Chick Lit and Guy Lit
I kind of have a thing about the term "Chick Lit" or "Guy Lit" for that matter. There is of course a definition in wikipedia to define what this genre is all about. By the way, type in "Guy Lit" in wikipedia and you discover there is no such category. Is that called discrimination or what? More importantly there is a kind of a predetrmined pigeonhole into which we are putting the kind of stuff chicks write or read about. Stuff that guys read or write about. Don't we all do a bit of everything? I know enough men who found the film Sex and the City good to watch. Enough men flip through Femina as women who buy Car and Driver.
"Chick lit features hip, stylish female protagonists (usually in their twenties and thirties and in urban settings) and follows their love lives and struggles for professional success (often in the publishing, advertising, public relations or fashion industry). The books usually feature an airy, irreverent tone and frank sexual themes. The genre spawned Candace Bushnell's Sex and the City and its accompanying television series. Popular chick lit novelists include Ireland's Marian Keyes, Cecelia Ahern, and Sophie Kinsella, author of the Shopaholic series. Variations have developed to appeal to specific audiences, such as "Chica Lit," aimed at English-dominant, middle-class American Latinas, the top-seller being novelist and film writer/producer Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez; Christian Chick Lit, Matron Lit (aka Hen Lit) for middle-aged women, Young Adult Chick Lit (also Teen Lit)."
The website http://www.thaindian.com had recently done a story on Chick Lit Delights By Not Coming of Age. Because then it would be Hen Lit?? I don't know. To me a novel is a novel. Every novelist essentially shares a world view with a reader - either real or fictitious. By ascribing that world view to gender, I believe we pigeonhole the creative work. Librarians may need to categorize books, bookshops may need to categorize books by genre, so what is the problem you would ask? Shouldn't the libraries or bookshops have just two broad categories - guy literature (written by guys) and chick? What about those books that are written by guys but talk about girls?If many novels appear that have similar settings, themes and characters, a genre gets created. The chick lit genre has commonalities in settings - urban, svelte women in twenties who are exploring the world and living it on their own terms. Yet in calling chick lit a genre, it only reinforces stereotypes - girls are supposed to talk about the girlie topics. Guys have other aspirations or insecurities even though the male characters maybe put in similar settings. Stereotyping helps us make sense of a complex world but also creates sharp barriers in one's mind.Sample the piece written on http://thaindian.com website:
Financial journalist-turned-author Anita Jain is back to India to find a suitable husband after meeting several prospective candidates in the US.In her new book, “Marrying Anita”, launched by Penguin India in the capital, Anita pours out her heart as every “suitable encounter” flounders and she ends up single in a migrants’ city with a maid to take care of her needs. But hope still burns bright.
The article mentions The Zoya Factor by Anuja Chauhan and Almost Single by Advaita KalaI was delighted to find the article mention my neighbor Nirupama Subramanian as an aspiring chick lit writer. She won the Commonwealth prize winner for the best short story and is now writing her first chick lit novel about a conservative Tamil Brahmin girl working alone in Mumbai. Nirupama's hubby R Rajesh (also ex-colleague from PepsiCo) is a shutterbug and was the one who did my mugshot that on this site's banner and the one used in the last page of my new novel. The article ends with a reference to Married But Available.
Abhijit Bhaduri, author of the newly released novel “Married But Available”, sums up: “Popular contemporary novels is fast becoming a slice of life - something that all people read, find more believable, possible and easy to understand. I have written about the joys and dilemmas that professionals face in the first 10 years of their working lives in my new book,” he said.
I was surprised to find popular blogger Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan (who blogs at http://thecompulsiveconfessor.blogspot.com/) missing in the article. Her blog traces her life complete with vodka+ Red Bull, gatecrashing parties, boyfriend and lover hassles and the works. Her book You Are Here is the latest in chick lit. On her blog she describes herself as:
"Okay, here goes: twenty-something, single, female, writer, with large groups of friends and who goes out for drinks pretty regularly. That's my life and that's what I write about. Okay? Okay."
Do you believe that terms like Chick Lit or Chick Flick reinforce gender stereotypes or does that help readers know what to expect in that book? Let me know.