The next in the debates series of posts on issues that seem to raise blood pressure to unhealthy levels within the literary community is on women’s fiction (read the first one, on literary vs commercial fiction here).
The Baileys prize for women shortlist is out today. This doesn’t concentrate on women’s fiction (the genre) per se, but rather on fiction written by women. But it’s part of the overall idea that women need more of a platform than men because their work is undervalued. The thinking is that while most readers, editors etc. are women, it is mostly men that write reviews in the main traditional outlets and they are mainly of books written by men. This seems to come hand-in-hand with the snobbery (sorry, a little bit lacking in objectivity here) surrounding women’s fiction.
So what is women’s fiction? For the uninitiated, women’s fiction is a genre that covers, as far as I can work out, ‘books marketed to female readers’. They generally sport pastel or pink covers (because, of course, all women loooooove pink) and can range from light romance to hard-hitting fiction. In fact, they can be pretty much anything related to life, as long as the publisher decides they want to market it to women.
‘So what is the problem with that?’ I hear you ask. Why is there even a ‘debate’? Well, probably because there’s no ‘men’s fiction’ (that’s what the world generally calls ‘fiction’). Why are books targeted at women pigeonholed, and not those targeted at men? This is especially confusing given that the majority of fiction readers are women. So, in essence, women’s fiction is targeting the majority of readers.
Back to the pigeonholing. More recently, there has been an influx of lad lit, which generally covers single shenanigans and/or romance from a man’s point of view. And when it’s romance, what makes it different from normal romance, where a good proportion of romantic fiction novels are written from both points of view? Less makeup, more sport? Keeping up stereotypes? Or simply telling a story aimed for readers that have a different take on things?
I think the big issue here is not so much the substance or even the classification, but the (usually completely undeserved) distaste associated with literature (yes, it is all literature) aimed at readers in what in other industries/ areas of society would be classed as a discriminatory manner.
Which brings us back to the beginning – is women’s fiction a necessary genre? And should prizes celebrating fiction by women really exist? What do you think?
Christina Philippou 
I’ve never thought about it is this way, to me it is just another genre like any other; SciFi, YA, Romance, Horror etc to help readers decide which books might interest them.
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What a great post Christina! I think it’s totally ridiculous to have a genre called women’s fiction. Many women read crime/thrillers. Many men read romance. We aren’t pigeon-holed in our reading tastes, so to try and pigeon-hole us into a genre seems unfair to both sexes.
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Setting aside the debate around hat constitutes ‘women’s fiction’, I do think prizes for female authors, like the Bailey’s prize, are incredibly important. Female authors are still outnumbered by male authors, still do less well in ‘open’ prizes, and until the system is fair, there is a need for women-only prizes, as they can really help raise an author’s popularity, their credibility and their sales. I suppose the term ‘women’s fiction’ can be helpful, depending on how it is defined – if it is used to distinguish books that centre on female characters and experiences, then, as Rosie points out, that could be helpful for a reader.
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I guess it depends on what the term women’s fiction actually means. Unfortunately, I think it’s more often a marketing moniker than a genre defined as you have (in which case I agree, it would be useful). I’m undecided about prizes celebrating women’s authors – I think they are great for redressing a balance, but unsure whether we shouldn’t be pushing for women authors’ recognition as a whole instead of pigeonholing ourselves further? (As an aside, I love the Bailey’s Prize and follow it closely every year)
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*what* constitutes!
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A good post, the segmenting drives me crazy – I had to make sure my historical novel had a really strong cover so that it didn’t get pigeon-holed in the romance genre (it so isn’t romantic). I was advised to use initials rather than my name – that made me really cross!
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Wow, interesting (and somewhat worrying!)
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An interesting post! I did like Alison’s response, but it’s sort of like our Title IX – there will come a time when prizes specifically for women’s fiction (which I’ve heard called chick lit) won’t be needed (I sincerely hope).
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I can’t count the number of times I’m asked what readership I’m aiming act. I’m afraid I have started saying ‘anyone who likes to read’.
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