All the uproar in the book world this past week has been about Publishers Weekly’s 2009 list of “top 10 best books”, NONE of which were written by women. (Many links are below, but this post is the best-looking one). PW gave this as an explanation:

“We wanted the list to reflect what we thought were the top 10 books of the year with no other consideration. We expect you’ll be surprised: there’s a graphic novel, an adventure story, possibly the next Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, a delicious biography that could bring Cheever back into the literary firmament. We ignored gender and genre and who had the buzz. We gave fair chance to the “big” books of the year, but made them stand on their own two feet. It disturbed us when we were done that our list was all male. There was kicking and screaming for a science fiction title. A literary ghost story came so close, it squeaked. There was almost a cookbook. Our fabulous long list smoothed ruffled feathers, but still we can’t resist one honorable mention: Kevin Wilson’s debut collection, Tunneling to the Center of the Earth (Harper Perennial). With no regrets, we’re ready for “Auld Lang Syne.” —Louisa Ermelino

I am not alone in calling bullshit on the above, which implies that no woman in 2009 wrote deserving enough fiction (the year that the great Alice Munro won the third Man Booker International Prize, let me remind you). Bookninja take up this argument: ” Was there really no amazing novels penned by a female author this year?  Of course not!  It was actually a great year for women authors– Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall took home the Booker, and A. S. Byatt’s latest came out to rave reviews (and was nominated for the Booker) as did Lorrie Moore’s A Gate at the Stairs.  2 of the 5 fiction writers nominated for the National Book Award are women.”

Most of the articles responding to this outrage– yeah, I’m not afraid to call it that–say that PW has the obligation to take ownership of their decision in one of two ways: Either fess up to their belief that men write better books than women or admit their reviewing is gender-biased. But let’s not allow them to hide behind the ‘ol, “This year was an anomaly,” or “We just didn’t read female authors who moved us in the way these male-authored books did.” [My interpretive quotes].

That’s the same excuse widely used in affirmative action cases and what it boils down to is something organizationally systemic; something built into the staff/editors/leadership responsible for these lists; that unconscious, unspoken tendency to have an affinity for that which is familiar and that which affirms our own beliefs. Duh: There’s a big bias towards male writing in literary editorship, and PW has decided to have zero shame about that fact. Here’s a NYT excerpt:

“Cate Marvin, a founder of the group Women in Letters and Literary Arts, told The Guardian, “The absence made me nearly speechless.” She added: “It continues to surprise me that literary editors are so comfortable with their bias toward male writing, despite the great and obvious contributions that women authors make to our contemporary literary culture.””

Salon reminds us this is not a new subject: “What’s at issue isn’t sales or even access to readers; this is an argument about prestige and critical recognition, an argument best articulated by the novelist and critic Francine Prose in a 1998 article for Harper’s magazine…I don’t doubt that P.W.’s editors are entirely sincere when they say their list reflects their unvarnished preferences. Still, the fact that those preferences can’t encompass one woman author among 10 books (fiction or nonfiction) picked from the 50,000-plus titles they claim to have sifted through suggests that their horizons might need a bit of deliberate widening.”

Jezebel gets to the heart of the matter: “When a list like this one draws criticism — and they have in the past — the compilers usually defend it with the argument that “this is just what we like.” But what we like is subject to deeply held and unconscious biases, and when we think we’re being objective, we are often praising what we’re most comfortable with, or what we think is most deserving of praise based on whatever stereotypes we grew up with.”

The Washington Post puts out a call to action: “According to the 2008 U S. Book Consumer Demographics and Buying Behavior Annual Report, women gender buy 65 percent of all books purchased. We buy the vast majority, in particular, of paperbacks, hardbacks, and audio books. So, dominant consumers [and reasonable dudes-who-don't-want-to-just-read-more-dudes-G.K.], let PW know that you would appreciate a more gender-balanced list next time and that you’ve got the dollars to back it up.”

I don’t think anyone reasonable would call for PW to actually change their final list after realizing it was all-male. At that point, they’d already failed. But one one does hope, nay, expect, that the widespread negative response their list provoked will impel them to do an about-face when it come choosing their own tastemakers/editors. Only from the ground up can this kind of change occur. We’re talking systemic change in staff and leadership, and in modes of thinking. Let’s keep our eyes out for next year’s list.

No. 1 Omission From Top 10 Book List: Women [NYT ArtsBeat Blog]
A 10-Best Books List Without Women? [Salon]
Best Books Of 2009 [Publishers Weekly]
The WILLA List Wiki [Official Site]
Is It Time To Stop Listing Best Books? [Jezebel]
Fury After Women Writers Excluded from Books of the Year [Guardian UK]