Top 10 book list shuts out women
Publishers Weekly, which surveys some 50,000 books a year, has announced its first top 10 list.
Interestingly, it includes not a single book written by a woman. (This year, Hilary Mantel’s “Wolf Hall” won the Booker award and several novels by women, including Jayne Anne Phillips’ “Lark and Termite,” are finalists for a National Book Award. In addition, one of the major surprises of the year, the best-selling “The Help,” is Kathryn Stockett’s debut novel.)
Here it is from publishersweekly.com:
The top picks of the year; which include both fiction and nonfiction titles, are: The Age of Wonder by Richard Holmes (Pantheon); Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon (Ballantine); Big Machine by Victor LaValle (Spiegel & Grau); Cheever by Blake Bailey (Knopf); A Fiery Peace in a Cold War by Neil Sheehan (Random); In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin (Norton); Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer (Pantheon); Lost City of Z by David Grann (Doubleday); Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford (Penguin Press); and Stitches by David Small (Norton).
In a few weeks, the Post-Dispatch will run its annual roundup of the best books our reviewers have read.
Do you have any suggestions? What do you think of the PW list?
UPDATE: Apparently I am not the only one to notice the dearth of women. I just saw a Christian Science Monitor item that referred to a Miami Herald posting. For the Herald, Connie Ogle notes:
In a press release, PW halfheartedly tackles this question. “We wanted to pick the best 10 and we came ready to mix it up, and although we were surprised that, when the dust settled, it wasn’t the most politically correct list—there are no women authors, for example—the balance of our top 100 reflects a remarkable diversity,” says Louisa Ermelino, reviews director. PW’s full list comes out Nov. 2.
The full PW list will be 100 books. Ogle notes that PW passed over A.S. Byatt and Margaret Atwood.
The only way to know whether people who pick “best of” lists are biased by author reputation or other facts is to have qualified judges read all the contenders blind - without knowing who wrote them, who published them, etc. Although it’s unlikely to happen, I’d love to know what such an experiment would show.
What was the criteria PW used?
I think the argument being posed here is a non-sequitur. Some things happen by chance, and I really doubt Publishers Weekly uses EEO policies when reviewing books :/ . It seems like some of the staff at the Post are just obsessed with promoting an agenda of affirmative action… it must be fun being a white male job applicant over there!
I agree with Jason. I think Ms. Henderson is looking for something that probably isn’t there. I don’t choose the books I read by the author’s gender. The last 8 books I’ve read have been written by men. The next one on my list is a woman.
If PW had compiled their list to be conscious of diversity, they would have been doing a disservice to those of us who seek the literature needles in the genre, mass-produced haystack.
Oh my gosh. For heaven’s sake. When will people STOP keeping score as to how many women, minorities, gays, muslims, jews or WHATEVER are represented in every flipping area of life?!? Women and men and minorities are well down to road to being excepted as totally equal in this country EXCEPT WHEN they start whining about quotas. Holy crap. Our schools’ English literature classes are incredibly dumbed down because the school boards and curriculum writers have to be sure every single reading list for every single class (even classes supposedly on the classics) contains at least one muslim writer, woman writer, gay writer, transgendered/gender confused writer, black writer, South African oppressed writer, etc… ad nauseum. Try to find serious literature in the classroom of our colleges and high schools. Not happening.
Oh, I forgot to mention… I am a woman.
Grow up, Jane. When women want to be represented equally on the best book lists…. they should write THE BEST BOOKS.
This reminded me all over again why I don’t get the Post Dispatch.
Bibliophile - LOL… Sounds like the reading selection set forth by the English department at SLU! Social justice for all, and they can’t wait until whites, and especially white males, are in the minority in this country. Then how will all these “reverse” discrimination lawsuits be handled? Well, if I was a reader, I’d make sure I check the Post’s preferred book list over Publisher’s Weekly. Not.
Moderated for name-calling.
PW did not say what its criteria was.
Bibliophile, I don’t think you can stereotype curriculums as you have. I can tell you right now that what my own kids are reading in school is “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck and “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Both longtime classics, of course, and I’m delighted that they are reading them. I hear from a lot of kids in middle school and high school and most are reading standards.
Of this list at least two of the authors probably can claim some sort of minority status, if they want.
I just find it interesting that not a single woman’s book is on the list. There are certainly books written by women this year that have made other lists.
But all ‘best of’ lists are affected by the individuals coming up with the picks. It’s good to have a variety of lists, I think.
Unless they specifically excluded women, I don’t see a problem. It just may be that the 10 best books this year were written by men. Next year, it might be all women. Year after that it might be split 6-4. It would be a great disservice to both reader and writer to include a woman just because she is a woman.
“It’s good to have a variety of lists, I think.”
It HAS a good variety. See? Ten different books and everything. I agree with Bibliophile. This obsession with including every gender and race when it comes to lists like this is way out of whack. This silly article is a perfect illustration of that. What are you saying, Publishers Weekly is sexist because of this list?
If you confronted the editors of Publishers Weekly with a sexism claim, they’d throw so many instances of female inclusion at you, your head would spin for a month.
Try not to sweat the small stuff. The Publishers Weekly Top 10 list is, without a doubt, very small stuff.