Blog 2

I just finished reading the "Hunger Games" trilogy and as I was doing the reading for this class, I kept thinking about the books. In them, a female character is the lead, she is the strong one, the fighter and the reason for a revolution. It made me stop and really think, because in addition to being all those things, she is also just a confused, scared, maturing young woman who is going through the same things we all went through at her age, only on a grander scale. She does not ever pretend to know all the answers and is constantly conflicted about the things happening around her. I have more and more respect for the author for creating a character whose gender is almost an after-thought. Yes, she is female, but really, she is so much more. She is "human" and because of that, she is still reverberating in my mind several hours after finishing her story.

It just made me stop and think about how little literature revolves around a strong female character; one who's main goal is not getting the guy. Another one I read recently that has a strong, powerful, meaningful character is "My Name is Mary Sutter". Her gender plays a huge role in who she is and she is "allowed" to be, but in a way where it makes sense that you are seeing such massive inequality.

I love to read and will read just about anything. Reading our chapter and readings this week made me really stop and think about how many of the books I read, and love, are based on male privilege. It's sad to me that even in fictitious worlds, ones where anything can happen, where anything is possible, authors, creative minds, still don't know how to create strong, interesting female characters. Is that because they don't see enough examples of them in real life? That's my question to myself for them week, and my goal for the semester: find the type of women in reality that I want to see in my fiction. I challenge you all to do the same.