MOM, WE HARDLY KNEW YE

ELLEN SAYS: A week in New York City is heady stuff for a small-town persona like me, but it's worth braving the cold and congestion for the annual meeting and awards celebration of the National Book Critics Circle, which took place Thursday at the New School in Manhattan. You can find the names of the winners on the NBCC site. So I'll offer a few extremely pertinent observations about the winners, instead.

First, the winners were all men. This did not go unnoticed by a certain proportion of the very people who voted to give said winners their awards, specifically a certain number of women on the NBCC's 24-critic board. Not that we begrudged any of the winners their due, but really: What were the odds that we'd go seven out of seven (normally six, but this year two poets split that award). Not to mention that the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing went to Ron Charles (a man, as might be presumed), and the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award to Pen American Center, a worthy organization that fights for writers' freedom around the globe, brought three men to the stage to accept the award.

One possible exception occurred when Natasha  Wimmer, a tall, lanky woman with an improbable crown of curls, loped to the stage to accept the fiction award for Roberto Bolano, author of "2666," because Bolano couldn't be there: He died in 2003. Which is not an incidental point: The critics were divided on what would have become of the sprawling (as in, "where is this going?"), 900-page novel had he lived. Similar thoughts haunt the last work of David Foster Wallace, which is excerpted along with a touching profile in last week's New Yorker magazine. Wallace killed himself -- in part, it seems, over his sense of having failed at the nearly supernatural goals he set for himself with that work. The excerpt suggests room for revision. In both cases, readers are left to wonder what might have been.

But enough sorrow. In looking for small victories regarding this year's NBCC winners and the writerly strengths of our fellow women, I need search no further than the list of finalists to find the evidence. In fiction, Marilynne Robinson and Elizabeth Strout produced novels ("Home" and "Olive Kittredge," respectively) that were real contenders. In biography, few would argue that Annette Gordon-Reed, Paula J. Giddings and Brenda Wineapple produced exemplary work, even if Patrick French won the prize for his authorized biography of V.S. Naipaul.

Meanwhile -- and I doubt if you'll read this anywhere else -- two of the male winners invoked their mothers in accepting their awards. Seth Lerer, who won the criticism prize for his history of children's literature, praised Mom for taking him to the library when he was four. Juan Felipe Herrera, co-winner of the poetry prize, traced his lyrical gifts to his mother singing lullabies to him as a baby.

Women are everywhere, but sometimes -- often times, alas! -- it consists of being the power behind the man. An eternal verity, perhaps?       

Comments

[Sheila Weller]

Hi, Margo and Ellen,
I'm a woman writer (my sixth and most recent book, soon to be in tradeback, was last spring and summer's gratifyingly well received NY Times bestseller Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon -- And the Journey of a Generation --and I'm a magazine senior contributing editor and (award-winning) writer. I just discovered Book Babes -- I'm a new subscriber -- I love your blog and site! I'd love to communicate with you personally, between us, not in just posted comment form. I would love it if you could send me an e-mail address or two. Lots of mutual interest to chat about.
Thanks, thanks!
Sheila Weller
www.girlslikeusthebook.com

[alex boies]

Good morning Margo and Ellen -
I too am a new subscriber. Abram's has just published my new book: Itty Bitty Kitty Ditties which I am very excited about. It's a very cute little alphabet cat book meant for adults but kids seem to like it too. The website: kittyditties.com which shows a little action. If you get a chance, please check it out and let me know what you think. I'd love ANY feedback.
Have a wonderful week!
My best, alex boies

[Betsy]

There was a really interesting article in Salon.com about women writing the Great American Novel. http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=71383245015&h=-hIi4&u=9ewgF
It speaks about the very issues you mention above.