Men write better than women

25 comments on “Men write better than women”

1. former bookstore clerk says:
   April 13th, 2007 at 9:29 am

   If a customer’s taste in literature is the litmus test for good writing, then slay me first.

2. panic says:
   April 13th, 2007 at 9:47 am

   “If a clerk’s taste in literature is the litmus test for good writing, slay me, right now.”
   Ahhhh, classism rears it’s ugly head again. I was a Chapters employee for a while. I also have a degree in English Lit. Does the former cancel the latter? Though it’s not like there’s ever been consensus on what qualifies as “good” in literature anyway, even among the elite types, which I guess you fancy yourself to be.

   Which is not to say I agree that “men are better writers.”

3. Kathryn says:
   April 13th, 2007 at 10:16 am

   The clerks in my local Chapters seem to only read sci-fi/fantasy. I’m pleased you are not all so, panic.

4. panic says:
   April 13th, 2007 at 10:32 am

   Kathryn,
   Chapters is a big store with a lot of employees. I’d encourage you to engage with more of them.
   I love Bookninja. LOVE. However, I’m tired of seeing this attitude toward booksellers here (though, admittedly, it’s mostly in the comments section). Say what you will about the higher ups, or the big box concept, but give the people on the front lines a little more credit. There are a lot of low-paying retail jobs out there, and the people you interact with at store level could just as easily be working at the GAP. The fact that they’ve chosen to work in a bookstore means something, usually that they love books, and reading.
   It’s also worth noting that many people in the publishing industry, either industry professionals or writers, have done time (heh) working for Indigo/Chapters.
   I also worked with three actors, a documentary filmmaker, an accomplished jazz musician, and an event curator.

5. patricia says:
   April 13th, 2007 at 12:59 pm

   I concur with panic. As much as I dislike the big box concept, I’ve had some very good experiences with some of the staff at various Chapters. And I keep meeting talented writers who at some point in their careers have worked for Chapters. I doubt very much that they were any less talented and intelligent when they worked there.

6. von b says:
   April 14th, 2007 at 12:30 am

   I was much less intelligent when I worked somewhere.

   Or more.

   Lemme get back to you on that.

7. Zen of Writing says:
   April 14th, 2007 at 9:23 am

   Perhaps better to put it, People who read books by men end up working in bookstores

8. anonymous donor says:
   April 14th, 2007 at 10:56 am

   But what do Canada’s bookstore clerks think: are men or women better writers?

9. Fish Fish says:
   April 14th, 2007 at 11:11 am

   I’ll tell you what Canada’s bookstore clerks think – they think, ‘I wish this were a damn record store.’ That and, ‘God, I hate people.’ I speak as an ex Coles employee.

10. Michelle Butler Hallett says:
    April 14th, 2007 at 11:27 am

    Of course, there’s always the historical reality that far more men than women over the centuries have had access to literacy and literature.

11. Tbone says:
    April 14th, 2007 at 12:12 pm

    Of course, there’s always the historical reality that far more men than women over the centuries have had access to literacy and literature.

    Yes, although this poll only took into account books published from 1982 to the present….

    I do think there are probably more male writers than female writers though, at least in the realm that these people were measuring (mainstream selling, mid to highbrow novels and non-fiction books) so these percentages might not be THAT far off (just like the recent post on here about how sexist it was that magazine writers are a majority male, but the link said that 75% of all submissions come from males)

12. panic says:
    April 14th, 2007 at 1:54 pm

    Tbone,
    We’re still a long way off from women having that coveted “Room of One’s Own.” If you take into account that most writers need a day job, and most women work the “double shift” of paid work, and housework (including most of the childcare), women still are less likely to have the time to write novels.

13. Jay Thompson says:
    April 14th, 2007 at 4:10 pm

    “most women work the “double shift” of paid work, and housework…” – Where exactly do you live, Panic, 1950sville? The room of one’s own argument is slightly outdated.

14. George says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 7:28 am

    Even though people have somehow got the idea in their heads that those days are over, the sad thing is, Jay, they’re not. Any bucket o’ stats, never mind the anecdotal evidence picked up at any gathering of women, will tell you that. Your incredulity might show you don’t live that way, much like my head-shaking sad disbelief does for me, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t go on.

    Did that make sense? I am so hungover.

