Women Writers

We have only read two women writers so far: Barbara Kingsolver for The Bean Trees and now Edith Wharton with Ethan Frome. Are women writers any different from men? Do they choose different topics? Do they have different writing styles? Do you prefer to read stories by men or women? Does it matter if a book is by a man or a woman?

For a lot of these I'll give the same answer: It all depends on the time and place the woman was writing the book. For example someone writing in the 1800s would write something completely different from someone on the 1900s. Why would it matter if a book is by a man or woman? That's a weird question.

Five Facts: Edith Wharton

* The saying "Keeping up with the Joneses" is said to refer to the family of her father.

* Wrote at least 85 short stories, and was also a highly regarded landscape architect, interior designer, and taste-maker of her time.

* First woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 1921.

* The Beinecke Library at Yale University houses the Edith Wharton collection, which has some 50,000 items, consisting of letters, manuscripts, photographs, and miscellaneous personal items of hers. (Creeeeeepy.)

* Wharton continued writing until her death.

Seattle 1999

What is the WTO? In the movie This is What Democracy Looks Like, what are they protesting about the WTO?

The WTO is the World Trade Organization. They're protesting about bad working conditions and low wages that the workers are getting. Blah, blah, blah. David Bowie, David Bowie, David Bowie.

Yeah.