From LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU Tue Oct 19 13:30:08 1999 Date: Sat, 16 Oct 1999 11:10:03 -0500 From: "L-Soft list server at University of Illinois at Chicago (1.8c)" To: Laura Quilter Subject: File: "FEMINISTSF-LIT LOG9909C" ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 13:06:06 +0200 Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: =?iso-8859-1?q?pascicutte=20De=20Pascicutte?= Subject: No mail MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Can anyone tell me why I don't receive any more mails from FSFFU-LIT list? Thanks Restittuta ______________________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Il tuo indirizzo gratis e per sempre @yahoo.it su http://mail.yahoo.it ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 14:13:09 0100 Reply-To: mayerhofer@usf.uni-kassel.de Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: BDG: The Slave and the Free (Online sources) In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19990914011225.00709418@together.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT The list is really quiet at the moment. Unfortunately I am also very busy right now because of a review meeting next week. But I wanted to post the online references on Suzy Charnas and the Holdfast books which I have. There might be more at the Lycos page that was posted already. I hope I find time to comment the books and the reviews in the next days. Reviews: ------------ Strange Words Review of WttEotW http://www.strangewords.com/archive/walkto.html Quote: 'Walk to the End of the World is about questing for Self Knowledge and the hard truths that may be discovered along the way. Each of the principle characters is pursuing personal revelation and each finds it. However, in all cases the cost is far more than they ever would have imagined or been willing to pay. The serial reinforcement of this lesson serves to prepare the ground for Charnas' most basic hard truth. Holdfast's all male culture is one in which all relationships are reduced to their most basic, brute levels. Charnas proposes that such savagery is intrinsic to men and thus all male relationships. The take home message is that women can escape brutalization by men only when avoiding men entirely. Walk to the End of the World is unmistakably science fiction with an agenda. Charnas extrapolates to their logical extremes radical feminist perceptions of the worst, the most misogynistic attitudes. Her message about the inevitable nature of male-female interaction is unmistakable and the novel's structure conveys it powerfully. The interactions are archetypal and the vision often grim, but I couldn't stop turning the pages. I recommend it to the open-minded who seek some relief from the dominant chords of science fiction.' Emerald City Review of all 4 Holdfast books (including spoilers for _The Furies_ and _The Conquerer's Child_): http://www.emcit.com/emcit047.htm#Herstory Quotes: 'Probably the place to start is to admit that yes, this is another post-disaster novel. David Brin gets very angry about the fact that feminist SF almost always starts with the destruction of the known world and he attributes this to some sort of collective revenge fantasy amongst feminists. A more likely reason is that many feminists believe that it will not be possible to construct a feminist society from one in which men are currently in charge. That again is a debatable claim. You could, for example, employ extreme violence, but that would just be sinking to the level of the opposition. You could espouse separatism instead, but the men would probably resist that.' 'What Suzy has done here is create a society that is every Rad Fem's dream. No men, no need for men, even an opportunity to get even with the bastards every now and again. And a social structure that every liberal American could approve of. Were this a Joanna Russ book, the story would probably end there. But Suzy is made of sterner stuff. She is not afraid to examine this "perfect" society and find it wanting.' 'It is at the Free Fem camp that we first meet the character who is to become the greatest villain of the series. Daya [...] Many readers, I suspect, will see Daya's role as a villain simply as a case of jealous revenge upon the beautiful, but Suzy is never that crude. Daya's "crime", the reason for her evil, has nothing to do with her looks, or her liking for sex with men. It is because she knows no other life but the pleasing of others. Briefly, amongst the Riding Women, she has a taste of freedom and courage, but away from them she immediately reverts to her suspicious, servile lifestyle and her habit of intrigue. What Daya represents is the traditional role of women in a male- dominated society. She is the schemer, the power behind the throne, the woman who, although clever, cannot act on her own because it is not seemly for a woman to do so. Because she sees her life solely in terms of her relationship to others, she can never be free. It is no accident either that she is an expert story teller. Daya lives in a world of fantasy, convincing herself that all is well, and that others are brave, because she doesn't have the courage to come forward herself. This is what Suzy is telling us is wrong with women's lives. This is what we must reject in order to be free.' 