wasnt there a fairly well known article discussing that?

Interesting.

Joan Didion engages the dialectic through the use of her images. She doesnt refuse the dialectic or what it means or its processes or the intellectual and political stances it requires-but she instead translates the dialectic into images.

You can quote me on that.