In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.
Thanks to everyone who said such lovely things last week after I lost the In the Media post and to everyone who offered suggestions to stop it happening again. I think I have a solution and it seems to have worked well this week.
The morning after last week’s last minute loss, I realised that all was not entirely lost; all the articles I’d linked to that hadn’t saved were in my laptop history, so I recovered the remainder of last week’s post (apologies if you received an email with a half-done post in it, it posted when I retrieved it) and relinked all the articles, then added this weeks. The result of that is this bumper issue. Enjoy!
This week saw the death of Colleen McCullough, author of The Thorn Birds, as well as 23 other books, and a neuroscientist. Steve Dow remembers her in The Guardian; Alison Flood gave her tribute with ‘Colleen McCullough’s The Thorn Birds helped me get over heartbreak‘ also in The Guardian, and in response to that obituary (I’m not linking to it) Rebecca Shaw wrote ‘We’ll celebrate a woman for anything, as long as it’s not her talent‘ in The Guardian while Liz Kearney responded with ‘You may be a best-selling writer, but never forget that you’re still fat and ugly‘ in The Irish Independent.
It’s been a fortnight filled with awards. Last week, Claudia Rankine became the first person ever to be nominated for two National Critics Circle Awards in the poetry and criticism categories; her editor tells The Washington post why she’s a ‘genius’ and Jonathon Sturgeon tells us why the double nomination is ‘the correct decision’ on Flavorwire; While Jhumpa Lahiri won the DSC Prize. Here’s ‘Six things you should know about Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Lowland’ on Scroll.in
This week, it’s been the turn of the Costa Awards. Helen Macdonald won the overall award for the fantastic H is for Hawk. Here’s an interview she gave to The Times last week; you can watch her talking about the book here; you can listen to an audio excerpt and read her piece ‘On Ringing Wild Goshawks’ on Vintage Books, and discover the six books that made her in The Guardian. You can also watch the short films made of the other finalists: Emma Healey; Kate Saunders; Ali Smith. Zoe Gilbert won the Short Story Award with Fishskin, Hareskin. With Joanne Meek, Lucy Ribchester, Jane Healey and Paula Cunningham also shortlisted. You can read all the shortlisted stories here (scroll to the bottom of the page).
Other exciting news for female writers is the launch of #ReviewWomen2015, following the success of the #ReadWomen2014 campaign. Hannah Beckerman explains why she wants more books by female writers, especially commercial fiction, to be reviewed in the broadsheets in the Huffington Post. Anne Enright became the first Laureate for Irish Fiction in a unanimous decision and in China came the discovery of a new poet, ‘dubbed China’s Emily Dickinson‘, Want China Times reports on Yu Xihua.
There’s been a wave of feminist articles this fortnight, partly thanks to The Sun newspaper appearing to stop publishing pictures of topless women on p3 and then declaring it a joke by the middle of the week. Sarah Ditum wrote, ‘The “return” of Page 3: the Sun revels in the chance to make women with opinions look stupid‘ in the New Statesman; Marina Hyde responded with, ‘No more t*ts in the Sun – a campaign we can all get behind‘ in The Guardian. Elsewhere, Sophie Heawood wrote, ‘If Björk can’t stop a man stealing the limelight, what hope is there for the rest of us?‘ in The Guardian; Eleanor Catton wrote a statement on her website following a media furore in New Zealand about comments she made about the government; Louise O’Neill related, ‘My journey to feminism‘ in The Guardian; Elisabeth Camp asked ‘Should I let my daughter wear pink?