December 10: middle-aged female protagonists (for ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
transposable_element) [Tumblr crosspost]
We need about ten thousand more of them, yesterday.
I mean, seriously, if middle-aged men can be the protagonists of millions of stories over the years, there is no reason middle-aged women can't also. Adventure stories, mystery stories, college professors having midlife crises and hitting on their student stories, you name it. If it works for a man (except for, you know, prostate cancer etc.), it will work for a woman, goddammit.
I think these stories don't get written because too many people are used to thinking of women as the objects in someone else's story, and since middle-aged women aren't either the beautiful young (innocent?) sex prize, or the grandmother figure (either kindly or wicked), they might as well not exist from a fictional perspective. (Except maybe in contemporary realistic fiction? Which is a genre I don't read -- if it doesn't have an edge of the unfamiliar, either fantastical or historical, I'm not usually interested -- and thus know nothing about. And you get women in their thirties in genre romances -- which I occasionally read even without 'paranormal' elements, because they are undemanding brain candy with guaranteed happy endings -- but not so much in their forties or fifties, at least not as the romantic heroines.) Anyway, there has been an increase in female protagonists in general lately, I think, but they seem to be mostly teens and young women. Which is great! I remember how much of a welcome surprise Alana of Trebond was when I discovered her, and I am happy beyond words that she has lots of company now.
But what I really want is Die Hard with the Bruce Willis and Bonnie Bedelia roles reversed, and maybe a female replacement for the villain and/or the cop as well. I don't think that's so much to ask.
*pause*
I should get to work on that myself, shouldn't I? *grin*
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December Talking Meme: All Days
transposable_element) [Tumblr crosspost]We need about ten thousand more of them, yesterday.
I mean, seriously, if middle-aged men can be the protagonists of millions of stories over the years, there is no reason middle-aged women can't also. Adventure stories, mystery stories, college professors having midlife crises and hitting on their student stories, you name it. If it works for a man (except for, you know, prostate cancer etc.), it will work for a woman, goddammit.
I think these stories don't get written because too many people are used to thinking of women as the objects in someone else's story, and since middle-aged women aren't either the beautiful young (innocent?) sex prize, or the grandmother figure (either kindly or wicked), they might as well not exist from a fictional perspective. (Except maybe in contemporary realistic fiction? Which is a genre I don't read -- if it doesn't have an edge of the unfamiliar, either fantastical or historical, I'm not usually interested -- and thus know nothing about. And you get women in their thirties in genre romances -- which I occasionally read even without 'paranormal' elements, because they are undemanding brain candy with guaranteed happy endings -- but not so much in their forties or fifties, at least not as the romantic heroines.) Anyway, there has been an increase in female protagonists in general lately, I think, but they seem to be mostly teens and young women. Which is great! I remember how much of a welcome surprise Alana of Trebond was when I discovered her, and I am happy beyond words that she has lots of company now.
But what I really want is Die Hard with the Bruce Willis and Bonnie Bedelia roles reversed, and maybe a female replacement for the villain and/or the cop as well. I don't think that's so much to ask.
*pause*
I should get to work on that myself, shouldn't I? *grin*
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December Talking Meme: All Days
