write an article about the character of the girls
Answers
Explanation:
That’s a decent answer, although rarely easy to pull off in practice, but it’s not really answering the question I’m getting asked.
Standard Disclaimer One: In no way am I suggesting anyone has to write women in a particular way or that they have to write women at all. Write what you want to write. That’s what I do. This post is for the people who have asked the question to me directly or in a more general way to themselves.
Standard Disclaimer Two: I’m barely scratching the surface here. There is so much more that can be said. Think of this essay as part of the journey rather than the destination.
My Three Basic Pieces of Advice
1. Have enough women in the story that they can talk to each other.
The lack of women talking to each other is the most frequent criticism I have of writers writing women (especially male writers).
Pay attention to the fact that women DO talk to each other. Create opportunity for women characters to talk to each other. Check to see if you-as-writer are missing chances to have women talk to and interact with each other.
It’s all well and good to remind writers that they can in fact have more than one female character in their story. But I often notice stories with more than one woman character in which the female characters exist in isolation from each other. That is, each woman or girl exists in a different sphere—a different sub-plot or specific plot-setting—which results in each being the only woman or girl within her sub-plot, which results in the individual women only ever (or mostly) interacting with men. It’s not that those characters have to come into contact with each other, and it may not be possible or desirable for those individuals to do so within the narrative, only that it is possible to think about who else they could interact with.