‘ in Aeon; Jami Attenberg recounted her time passing as a man, ‘Track Changes‘ in The New York Times; Bayan Perazzo wrote ‘The Burden of Being Female in Saudi Arabia‘ on Muftah; Rose George declared, ‘My period may hurt: but not talking about menstruation hurts more‘ in The Guardian; Arabelle Sicadi wrote, ‘A Bridge Between Love And Lipstick: Queering the beauty industry‘ on Buzzfeed; Jeanne de Montbaston responded to an Alison Wolf article (link in the piece) with ‘What the Hell kinds of Feminists are you Reading, Alison Wolf‘ on Reading Medieval Books; Lucy Magan says, ‘Let’s Silence the Voice That Tells Us We Can’t‘ in Stylist; Marina Sofia looked at the new Barbie Princess Power on her blog; Rebecca Carroll wrote, ‘I was six when a man first touched me. I didn’t speak up until I was an adult‘ in The Guardian; Jia Tolentino wrote, ‘Rush After ‘A Rape On Campus’: A UVA Alum Goes Back to Rugby Road‘ on Jezebel; Homa Mojtabai listed ‘Reasons You Were Not Promoted That Are Totally Unrelated to Gender‘ on McSweeney’s; C M Meadows-Haworth, ‘Reading Audre Lorde Is Changing My Life‘ on A Room of Our Own; Chika Unigwe wrote, ‘Why Nigeria is failing its citizens over Boko Haram attacks‘ in Litro; Maddie Crum told us ‘Why Virginia Woolf Should Be Your Feminist Role Model‘ on Huffington Post; Brandi Bailey selected ‘The Best Feminist Picture Books‘ on Book Riot, Monique Wilson said, ‘Critics of the Vagina Monologues must acknowledge its transformative powers‘ in The Guardian, Alison Flood told us ‘Why I hate the Little Miss books‘ in The Guardian, Sarah Ditum also told us, ‘I ain’t afraid of no girls: why the all-female Ghostbusters will be good for Hollywood‘ in the New Statesman; Max Cairnduff wrote, ‘Looking back on #readwomen2014 and my favourite reads of the year‘ on his blog; Hannah Renowden shares, ‘2015 – When I got angered by a reading list so read it. Also, crochet.‘ on her blog, and Isabel Rogers read and took down Mike Buchanan’s Justice for Men and Boys (and the women who love them) Party Election Manifesto on her blog.
And a number about class following James Blunt’s open letter to Chris Bryant. Sarah Perry responded with, ‘James Blunt has misunderstood the relationship between privilege and success‘ in The Independent and Suzanne Moore with, ‘What James Blunt doesn’t understand about the politics of envy‘ in The Guardian. Other issues surrounding class were covered by Lisa McKenzie, ‘The estate we’re in: how working class people became the ‘problem’‘ in The Guardian; Lucy Mangan, ‘If you don’t understand how people fall into poverty, you’re probably a sociopath‘ also in The Guardian; Nicola Morgan asked, ‘Why fund libraries when it’s all online?‘ on An Awfully Big Blog Adventure; Harriet Williamson said, ‘Every time I visit the job centre, the staff treat me like a subhuman‘ in the New Statesman; Grace Dent said, ‘When rents are so high that you have to share a bed with a stranger, surely the revolution can’t be far off‘ in The Independent, and Kathryn Hughes wrote, ‘Yes, Kirstie Allsopp, littering’s bad. But then so is self-righteousness‘ in The Guardian
The best of the rest articles/essays:
- Zoe Williams, ‘Wolf Hall: A Lesson in the triumph of low birth over hierarchy‘ in The Guardian
- Rachel Cooke, ‘Oscars 2015: All about Eve? In today’s films, it’s more like All About Adam‘ in The Guardian
- Kim Kankiewicz, ‘The Watcher and the Watched‘ in the Los Angeles Review of Books
- Beluah Maud Devaney, ‘Three thousand reasons to choose your reading carefully‘ in The Guardian
- Tiffany Midge, ‘Part One: Redeeming the English Language (Acquisition) Series‘ in The Butter
- Rene Steinke celebrates the profound influence of independent bookstores on Read Her Like an Open Book
- Mary Wollstonecraft, ‘On Poetry, and Our Relish for the Beauties of Nature‘ on Berfrois
- Judith Lennox, ‘Loneliness and the Long-Distant Granparent‘ in The Guardian
