July 27, 2004

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Not your ordinary Soccer Moms...

    By Jack Grant

Katie has started an "Eowyn Voters League" whose motto is "because those without swords can still die upon them...". Her original post on the concept is here, saying:

You mess with me and the people I love -- I take offense to that. You stand aside and let other people mess with me and the people I love -- I take offense to that too. I'm not a fan of war, I have no great desire to be a warblogger, but it is because I long for peace, true peace, that I choose to fight the war that is upon us. I choose to fight by blogging, I choose to fight by voting, and if I ever find myself in a situation where I have to physically fight for my life or for those around me, I will choose that as well. Terrorists would do well to remember the old adage, "If captured, don't let them give you to the women." Because we will protect ourselves and our families, and it won't be pretty.
I suspect this captures the feelings of many more women than the leaders of either major political party truly understand.

I also find it interesting that the fictional character who best represents these feelings is from Tolkein, who is not generally thought of as writing "complete" female characters. However, Eowyn as presented in the recent The Lord of the Rings movies does seem to capture the moment.

---

Thanks to the King of Fools for the reminder about the Eowyn Voters.

Posted by Jack Grant at 19:34 on 27 July 2004
Comments

As an avid Tolkien reader, my guess would be those who don't think of JRR as writing "complete" female characters missed something. His female characters are not complete in that they do not have the major roles in the narrative or dialogue. However, they do prove to be quite deep whenever they appear, and as they reappear, it is apparant that they are not merely a fascade or part of the set. They are indeed well thought-out and complete in character even if only partially visible.

I'm currently re-reading Orson Scott Card's Ender series and I remarked to my wife that I believe these books will be like the Tolkien books in another 50 years. The character development is similar in that you feel the struggle and the pain and the triumph of the characters. Plus both books deal with themes both local to the story and universal to the human experience.

Posted by: King of Fools at July 27, 2004 07:55 PM



























































































































































































































































































































































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