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when it's just a little off
May. 18th, 2019 09:21 pmSo in high school I really loved the Fionavar Tapestry. I don't know that it would hold up, but at the time I loved it. Since then, Guy Gavriel Kay has shifted from that high fantasy Narnia-meets-Camelot kind of thing to writing historical fantasy--he researches a culture in a specific era very, very thoroughly, and then writes a fantasy version of it, sometimes with magical elements, sometimes not. Honestly, this is one of the kinds of books I want to write. I really love this idea--it's a way of doing alternate history but with more freedom. His worldbuilding isn't really worldbuilding because he's not creating any of it, but he's evoking it, and he evokes it so very well.
Anyway! I just read his duology the Sarantine Mosaic because one of the books I'm writing now is set in the Byzantine Empire (actually, more like a fantasy version of it) and I like to read books with similar settings while I write.
The books are good. Especially the second one. He's a hell of a writer and even though he can be grandiose sometimes, it's in the service of really digging into ideas that I love seeing explored. Huge cast of diverse characters, interlocking stories, criss-crossing plot elements, complex themes. Good stuff.
And there are a lot of women! Women making choices, women being major players in the plot--in fact, in some ways, women drive the plot even more than men. The women have diverse motivations that are as interesting and nuanced as any of the male character's.
But. The female characters just seem...off. For one thing, they are all beautiful (either straight-up gorgeous, or stunningly attractive, or surprisingly pretty. Not one average-looking woman in the whole thing, much less a *gasp* ugly woman). Which is annoying, and he does remind you a lot of the characters' beauty, but thankfully he doesn't, like, intimately describe the women's faces and bodies in a way that feels gross. So I mostly just roll my eyes about it, but it feels male gazey without actually doing any of the things that the worst male gazey writers do?
If that was all, I wouldn't even bring it up, because there are so many men guilty of thinking that the only women who really matter are conventionally attractive ones that what's the point of even bringing it up? But there's something more with Kay's novels. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's like when he's writing about women I am so aware that he's writing about The Other. I definitely didn't get the feeling while reading it that he hates women (which is something I get from quite a few male writers). I think he likes women. I just think he thinks that women are Different and that shows through in his writing.
It's incredible how something like that shows through. On paper, other than the every-woman-worth-writing-about-is-super-attractive thing, there is nothing wrong with how he writes the women. But there's just this vibe, and I can't deeply analyze it, because I don't understand where it's coming from or what's creating it, but I can't stop thinking about it.
I think that's my fear about writing characters who are different than I am. I am all about research and about sensitivity readers and things like that, but you can get everything technically right and yet still...be off. And I never want to give a reader the feeling that he gives me, of wondering what it is that isn't quite right. Of feeling that the writer is at a distance from his female characters in a way he isn't from his male ones.
I don't know. The books have prompted a lot of thoughts, and yet none of them are very coherent, and I'm not arriving at any conclusions, which is frustrating. I actually think I'll read more of him both because I do like his books but also to see if I can get a handle on what's going on.
Anyway! I just read his duology the Sarantine Mosaic because one of the books I'm writing now is set in the Byzantine Empire (actually, more like a fantasy version of it) and I like to read books with similar settings while I write.
The books are good. Especially the second one. He's a hell of a writer and even though he can be grandiose sometimes, it's in the service of really digging into ideas that I love seeing explored. Huge cast of diverse characters, interlocking stories, criss-crossing plot elements, complex themes. Good stuff.
And there are a lot of women! Women making choices, women being major players in the plot--in fact, in some ways, women drive the plot even more than men. The women have diverse motivations that are as interesting and nuanced as any of the male character's.
But. The female characters just seem...off. For one thing, they are all beautiful (either straight-up gorgeous, or stunningly attractive, or surprisingly pretty. Not one average-looking woman in the whole thing, much less a *gasp* ugly woman). Which is annoying, and he does remind you a lot of the characters' beauty, but thankfully he doesn't, like, intimately describe the women's faces and bodies in a way that feels gross. So I mostly just roll my eyes about it, but it feels male gazey without actually doing any of the things that the worst male gazey writers do?
If that was all, I wouldn't even bring it up, because there are so many men guilty of thinking that the only women who really matter are conventionally attractive ones that what's the point of even bringing it up? But there's something more with Kay's novels. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's like when he's writing about women I am so aware that he's writing about The Other. I definitely didn't get the feeling while reading it that he hates women (which is something I get from quite a few male writers). I think he likes women. I just think he thinks that women are Different and that shows through in his writing.
It's incredible how something like that shows through. On paper, other than the every-woman-worth-writing-about-is-super-attractive thing, there is nothing wrong with how he writes the women. But there's just this vibe, and I can't deeply analyze it, because I don't understand where it's coming from or what's creating it, but I can't stop thinking about it.
I think that's my fear about writing characters who are different than I am. I am all about research and about sensitivity readers and things like that, but you can get everything technically right and yet still...be off. And I never want to give a reader the feeling that he gives me, of wondering what it is that isn't quite right. Of feeling that the writer is at a distance from his female characters in a way he isn't from his male ones.
I don't know. The books have prompted a lot of thoughts, and yet none of them are very coherent, and I'm not arriving at any conclusions, which is frustrating. I actually think I'll read more of him both because I do like his books but also to see if I can get a handle on what's going on.
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