My favorite commentary on this subject, from Bob Dylan's "Time out of Mind":
She said, You don't read women authors, do you/ I said, You're way wrong/ She said, Which ones have you read then/ I said, I've read Erica Jong.
-- Liza
>> Women are still a closed book to men
>> Research shows men mainly read works by other men
>>
>> David Smith
>> Sunday May 29, 2005
>>
>> Observer
>>
>> Men have finally realised what they are missing, but they still aren't
>> all
>> that keen to do anything about it.
>> This is the conclusion of a study into sex differences in reading
>> habits,
>> which found that, while women read the works of both sexes, men stick to
>> books written by men. And the boys can no longer use ignorance as an
>> excuse.
>>
>> 'Men clearly now know that there are some great books by women - such as
>> Andrea Levy's Small Island - they really ought to have read and ought to
>> consider "great" (or at least good) writing,' the report said. 'They
>> recognise the titles and they've read the reviews. They may even have
>> bought, or been given the books, and start reading them. But they
>> probably
>> won't finish them.'
>
> I wonder how this shakes out in non-fiction? I read maybe one or two
> fiction books a year everything else is non-fiction. Most non-fiction
> books in the sciences and about economics or politics are written by
> men.
>
> Are there any differences in writing style by gender? When I picked up
> "Longitude" a few years back I kept thinking it was oddly written. I
> enjoyed it but it just didn't seem to read the way I expected it to. My SO
> suggested it was because it was written by a woman and not a man. I
> hadn't even noticed the gender of the author when I picked it up.
>
> I realize every author has their own style but do men and women write
> differently? Do culture and society construct language differences by
> gender that manifest themselves in writing?
>
> John Thornton
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