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scribblemynameOn Girls, Fiction, & Self-Esteem
This, of course, makes me think of Raven in X-Men: First Class and then Emma in the same. One doesn't believe she's beautiful. The other believes she is. Which one is infinitely more appealing?
Gaining self-esteem or self-awareness really shouldn't be the benchmark of an awesome character.
Tris in Divergent by Veronica Roth doesn't realize how amazing she is, failing this understanding in small, but consistent ways. Why? It doesn't really add to the character. It just makes her seem a tiny bit dense.
Emma in Emma by Jane Austen does thinks herself special, except when she recognizes a good trait she's lacking, and I love her all the more for it.
Alanna in The Song of the Lioness Quartet by Tamora Pierce has a love/hate relationship with the things that make her special, but she isn't unaware of them. Do I like her less? Heavens, no!
I had never paid attention to this before, but now that it's been pointed out to me, it makes me want to start pulling books off the shelf and figure out how many characters actually have a real handle on their own strengths and weaknesses. It makes me want to avoid this at all costs in my own fiction unless that genuinely belongs to the character.
Rogue really doesn't understand her own potential because she hates the drawbacks so much. The main character in my manuscript, In This Wood, has low self-esteem and learns to get over it. It's okay to make that journey with a female character, but to me, it's not okay to make that journey when it isn't called for.
There’s a trend in young adult fiction now to have a female main character who in some way doesn’t recognize how special she is. It could be that she doesn’t know how beautiful she is, or doesn’t understand her full potential. But this lack of self-esteem is a central part of these characters, and that worries me. Is a girl really only beautiful if she doesn’t know it? Can a girl who doesn’t know how smart she is really be that smart? Do we only appreciate young women who are humble or completely self-aware?~ Elizabeth on Knit Quip
This, of course, makes me think of Raven in X-Men: First Class and then Emma in the same. One doesn't believe she's beautiful. The other believes she is. Which one is infinitely more appealing?
Gaining self-esteem or self-awareness really shouldn't be the benchmark of an awesome character.
Tris in Divergent by Veronica Roth doesn't realize how amazing she is, failing this understanding in small, but consistent ways. Why? It doesn't really add to the character. It just makes her seem a tiny bit dense.
Emma in Emma by Jane Austen does thinks herself special, except when she recognizes a good trait she's lacking, and I love her all the more for it.
Alanna in The Song of the Lioness Quartet by Tamora Pierce has a love/hate relationship with the things that make her special, but she isn't unaware of them. Do I like her less? Heavens, no!
I had never paid attention to this before, but now that it's been pointed out to me, it makes me want to start pulling books off the shelf and figure out how many characters actually have a real handle on their own strengths and weaknesses. It makes me want to avoid this at all costs in my own fiction unless that genuinely belongs to the character.
Rogue really doesn't understand her own potential because she hates the drawbacks so much. The main character in my manuscript, In This Wood, has low self-esteem and learns to get over it. It's okay to make that journey with a female character, but to me, it's not okay to make that journey when it isn't called for.
