On Tue, 15 Apr 1997, Daniel L Krashin wrote:
>
> 2)It's easy to forget that Anne McCaffrey wasn't always the mistress of
> Pern INC. I gather, from the awards of the time, that she was something of a
> groundbreaking and innovative writer in the late 1960's. (Although not a
> feminist one.) Cs "Ship" really that bad? Contrary to Tanya Wood's comment,
> I recall the scene ofI sexual frustration in "The Ship who Sang" to be more
> nuanced and moving than just a scenario of failed rape. YMMV.
Daniel Krashin
NH: YMMV? Your move? Young Mothers Make Vittles? I remember that
scene. I read the "ship's" human body as being trapped and vulnerable,
so I found that scene threatening and icky. Meant that I never did find
the male pilot dashing or sympathetic, but egoistic and self-involved.
But in terms of the 60's and 70's, I suspect that McCaffrey's work was
ground-breaking, because as coy and sexually determined as her whole Pern
society is, women are active and vocal participants in it; out there on
dragonback fighting Thread, and being scientists, and so on. I devoured
her books when I was younger, then it slowly filtered through that they
weren't exactly progressive, not just with relation to gender, but to race.
-nalo
"Sleeping in shifts, or working in shifts, or if you were so tired you
couldn't sleep you stared at the television and learned a new language.
Whadya say. They learned this. Watched every show. After, feeling
confident they'd gained something, a key to the day..."
Dionne Brand, _Another Place, Not Here_
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