- Laura Sook Duncombe, ‘Literary Ladies Cage Fight: Clash of the Titans‘ in The Butter
- Sasha Dugdale, ‘The Necessity of Translation‘ on Commonwealth Writers
- Priscilla Ward, ‘I’m tired of suppressing myself to get along with white people‘ on Salon
- Susanna Basso (tr. Mati Colarossi), ‘On translation‘ on Parallel Texts
- Elizabeth Haynes, ‘Closer Than You Think‘ on her blog
- Diane Mehta, “And She Went On Her Way Rejoicing” (On Muriel Spark) on The Rumpus
- Leesa Cross-Smith, ‘Anxiety & Comfort‘ on Real Pants
- Brittany Wilmes, ‘Growing Up‘ in The Butter
- Rosie Gray, ‘France’s Far-Right Party Seizes the Moment – And the Youth‘ on Buzzfeed
- Dan Piepenbring, ‘A Dissatisfaction with Life‘ (on Patricia Highsmith) in The Paris Review
- Trisha Ready, ‘How Listening to Music and Fighting with Susan Sontag Helped Me Cope with Chemo‘ on The Stranger
- Dinah Jeffries, ‘The Hidden Psychology of a Writer‘ on her blog
- Eva Wiseman, ‘Questions to Make You Fall in Love‘ in The Guardian
- Nina Martyris, ‘Auden, Rabelais, and “Charlie Hebdo” in The Los Angeles Review of Books
- Zoe Heller, ‘Rape on the Campus‘ in The New York Review of Books
- Amanda Foreman, ‘Why Footbinding Persisted in China for a Millennium‘ in Smithsonian
- Sophie Heawood, ‘A little bit of hatred can take you a long way‘ in The Guardian
- Kat Brown, ‘Depression made me feel ‘appalling — I couldn’t bear my own company’ in The Times
- Catherine Taylor on Elena Ferrante on Open Book
- Suzanne Moore, ‘Eventually, I took a driving test. But Mister Much didn’t think much of my motoring skills‘ in the New Statesman
- Paula McLain, ‘I Was Always, Always Looking for More‘ in Good Housekeeping
- Virginia Woolf on E.M. Forster in Berfrois
- Ijeoma Oluo, ‘I understand why people believe sexual predators before victims. I did‘ in The Guardian
- Sybil Baker, ‘The History of the Wanderer‘ in The Critical Flame
- Lauren Westerfeld, ‘Mother Maps‘ on The Butter
- Ruth Graham, ‘Chandler Bing Is the Worst Thing About Watching Friends in 2015‘ on Slate
- Anne Helen Peterson, ‘The Trouble with “It Girls”‘ on Buzzfeed
- Shelley Harris, ‘Writing a hero from the inside‘ on Isobel Costello’s Literary Sofa
- Shruti Ravindran, ‘A circus of the senses‘ in Aeon
- Sadie Stein, ‘More things in heaven and earth‘ in The Paris Review
- Tracy Borman, ‘Big bad Wolf: Why have we fallen for Thomas Cromwell?‘ on BBC Arts
- Rene Denfeld, ‘The Other Side of Loss‘ on The Manifest-Station
- Soo Na Pak, ‘Woman‘ in The Butter
- Jonathan Gibbs, ‘The Art of the Novella challenge 11: The Awakening‘ on Melville House
- E.B. Bartels, ‘Freedom, My Dear‘ in The Butter
- Evan McMurry, ‘The stunning weirdness of Ayn Rand: Why her newfound popularity makes no sense‘ on Salon
- Susanna Daniel, ‘What took you so long? The quiet hell of 10 years of novel writing‘ on Slate
- Randon Billings Noble, ‘The Heart as a Torn Muscle‘ in Brevity
- Heather Sellers, ‘Fun for Everyone Involved‘ in Brevity
- Jennifer Sinor, ‘One Hundred Days in India‘ in Brevity
- Fleda Brown, ‘Home Bodily Repair Kit‘ in Brevity
- Jenny Boully, ‘I Remain Very Sorry For What I Did to the Little Black Kitten‘ in Brevity
- Sarah Freligh, ‘Lessons of the Body‘ in Brevity
- Anna Journey, ‘For Great-Aunt Jeannette, Who Donated Her Body to Science‘ in Brevity
- Anna B. Sutton, ‘Carolina/Tennessee‘ in Brevity
- Ginny MacDonald, ‘Go, Jim Dandy‘ in Brevity
- Jen Palmares Meadows, ‘Imprint‘ in Brevity
- Lisa Nikolidakis, ‘Landlines‘ in Brevity
- Margo Barnes, ‘Falling‘ in Brevity
- Lessa Cross-Smith, ‘Other Boys & High School Hearts‘ on Real Pants
- Elisa Gabbert, ‘Some Notes on Packing‘ on Real Pants
- Stassa Edwards, ‘From Aesop to doge‘ in Aeon
- Sadie Stein, ‘Common Colds‘ in The Paris Review
- Samantha Lyon, ‘Gender Inequality in the World of Children’s Books‘ on The Inflectionist
