Why I Write About Subversive Women
“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” — (paraphrase, G.K. Chesterton)
My first novel is set in Jazz Era New York City. My second on board the last, ill-fated flight of the Hindenburg. My third amidst the Russian revolution. My fourth in the maddening haze of WWII. And, my latest, The Frozen River, in late 1700’s America. They are all historical fiction based on real people and events. But that isn’t what they have in common.
I write about subversive women.
Women who conspire. Who escape. Who scheme and undermine. Who fight back. Who tell the truth. I write about women who doggedly pursue justice, at great personal cost. Some of these women have an inspiring, quiet strength. Others are brash and bawdy and take no prisoners. All were nearly lost to history.
It’s not something I set out to do. And it took me years to recognize the trend, much less understand why I keep coming back to these stories of women who defy the systems that oppress them.
The fact is that women have never been passive bystanders to history. It isn’t something that happens apart from us. But take one look at the history section in any bookstore or library, and you will notice how often we are relegated to the footnotes. We become the afterthoughts. The addendums. The belated acknowledgement in a greater tribute to the king (president, husband, general, etc.) Too rarely does the spotlight shine on the fascinating women who were there to witness history unfold.
Oh, but darling, have you even stopped to ask the trophy wife what she’s seen? Are you stunned to learn that the arm candy has a ferocious sense of humor? Or that wallflower charged with the cleaning the toilets? She could end careers. And that’s just my debut novel, The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress.
My job is not just to help the world remember these women, but to care about them.
The fact is, being a woman in the world is dangerous work. For each and every one of us. Getting home safely can require a risk assessment and three forms of self-protection. We all have war stories of our own. Battles that took place in boardrooms or bedrooms. It is the great contradiction of our existence: we bring life into this world, and yet we are perpetually vulnerable.
Every woman learns at an early age that just because you don’t live by the sword doesn’t mean you won’t die by one.
So when I find stories of women who defy the odds, who make it out, who subvert, who prevail, who find justice (poetic or otherwise), I take note. And then I take notes. I build a plot, write it down, and tell her story. I do this for myself and for every woman that I know.
Because yes, the dragons do exist. And they’ve been devouring women from the dawn of time. But if history tells us anything, it’s that they can be beaten. We only need to remember how.
I felt this deeply and love the last paragraph because it encapsulates what us women deal with daily. I walk with bear spray every morning, and I gave a canister of it to my daughter when she left for college. My son, however, did not get one for his freshman year at college because he did not need one. A sad fact of life. I'm hoping by the time my youngest is a freshman at college she won't need one, but I'm not holding my breath. That is only three years away.
May I use this essay to read at bookclub in July? We are doing Frozen River! I’m introducing them to you. I’m hoping to be able to find it here.