A Dearth of American Women Novelists?

By Ruiyan Xu

In a recent New York Times article that attempted to identify the best work of American fiction of the last 25 years, Toni Morrison’s Beloved took first place, followed by twenty-one runners-up, only one of which was also written by a woman (Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping.) Despite the fact that Morrison trounced the competition handily, two women out of twenty-two authors is a pretty paltry number.

But it should come as no surprise. Looking back over the history of American letters, it’s clear that very few American women novelists—past and present—are considered “great” in the eyes of critics, academics, and, perhaps, even readers.

Why is it that America has produced so few great women novelists?

As a point of comparison, we need only to look at the number of great women novelists from Britain. From Jane Austen to the Brontes to George Eliot to Virginia Woolf to Doris Lessing, Britain’s women have produced extraordinary novels that have stood the test of time. They’re still read, studied, and loved today.

Regarding novels written by American women, the pickings are slim. I could only find Willa Cather, Edith Wharton, Carson McCullers as possible examples of great American women novelists from the 19th and early 20th centuries, and while each author might be beloved, it’s a stretch to mention any of them in the same breath as the British women listed above.

Today, the greatness of Toni Morrison is indisputable. Marilynne Robinson’s majestic prose and Joyce Carol Oates’ prolific observations of American society rank them among the best American novelists. Glimmers of greatness can also be seen in the works of Kathy Acker, the radical authoress, poet and performance artist; Mary Gaitskill, with her dark and precise incisions into female sexuality; experimental Carole Maso; Andrea Barrett, Maxine Hong Kingston and other women authors. Whether any of them (besides Morrison) can rise to the upper echelon of truly great novelists remains to be seen.

But what makes a novelist great, anyway? In literature, greatness seems a combination of beauty, relevance, a touch of the sublime, hindsight, and a matter of reputation, acclaim and critical acceptance. Based on each of those characteristics, one could construct a hypothesis—depending on your politics and school of literary criticism—about why America has produced so few great women novelists. I don’t pretend to have any of the answers, but what I find interesting is the comparison between British and American women. 

There is, I would argue, something about the atmosphere of American letters and criticism that does not foster the cultivation and success of great female novelists. To wit:

France’s Prix Femina is judged by an all-female jury, Britain’s Orange Prize is awarded to novels written by women, but there is no American equivalent for either prize. American women have excelled as poets (Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Jorie Graham) and short story writers (Eudora Welty, Grace Paley, Lorrie Moore), but those two forms are narrower than the novel, more traditionally feminine, and dare I say, more often in service of the exquisite rather than the ambitious.

I’d be interested in hearing thoughts and responses, recommendations for reading, and contrary opinions. Maybe I’m the one shortchanging American women—maybe there are great American women novelists out there waiting to be read and discovered. This is a case where I’d be thrilled to be proven wrong.

Ruiyan Xu lives in Brooklyn.

(Originally published 11/10/06.)

Comments

[Michelle]

57% of all books are purchased by women. Obviously, we know what our "secret" is. We are dying to find out what the other side thinks.