15. Jay Thompson says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 7:49 am

    Do you have stats specific to the socio-economic group from which most writers come from? I don’t know about you, but I’ve addressed lots of gatherings of women in writings groups and a far whack of them aren’t spending their days as washerwomen or domestic servants. Laying out an argument based on the catch-all Bill O’Reilly term “stats” isn’t quite accurate enough for modern society. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to the mine for 12 hours so that I can get home later and write my next novel, which I hope Chapters employees will like, because apparently popularity is directly related to how much time we all have to type…

16. Jay Thompson says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 9:01 am

    Sorry, a couple further thoughts and then I’m done. Basically, I’m in on this thread because the whole article/discussion is ridiculous. Because they are the media, the source of the article is obviously trying to spark a reaction: men versus women. When really this is about some clerks saying what books they like. Ask another sampling of clerks, maybe you’ll get completely different books. Maybe it will be 80-20 in favour of women. But suddenly this has lead to: a rip against store clerks; a cop-out about women not having the same chances as men. As for the first point, there are good clerks and bad clerks; clerks who love books and those who hold up The Simpsons as the pinnacle of enlightened debate in modern society; just as there are good plumbers and bad plumbers, etc… But it’s really hard to knock Chapters clerks as a whole, since it’s really the only game in town anymore. Of course the argument that has been ignored re: clerks, likely because everyone hopes it’s pure sarcasm and not dim-witted observation, is from Zen of Writing, who says “Perhaps better to put it, People who read books by men end up working in bookstores”. If Zen is being honest, I’d say he/she/it doesn’t know much about Zen or Karma, because that comment is likely to leave him/her/it spending the next seven lifetimes as “Steve the one-legged mute in pet books who lives with his mother.” Not that I have anything against pet books, or the clerks who work in that section. I’m just saying… As for women not having the same chances to write as men, ala Virginia “I’m very much old and dead” Wolfe, that’s a bullshit argument as well. I know men who work 80 hours a week who are very talented and could probably write fantastic books. I know women who do the same. I also know men and women with enough time, yada yada yada. Fact is, if you have a book that you need to write, somehow you will find a way, because you HAVE TO. I wrote my first novel while working full-time and helping take care of two kids under 5 (not my kids granted, but I generally handled the post-work to bath-time shift). I wrote during any spare moment because I HAD TO get the book out of me – it drove me – and it was more excruciating not to write than to drag my ass to a keyboard. I’d say most of the writing took place after 10 PM. Man, woman, dog, alien, cockroach, high earner, low earner, busy, not busy, if you want to write a book, you will. Everyone makes excuses about why they haven’t written a book, and a few hundred people have told me they’ll do it when they retire. In reality, 95 percent of those people will probably take up gardening, watch more TV, go on package tours to safe destinations abroad and complain about the cleanliness of the toilets… Beyond motivation, realistically, if we looked at the publishing lists of novels from 1982 onwards the percentages of titles by men versus women would probably be equal or slanted slightly towards women, who if statistics are to be believed, make up the bigger percentage of readers. (Sorry, you can Bill O’Reilly me back on that one, George.) There is no dearth of female writers. Thank god that’s out. Now I can get back to being pissed off about more tangible things in life, such as “who left the empty milk carton in the fridge?”

17. Kathryn says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 11:49 am

    Jay, I would certainly argue that Chapters is not the only game in town; there are plenty of other places to buy books on-line or off (hell, you can buy directly from the publisher in many cases now). I do not shop in Chapters unless I have to (ie. when someone gives my children gift certificates or some such thing).

    As for women having enough time to compete with men as writers I would agree with you. The question was not whether there were as many books by women as men but whether the books were better written. It is a ridiculous question. A good book is just a good book and that a bunch of waterstone employees choose more male written books that female does not make the books better written. It’s an argument that breaks down quickly. Even if there are less female written books, which is debatable (and I have no stats), who is to say which are better written? If I choose to eat two apples and only one orange does that mean the apples taste better or that I prefer apples. Whatever.

18. George says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 12:06 pm

    For the record, I jumped in not to argue about the time bind of women writers or the efficacy of Chapters clerks, just against the idea that we live in an age where women are treated equally and don’t have two shifts of work. The division of labour in the average household has not equalized. Stats will have to wait til I get back to my books and a headspace where I’m interested in stats.