'I've read better books than these, literary wise, but I don't think I've ever read any more thoughtful books. Suzy has taken one of the defining political questions of our times and has turned it into a tale that is both entertaining and insightful. And she never stops digging, never stops turning the searchlight on our complacency. You see, the women that Servan brought back from the wilds are black. Their welcome in Holdfast is uncertain. No matter how much we grow, we always have something new to learn.' Review of _The Furies_ by Randall Byers, originally published in The New York Review of Science Fiction, Issue 76 http://weber.u.washington.edu/~rbyers/furies.html Review of _The Furies_ by Lee Anne Phillips http://home.cybergrrl.com/review/gb0796.html#Furies (Short) review of _The Furies_ http://www.ansible.demon.co.uk/writing/sfxrev95.html#furies Science Fiction Weekly Review of _The Conquerer's Child_ by Tamara Hladik http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue111/books.html#cc Once there was a review of _The Furies_ by Gwyneth Jones but today I could get no connection to the site. I try again in the next days. Interviews: --------------- InternetBookstore (UK) interview from 1996 titled 'Vampires and Amazons' http://www.bookshop.co.uk/aut/autint.asp?author=70419 (takes a very, very long time to load) Quote: 'Q:So what are you working on now? A: The book that follows THE FURIES and ends that cycle of novels. It began, quite by accident, about thirty years ago, when I started recasting the story-in-my-head-forever in SF form, for a change. This became my first book, WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD, which was supposed to conclude with a smug little sentence under "the end," as follows: "This book is not the first volume of a trilogy." The whole genre was much afflicted at that time by the first throes of trilogyitis, which I thought contemptible (that is, stretching and padding a story so as to reach the requisite, Tolkienesque, three- book length). Had I but known, as they say, I could have put in a notice instead as to what it was the first volume of (unknown to me at the time): a tetralogy, WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD, MOTHERLINES, THE FURIES, and Volume Four. ' I sometimes have a hideous suspicion that when I am dead and gone (if not before) these books will vanish from sight and I will be remembered, if I am remembered, for my vampires and werewolves and such, much as Conan Doyle is remembered not for THE WHITE COMPANY, his serious historical novel, but for Sherlock Holmes. [...] Not that I'd mind having people go on reading "Boobs" and TAPESTRY and "Beauty and the Opera" and so on into the next century; they're good works and I'm proud of them. But the cycle of books begun with WALK looks, through sheer staying power as an activity through my entire career (so far anyway), like a life-work; and you do want your life work to have some legs, too. Q: Taken all together, the books begun with WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD seem to form a sort of futuristic epic. A: I think of them that way sometimes, although they were never planned as such. That is, WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD was an out-growth of the consciousness-raising work of sixties feminism: I was writing a standard sort of quest novel, young man in search of his father with allies and enemies in his little band, when I was forced by a discussion in my women's group to notice that there were no women in this story (not even the obligatory "girl" companion to be romanced and rescued and to turn her ankle at the right time) - except in the background, as despised slaves. Misogyny itself then became the heart of the story: men's age-old fear and loathing of women, and how that deforms the society created and ruled by men and their hierarchies into something that works badly for everybody and is essentially unsta' Unfortunately the connection was interrupted at this point and I was not successful in reloading (I don't know whether the problem lies on my side or on that of the internet bookstore). An Amazon.com interview (undated, but probably from 1996/7) with Suzy Charnas at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/show-interview/c-s- harnasuzymckee/002-9190912-0243067 (I think the generic format of Amazon interviews does not lead to very interesting interviews) Chat with Suzy McKee Charnas on 17 July, 1997 at Omni Visions moderated by Edward Bryant http://www.omnimag.com/archives/chats/ov071797.html Quote: '[...] but at the moment I am completely drowned in the final volume of the series of novels that began with "WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD." There's this THING that happens when you unwittingly commit yourself to what turnes out to be a futuristic, feminist, epic which you only meant to be one adventure SF novel. Toward the end of the process, particularly when it has taken over 25 years, you