Strong Female Characters*

[allmywires]

For me, Orc feels like he has a lot of negative female traits -- his lack of rationality being one -- and they work in a man because they're unexpected; in a woman, I suspect, they would be too feminine and (s)he would be easier to disregard because she wouldn't have the underlying importance of being a man.

Ah, no, Orc would be a great female character - I love female characters that are irrational (but in a driven way, if that makes sense? and not in a 'It's because she's a woman! with hormones!' way). (Though I'm only 10% through TGP* at the moment so perhaps my opinion will change!)

*soz HB! slow reader...

 

[RX-79G]

Personally, I dislike the term "strong women," for the same reason I dislike the term, "strong men." Much better to have believable men, and believable women. A "strong" character just seems like a code word for "flawless", which is just another way of saying "one-dimensional" to me.

I had always understood the term "strong woman" to mean proactive in terms of the character, and nuanced in terms of how they are written. I have never gotten the idea that it means "flawless".

"Strong", flawed women do very well in TV and film (Jessica Jones), leading me to believe that the problem isn't the existence of flawed, strong women - but the ability to properly write them as well as actors can portray them. And when a writer is struggling to write such a character, maybe studying a well portrayed one from film could provide some insight into what is missing in the description, because I doubt it is not what is on the page that is the problem as much as what has been left out.

And, let's be honest about this, if someone tries really hard to get you on diversity, they will. It's the nature of the game.

Well, there is a defense against this that is available to SFF writers: Do not make your characters fit current definitions of race, gender or sexuality. OR, don't define those character traits. Thinking about something like Alastair Reynolds Revelation Space books, most characters do not have defining sexual relationships and I don't recall any important descriptions of race. A female Russian speaking character can just easily be Turkic or Mongolian as Russian, and she doesn't have a sexuality if she doesn't do anything sexual.

Literature can choose to flesh out a character any way the writer pleases - history, abilities, physical size/capability/presence, attractiveness, humor, peccadilloes, etc. You don't need to say "Bill is a white dude that likes chicks" if it isn't central to the story. Bill's role in a fantastic voyage can be independent of his skin color or sexuality, and maybe writers would do well to take greater advantage of this natural ability of the written word to be ambiguous about some things.

 

[ErikB]

I think strength comes in many forms. And given that genders are split up in a variety of ways that are complimentary though different it is easy to forget this.

Men and women often identify best with their own gender (its natural to do so given the familiarity with that subject matter through personal experience). I think it takes authors effort and time to really write opposing genders well though many do this with great skill.

As to creating strength in a character I think what is actually more of a bone of contention and what is being asked is how "masculine" is the perception of a strong female character?

The story I am working on now has some very strong female characters. This will seem a great contradiction since the alien world is a male dominated patriarchal society. But the female aliens, as well as the human female protagonists are quite powerful. And in ways that the males cannot measure comparably.

The types of strength are different but obvious as the story progresses. This battle of the genders and gender role perception is more smoke and ideas than actual conflict I believe.

People reading a book should enjoy the strength of a character primarily, rather than taking strong notice of the gender of the character that is showing those strong attributes.

Just my two cents worth. Cheers!

 

[MWagner]

Literature can choose to flesh out a character any way the writer pleases - history, abilities, physical size/capability/presence, attractiveness, humor, peccadilloes, etc. You don't need to say "Bill is a white dude that likes chicks" if it isn't central to the story. Bill's role in a fantastic voyage can be independent of his skin color or sexuality, and maybe writers would do well to take greater advantage of this natural ability of the written word to be ambiguous about some things.

Agreed. Fiction doesn't need to go into detail about the physical appearance of most characters. You should of course give them personality and some memorable traits, but that doesn't mean you need to describe their complexion or ethnic makeup, unless its relevant to the story. And sexuality should rarely come into play unless you're writing a story with a lot of romantic entanglements.

In my WIP, for instance, I do not reference the skin colour or ethnicity of the characters. The story is set in an Eastern-Mediterranean analogue, with people of various hues intermixed. I allude to some homosexual behaviour, but it's not in terms of identity (it wasn't an identity historically in that time and place). It's not necessary to spell everything out. Let the reader know what's relevant to the story and fill in the rest with whatever their imagination conjures up.

It does seem that in the fantasy genre these days, though, readers expect portrait-like descriptions of characters. I suspect it has to do with how influential YA fiction has become on the genre, and the apparent desire for young readers to be given detailed pictures of all the characters, complete with scenes where POV characters look in the mirror and describe their hair, eye colour, etc. Not really sure what the appeal of that type of description is, but it does create expectations.