- Alex Clark, ‘TV books programmes: if nobody watches them, make better ones‘ in The Guardian
- Jonathan Diaz, ‘Hello, Cruel World: Silvina Ocampo Is Argentina’s Literary Middle Child‘ on Flavorwire
- S.L. Huang, ‘On the Subject of Unlikeable Woman Protagonists‘ on Chuck Wendig’s blog
- Gemma Todd, ‘The Life of a Mobile Librarian‘ on the Picador Blog
- Wiam El-Tamami, ‘Cairo: September 2014‘ in Granta
- Elizabeth Kolbert, ‘Such a Stoic‘ in The New Yorker
- Dan Piepenbring, ‘Speaking Bluntly‘ (A letter from Colette) in The Paris Review
- Jill Dawson ‘The Life You Save May be Your Very Own‘ on Fat Is a Feminist Issue on Platform 505
- Jessica Levine, ‘On Writing About Sex: Is It Necessary‘ on Read Her Like an Open Book
- Lizzy Kremer, ‘The Stories Writers Tell‘ on her blog
- Suzanne Moore, ‘Single parents don’t need anonymous generosity but public respect‘ in The Guardian
- Corrine Duyvis, ‘Why Strong Characters Aren’t All That‘ on For Books’ Sake
- Ann Bauer, ‘“Sponsored” by my husband: Why it’s a problem that writers never talk about where their money comes from‘ on Salon
- Becca Rose, ‘The Third Generation‘ in The Butter
- Lydia Kiesling, ‘I Would Do This for You: The Narrative Possibilities of Leaked Emails‘ on The Millions
- Sarah Hollowell, ‘This is an Essay About a Fat Woman Being Loved and Getting Laid‘ in The Butter
- Margo Rabb, ‘In My Cat’s Death, a Human Comfort‘ in The New York Times
- Antonia Honeywell, ‘The Book That Changed My Life‘ on Novelicious
- Christopher Fowler, ‘Invisible ink no 259: Female short story writers‘ in The Independent
- Nicole Wolverton, ‘Mourning New York: Cari Luna and The Revolution of Every Day‘ on Bloom
- Rachel Aviv, ‘Your Son Is Deceased‘ in The New Yorker
- Vanessa Curtis, ‘On the 30,000 lost Jews of Riga‘ in The Guardian
- Nicolette Jones, ‘The renaissance of Beatrix Potter’s great rival‘ in The Telegraph
- Hermione Lee, ‘Alice Munroe’s Magic‘ in The New York Review of Books
- Helen Oyeyemi, ‘Born Out of Rapt Distraction: On Silvina Ocampo’s “Thus Were Their Faces”‘ on The Millions
- Roxane Gay, ‘Living with my parents in Florida, it’s difficult to feel like an adult‘ in The Guardian
- Samantha Tucker, ‘Kitchen Remodel‘ in Guernica
- Lucy Mangan, ‘There Are No Life Hacks for Love‘ in Stylist
- Claudia Smith, ‘Basic. Bitch‘ in The Butter
- Pallavi Aiyar, ‘The Foreign Correspondent‘ in Granta
- Sara Majka, ‘Cities I’ve Never Lived In‘ in Guernica
- Sara Gerard, ‘On Helen Keller Really Lived and The Wallcreeper:
How Should a Woman Behave?‘ in the Los Angeles Review of Books
- Dana Stevens, ‘Tumbling into the Screen‘ on Slate
- Emily Gould, ‘How Being Pregnant Ruined Shopping For Me‘ on Fast Company
- Vanessa M. Gezari, ‘Why it pays to work the fringes‘ on Lynsey Addario in the Columbia Journalism Review
- Roger Tagholm, ‘Why “Gone Girl?” Why Not “Gone Woman?”‘ on Publishing Perspectives
- Charlotte Higgins, ‘Leonora Carrington: wild at heart‘ in The Guardian
- Beth Miller, ‘There’s a difference in living and living well‘ on her blog
- Joan Didion, ‘on Writing and Revising‘ on The New York Public Library Podcast
- Helen Brocklebank, ‘The Books that Built Samantha Ellis‘ on Mrs Trefusis Takes a Taxi
- Kavita Bhanot, ‘Too Asian, Not Asian Enough‘ on Media Diversified
- Angela Köckritz, ‘They Have Miao‘ on Zeit Online
- Sarah B. Boyle, ‘Reports from the Field: A Textbook Case of Diversity: How Educational Publishing Skims the Surface‘ on VIDA
- Anna Maxymiw, ‘Making Gains‘ in Masionneuve
- Megan Mayhew Bergman, ‘Bring In the Old: The Writer as Collector‘ on Ploughshare
- Maya Jaggi, ‘Literature has Liberated Africa’s Authors‘ in The Financial Times
The interviews:
If you want some fiction/poetry to read:
Or some non-fiction:
The lists:
and Diane Watt is spending February recommending LGBT reads on her Twitter account using the hashtag #mylgbtbooks
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