find yourself dealing with a veritable army of characters most of whom have matured and changed thru the three previous books in real time, like real people.' Essays by Suzy Charnas: -------------------------------------- The Beast's Embrace http://www.autopen.com/beast.embrace.shtml Designing the Undead or What Model is Your Vampire? http://www.autopen.com/model.vampire.shtml Charnas' Websites: ---------------------------- Short autobiography written by Charnas at Internet Bookstore website at http://www.bookshop.co.uk/aut/autbio.asp?author=70419 Reader's Corner tribute site at http://www.autopen.com/suzy.mc.shtml summarizes news about Charnas' books, apparently last updated around the time _The Ruby Tear_ was published (in 1997). Alpha Ralpha Boulevard tribute site at http://www.catch22.com/SF/ARB/SFC/Charnas,Suzy.php3 offers (very) short biography and a bibliography, some links, not all up-to-date. Petra Petra Mayerhofer mailto:mayerhofer@usf.uni-kassel.de -- BDG website http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Comet/1304/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 07:34:25 PDT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Daniel Krashin Subject: BDG: The Slave and the Free Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed >Date: Tue, 14 Sep 1999 01:12:25 -0400 >From: "Janice E. Dawley" >Subject: BDG: The Slave and the Free >These [Holdfast] men are wrong, wrong, wrong, but in a way that >is not at all unfamiliar in the real world -- there is a sort of bitter >humor in it, particularly at times like the dreaming, when the boys chant >the conveniently rhyming names of the unmen and the beast names of the >fems. What a horrifying yet ridiculous ritual! I liked that too, but I thought the broadness of the satire kind of worked against the seriousness of the rest of the story. I think Ms. Charnas used, very skilfully, a time-honored SFnal technique for making one's morally ambiguous protagonists seem more sympathethic: she contrasted the male protagonists (who were pretty vicious) with even *more* vicious antagonists -- the Seniors in general, and then the "evil genius" character at the end (can't remember his name), who is nearly psychotic. (For a less skillful use of the same technique, see any of Susan Matthew's torturer novels). And there were a couple male characters who were actually pretty benign, for their time and place: Eykar Bek, and that military guy who gets killed (can't remember his name either). Their POV's were actually more pleasant for me than Alldera's POV, which was shot through with such fear and rage. Danny ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 11:12:10 -0400 Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Joan Bowman Subject: BDG: The Slave and the Free MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit This is the first Charnas I've read. Having picked up the original paperback version of "Motherlines" in a used bookstore it took most of a year to get past the cover art and start reading. Once I did I was mesmerized. The underlying concepts seem to emerge more easily from these books than from any others I've read. I don't recommend reading them out of order, though, because after being a part of the women's societies in "Motherlines," for all their good and bad, it was so difficult to go back through "Walk to the End of the World." Initially it was hard to adapt to the lack of women characters and also to the men's society. Their culture so defied logic that at times it was hard to keep reading. The more I found out about them the worse it got. At the same time, it was easy to see where they came from and how these beliefs could develop. That must be what kept me reading. About halfway through "Walk to the End of the World" I began to understand better why some women scientists would have developed the horse mating ability demonstrated in "Motherlines." One of the things I love most about Charnas' writing is her ability to present me with information I can form a strong, seemingly well-informed opinion about, and then give me information that completely changes my point of view. (I just finished reading "The Furies" so I'm having trouble thinking of examples from the earlier two books.) I can't wait to read "Conqueror's Child." Joan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 12:03:17 EDT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I agree with some earlier postings about the ambivalence I feel about the feral packs of kids in Motherlines. I'll admit to an wish to have had such an experience; an urge to go feral still surging in me now and then. I did find it uncomfortable. I guess because I thought the women would want to teach their young. The packs were brutal, but free. Imagine that sort of freedom. A constant bacchanal! Then, when the child is caught and brought inside one paragraph caroomed off the page at me and helped me to understand: *The tricky part of the ritual bath was coming; apparently all the youngsters fought against the discomforts of having their hair washed and untangled. Nenisi said that this was good: in her struggles to avoid her mothers' attentions a child learned that though they overpowered her, they did not harm her; she could trust them. *I think she's going to give us a good fight,* Shayeen predicted approvingly.