19. George says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 12:07 pm

    And the Bill O’Reilly comparison is funny, but somehow off, considering my argument…

20. Kathryn says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 1:29 pm

    Note to Tbone. I am not sure why your comments go in the spam folder but it might have something to do with the fact you’ve put google as your website. If your comments get trashed it is because of the high volume of spam and the low willingness to read through each spam message.

21. Jay Thompson says:
    April 15th, 2007 at 2:56 pm

    Kathryn, on-line ordering and direct-from-publisher buying options do not have clerks, hence the “only game in town” comment. The independents have largely gone the way of the Dodo. For some reason I now have a craving for fruit. Mm oranges…

22. panic says:
    April 16th, 2007 at 10:04 am

    Jay (the following comment assumes you’re male)

    I wish that sort of thing had been banished to the 50s!
    Maybe you should ask some mamas you know, who are partnered with a man and also work outside the home, how much time they spend on childcare and housework. (I also dare you to tell them, when they complain of exhaustion, and having no time to themselves, that that’s a “cop-out.” *eye roll*) If you are partnered, and do 50%, great! Ask your partner about it, if you have one. I bet a lot of hetero men would be surprised to learn exactly how much they’re missing. I think the difference is, in the 50s it was blatant, where as now men don’t even realise their female partners are doing far, far more. A quick search turned up this interesting BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6382429.stm
    And maybe, don’t be so dismissive next time, hmmmmm?

    For both men and women though, having the time, the opportunity, the space, to write is often tough to find if you’re working class, have kids, all that stuff factors in.

23. T-Bone says:
    April 16th, 2007 at 4:10 pm

    Kathryn: Hmm, sorry about that, I had no idea that would send it to a spam folder.

    Pat:

    I’ll condense my old post since I don’t feel like typing the whole thing again. Basically, I disagree with you. That has not been my experience. I fully believe that the double shift is still the case for many poorer women, but let us be frank. The vast majority of the authors publishing these types of work (male or female) are middle or upper class, not poor married men and women with children.

    Growing up in middle class family with upper middle and upper class fiends, my experience was the women had FAR more time than the men. The mothers either didn’t work or worked part time in jobs they wanted to work at. The mothers all had a large amount of free time that they occupied with activities like book clubs, horse back riding and various classes. The fathers, OTOH, worked full time and had very little time for hobbies or classes or the like. I’d aslo say that most of the women had house cleaners who would come once a week or so and cut down on most of their work (also, many, though perhaps not most, of the men did as much or more housework as this was in a rural area and all the outdoor activities and all maintenance are considered the man’s job.)

    I will, however, grant that when the mothers had young children they probably had less time, maybe even far less. But after their children were old enough to drive the motehrs had far far far more free time.

    So I have to agree with Jay, that really seems like just a cop-out. I dont’ think it appies to the majority of people in the classes that really are writing these books.

24. Tbone says:
    April 16th, 2007 at 6:14 pm

    Wow… isn’t this relevant.

    Slate article on new study showing men work as much as women

    Throughout the world, men spend more time on market work, while women spend more time on homework. In the United States and other rich countries, men average 5.2 hours of market work a day and 2.7 hours of homework each day, while women average 3.4 hours of market work and 4.5 hours of homework per day. Adding these up, men work an average of 7.9 hours per day, while women work an average of—drum roll, please—7.9 hours per day. This is the first major finding of the new study. Whatever you may have heard on The View, when these economists accounted for market work and homework, men and women spent about the same amount of time each day working. The averages sound low because they include weekends and are based on a sample of adults that included stay-at-home parents as well as working ones, and other adults.

25. sharonapple says:
    April 16th, 2007 at 7:52 pm

    I think there is a bias at work. As an earlier study noted, women may read male and female writers, but men tend to stick to their own sex.
    http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,,1747821,00.html

    As for arguing that men are simply superior writers… laughable. It would be like arguing female writers are better in Canada than male ones simply because this article argues that female Canadian writers win more literary awards than male Canadian writers….
    http://www.virginia.edu/topnews/textonlyarchive/March_1997/corse.txt

    As for the breakdown of market work vs. housework… even if the two sexes work the same total amount of hours, you do notice that women work more at home… the place where they’re suppose to have the most freetime to write. It would be like expecting a guy to write a novel while doing his market work.

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