* I also agree that these books are best read in order. I started the Furies before I'd read the others and couldn't get into it. Then was told I was starting in the middle. Loved all of them once I read them in sequence. Great story-telling and lots to think about. best, phoebe Phoebe Wray zozie@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 09:55:45 -0700 Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed I was most struck by the way each book in this series (read the first two in the trade pb, then grabbed the next two from the library) broadens the scope of the "world". The first book begins inside the heads of the men in the Holdfast; the second shows us not one but *two* ways in which women are living without men. Don't want to give away the plots of the next books, but they each take another step back, making us re-examine our previous view of the society. I loved this. (And I suspect it's the reason why you can't read the books in the wrong order: they feel claustrophobic.) I had to laugh at the comment: >> David Brin gets very angry about the fact that feminist SF almost always starts with the destruction of the known world and he attributes this to some sort of collective revenge fantasy amongst feminists. >> We'll leave aside the confusion between "feminist SF" and "feminist utopian/dystopian SF". David Brin wrote a novel called _Glory Season_, which posits a woman-ruled, parthenogenesis-based society in which men are kept around to serve the same function as Charnas's horses. It's not a very daring book, IMHO, and though I wanted to like it, I felt that it set up this female-centered society purely to show its flaws and weaknesses. (I don't think that was explicitly intended; but I do think that was the result.) The Riding Women were a tremendous relief to me, because they broke through the logic that Brin set up ("in species which use parthenogenesis, male genetic material (?) is neccesary to trigger conception, THEREFORE my society must include men") and created something wholly different. *That* is what science fiction is for. jessie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 08:13:38 PDT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Daniel Krashin Subject: BDG: The Slave and the Free Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed >Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 09:55:45 -0700 >From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah >Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free >[...]David Brin wrote a novel called _Glory Season_, >which posits a woman-ruled, parthenogenesis-based society in which men are >kept around to serve the same function as Charnas's horses. Actually, they are also kept around so that their distinctively male capacity for anger and violence will be available to defend the colony from invaders. This assumption (which goes unquestioned throughout the book) makes the book less interesting for feminist SF fans, IMHO. >It's not a very >daring book, IMHO, and though I wanted to like it, I felt that it set up >this female-centered society purely to show its flaws and >weaknesses. Yeah. Although one of that society's big problems was the domination of powerful clone-families and the oppression of the non-clone women. That couldn't be a problem in the world of _Motherlines_. Also, the women of _Glory Season_ had cities and science and technological progress, which the _Motherlines_ didn't. Danny ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 12:06:31 -0700 Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free In-Reply-To: <19990916151339.22810.qmail@hotmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed I wrote: >>[...]David Brin wrote a novel called _Glory Season_, >>which posits a woman-ruled, parthenogenesis-based society in which men are >>kept around to serve the same function as Charnas's horses. And Daniel Krashin accurately commented that: >Actually, they are also kept around so that their distinctively male >capacity for anger and violence will be available to defend the >colony from invaders. >This assumption (which goes unquestioned throughout the book) >makes the book less interesting for feminist SF fans, IMHO. I should have been more clear. In the afterword to the edition I read, Brin wrote that he did some research on existing parthenogenic species and found that there was still a required male function; and that this meant that he could not write an all-female parthenogenic society, because it would be scientifically inaccurate. The rest of the book evolved from there, as books always do, in many different directions. My comment was meant to point out that the initial restrictions of scientific fact (and as an engineer, I have a lot of sympathy for people who can't bring themselves to be inaccurate; it's one of my obsessions as well) were only as restrictive as the author's invention. Charnas's work is also stronger because throughout the series every assumption is broken down, exposed, turned inside out. Some characters handle it well; others don't, or can't. It seems to me (for instance) that some parts of the Riding Women's culture couldn't survive as a two-sexed culture, however benevolent. All the fems who learn how they reproduce are disgusted. And indeed, if penetrative sex has been an abusive experience, I imagine a horse would seem like your worse nightmare. Conversely, if it's a personal, romantic, emotionally-involved experience, it would seem wrong to have the same experience with a horse who might be culled at the end of the year. (Not to mention the culture clash between the clones and the non-clones...) As I read it, the Riding Women had a unique relationship with their horses that was unrelated to their romantic love among themselves, and that was why they were able to be comfortable with it. jessie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 21:20:07 EDT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 9/16/99 7:02:22 PM, Jesse wrote: << As I read it, the Riding Women had a unique relationship with their horses that was unrelated to their romantic love among themselves, and that was why they were able to be comfortable with it.>> Which is also why the feral kids hanging out with the horses makes sense. They bond. Someone earlier mentioned this, and Jesse's comment adds to the connection. phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999 02:21:09 GMT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Marianne Reddin Aldrich Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed From: Jessie Stickgold-Star >I should have been more clear. In the afterword to the edition I read, Brin >wrote that he did some research on existing parthenogenic species and found >that there was still a required male function; and that this meant that he >could not write an all-female parthenogenic society, because it would be >scientifically inaccurate. Er. There are, indeed female-only species without a required male function. Granted, the only ones of which I am personally aware are a few (of 1000s) salamander species we discussed in Herpetology last year, but they do exist. Of course, salamanders are also often capable of growing back limbs that break off, so they are hardly a 'typical' species. Just wanted to point out that he was not only limited by invention, but by insufficient research.... I seem to recall that I enjoyed _Glory Season_ however. Hmm. Marianne ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999 02:24:00 GMT Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: Marianne Reddin Aldrich Subject: ooooops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed Sorry for misspelling your last name, Jessie Stickgold-Sarah. That was very thoughtless of me. My apologies. Marianne ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 22:31:02 -0400 Reply-To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC Sender: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: BDG: The Slave and the Free In-Reply-To: <4.2.0.58.19990916115453.00975790@mail1.pa.bell-labs.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:06 PM 9/16/99 -0700, you wrote: >It seems to me (for instance) that some parts of the Riding Women's >culture couldn't survive as a two-sexed culture, however benevolent. >All the fems who learn how they reproduce are disgusted. And indeed, >if penetrative sex has been an abusive experience, I imagine a horse >would seem like your worse nightmare. Conversely, if it's a personal, >romantic, emotionally-involved experience, it would seem wrong to >have the same experience with a horse who might be culled at the >end of the year. As I read it, the Riding Women had a unique relationship >with their horses that was unrelated to their romantic love among >themselves, and that was why they were able to be comfortable with it. Isn't it a lot more complicated than this? Sexual intercourse can have more than one meaning, depending on the context. To me, doing it with a man in private seems profoundly different from being mounted by a horse in a public ritual for the express purpose of conceiving a child. The fems confuse the two because they have no experience with the horse matings and can only extrapolate from their unpleasant memories of rape in the Holdfast. Presumably if one grew up with knowledge of both realities one would be able to make the distinction easily. Alldera and Daya both experience a similar confusion when they first witness the cullings. They can only see the killing as brutality and betrayal, while the women look at it as an element of their bond with the horses and of the larger cycle of life and death. Both positions have their points -- I especially liked how Charnas complicated the situation further by pointing out that Daya's horse had been captured and tamed by Alldera, not the Women -- but in the end it seemed to me that neither Alldera nor Daya was qualified to evaluate the Women's morality in this case. A great example of culture clash. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: The *Velvet Goldmine* Soundtrack "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas