Love, Passion, Crossed Stars, Controversy, etc.

As I posted on 7/20/10, I liked Emma Donoghue's "The Sealed Letter" very much. I have now read two more of her books: "Touchy Subjects: Stories" (Harcourt, 2006) and "Landing: A Novel" (Harcourt, 2007). "Touchy Subjects" lives up to its title, covering all sorts of sensitive topics in diverting ways. "Landing" tells the story of two women -- one a flight attendant from Ireland and the other a librarian from a small town in Ontario, Canada -- who meet on a plane under unusual circumstances and fall madly in love. They write, call, e-mail, and visit as often as possible, but the big question is how they can continue their romance living so far apart. They are both very happy and very miserable in their long-distance relationship. The ending is somewhat predictable, but satisfying. The plot sounds a bit corny, but the writing is so literate and the characters so winning that I didn't mind. As a bonus, readers learn a lot about the two locales, aided by many (but not TOO many) historical and literary references; there are also several entertaining peripheral characters.

Is It the Author or the Book?

Yesterday at the library, a friendly-looking woman saw me checking out a novel by Jennifer Weiner. She enthusiastically pointed at the book and said, "Oh, I LOVE her!" I naturally asked, "So this book is good?" She replied, "Oh, I haven't read anything she's written, but I saw her on the 'Today' show and she was fantastic!" I of course nodded and said something innocuous like "Great!" But I went away wondering about admiring authors as personalities without actually reading their books, or apparently even planning to. (The woman hadn't even said something like, "Now I want to read her books," or "I'm planning to read her new book as soon as I have time.") It was as if seeing and hearing the author, especially on TV, where she was framed as a sort of celebrity, was enough. Obviously there is nothing essentially "wrong" with this. And in the interests of supporting and preserving authors and publishers and good literature, it could be argued that any exposure of authors is good for the overall cause. But this concept of "loving" the author without reading her work seemed odd and a bit sad to me.

"The Pleasing Hour"

After my ambivalent review on 7/23/10 of "The English Teacher," by Lily King, you may be surprised that I then read the same author's "The Pleasing Hour" (Grove, 1999). Despite my ambivalence, I was impressed enough with King's writing, as well as with good reviews and a listing as "A New York Times Notable Book of the Year," to read her earlier novel, "The Pleasing Hour." I enjoyed the book, and was reminded of King's talent at creating intriguing, if usually somewhat damaged, characters. She is also very good at showing very viscerally the deep, inescapable influence, whether acknowledged or not, that one's family of origin has on one's life. Relatedly, King's characters often have lost a family member, frequently a mother, young. In this novel, a young American woman, Rosie, who has gotten pregnant in order to give her infertile sister a child, then in sorrow needs to get far away from her sister and the child. She goes to Paris as a nanny, and becomes entangled in the life of the family she works for. The mother in that family, Nicole, is beautiful and seemingly impossible to know much about, but it turns out she has her own sad tale of childhood loss. Gradually their two stories come together. Although the two main characters, as well as the father of the family, Marc, are sometimes less than admirable and sometimes less than likable, King makes us understand and feel empathy for all of them as creatures of their upbringings and circumstances. The stories of the three very individual children of the family, Rosie's charges, are also compelling.

"Red Hook Road"

"Red Hook Road" (Doubleday, 2010) is a wonderful new novel by Ayelet Waldman. Yes, the same Ayelet Waldman who wrote "Bad Mother," which I posted about on 7/18/10; Waldman, also the author of a mystery series, is a very versatile writer. "Red Hook Road" begins with a tragedy: a young couple is killed in an automobile accident just an hour after their wedding in a small town in Maine. The rest of the novel tells the stories of the survivors: the families of the bride and groom, who have had an uneasy relationship in the past, and now struggle to find a way to co-exist, and to keep going. Waldman has a gift for portraying her complex, interesting, and often surprising characters. The mother of the bride and the mother of the groom are perhaps the most interesting, but the bride's sister and the groom's brother are also compelling, as they make major decisions about their lives, and gradually find some solace in each other. The bride's grandfather, an aging world-famous violinist, has his own story, and is a figure of dignity and hope. Another emblem of hope for the future is a young girl, an adopted cousin on the groom's side, who proves to have great musical talent, a talent which is nurtured by the bride's grandfather and mother. By the end of the book, several years after the terrible accident, events bring more loss but also hard-won reconciliation, peace, and even joy to the survivors. This novel is an example, to me, of a classic great novel: well-portrayed and varied characters that readers will care about, a compelling story including some side stories, a real sense of place, wonderful details, realism, reflections on social class and other issues, love, loss, hope, and more. Highly recommended.

2452 Pages of Literature by Women

I write in praise of “The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women: The Tradition in English” (Norton), edited by Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar. I bought, dipped into, marveled at, enjoyed, and then taught from the first edition (1985) and second edition (1996); it is now in its third edition (2007). It is hard to remember now what a thrilling breakthrough it was for women (and men!) readers to have new access to so many women writers starting in the 1970s, and then to have this magnificent collection of those writers' works all in one place. Granted it is incomplete: no book can cover all the great women writers, and choices had to be made about which of each writer's works to include. The book is bulky, the pages are tissue thin, and the print is small, but all in service of cramming more writers (almost 200) into those 2452 pages! And granted the collection is limited to literature in English, but it is very diverse geographically and ethnically, and it is a glorious precedent for other collections that have been published since, including those of literature in other languages or translated from other languages. Whose work do we find in the Norton Anthology? Everyone from Margery Kempe in the Middle Ages through many living writers such as Jamaica Kincaid and Eavan Boland. There are stories, poems, plays, and even a few whole novels, including (in my battered 2nd edition) "Jane Eyre," "The Awakening," and "Sula." The book also includes good introductory material for each time period, and useful informational headnotes as well as "selected bibliographies" for each author. This book is a wonderful addition for anyone's bookshelf!

How I Decide What to Read

People sometimes ask me how I decide what to read; here are some answers. Sometimes friends tell me about a book they loved, and/or think I will enjoy. I often browse in bookstores and libraries. I always watch out for new books by my favorite authors. However, the most common way I learn about new books, and choose what to read, is by reading many book reviews in many publications. For example, I subscribe to The San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, New York, San Francisco, The Atlantic, The Nation, The Progressive, Ms., Threepenny Review, The Women's Review of Books, and Vanity Fair, all of which publish book reviews. I also get publications from some local bookstores, notably Book Passage and Books, Inc., with suggestions of recommended new books. If I see a review of a book that looks as if I would like it, I immediately jot the title down and, most often, request it at my local library. Or if it looks like a must-have/must-keep book, I go to a local independent bookstore and buy it. If a book looks as if it could be interesting, but I am feeling ambivalent about it, I often wait to run across another review, or look up reviews online, before I decide if I want to read it. In other words, I always have my antennae up, looking for great new titles to read!

"The Mechanics of Falling"

Bursting with unique and yet somehow very recognizable characters, "The Mechanics of Falling and other stories" (West Word Fiction, 2009), by Catherine Brady, is a wonderful collection of engrossing short stories. Most of the stories are set in or near my "home town," San Francisco, which is always an added pleasure for me. Two words kept occurring to me while reading this collection. One was "dense": the stories are intense and full, with no wasted words. The other was "uncoiling": each story gradually - or sometimes suddenly - uncoiled itself into a revelation, a new understanding. Highly recommended. And I am proud to say that the author teaches at the same university I do.

On another note: It has been exactly six months today since I started this blog. I have been very much enjoying writing it, and hope to continue for some time to come. Thank you, Mary, for suggesting it. And thank you, all of you who have been reading it, either occasionally or regularly. Additional thanks to those who have commented, either on the blog site or in emails to me (vandricks@usfca.edu). If you like the blog, please keep reading, and please tell your friends, family, and reading group members about it.

Too Painful to Read? Your Call...

"The English Teacher" (Atlantic Monthly Press, 2005), by Lily King, is a novel about some very painful events, starting with the revelation of a traumatic event and continuing with the destructive effects that last for years after. The author bravely gives us a not-very-likable main character, Vida, and when we understand why she is the way she is, we (or at least I!) feel very sorry for her but still have trouble connecting with her. This paradox may be why I alternately raced ahead with the book and then stopped dead, resisting reading further, and then gradually became re-engaged with the story. Several of the other characters are very sympathetic, particularly the other main character, Vida's teenaged son Peter; the author's portrayal of Peter's feelings and experiences is extraordinarily astute. This is also a compelling and at times touching story of the attempted melding of two families when Vida marries a man with three children. In summary, the story is painful but rewarding, so I can't simply recommend it without reservations; I can say, however, that it ends on a hopeful note.

Ode to Alice Munro

I know I have mentioned my admiration of Alice Munro before, but having just finished listening to one of her short story collections on CD -- "The Love of a Good Woman" (BBC Audiobooks America, 1999) -- motivates me to devote a post to her. I have read almost all of the work of this Canadian author who is an accomplished novelist but is best-known for her short stories. This particular collection includes stories set in Vancouver, where Munro spent some of her earlier years, and those set in rural Ontario, where Munro has lived for many years and where most of her stories are set. All Munro's stories are very character-focused, and the characters they focus on are what we might call "ordinary," not being urban, flashy, or particularly "successful" (no Manhattanesque young professional types!). For just a couple of examples from "The Love of a Good Woman": a mean, trapped-by-gender-expectations small-town landlady; a young, pregnant musician whose husband has died in the war and who lives with his judgmental sisters. The stories usually start with seemingly ordinary, everyday scenes and matters, but as they unfold, they surprise readers, sneaking up on us and without fanfare revealing events and issues that are far bigger. A word I think of when reading Munro is "fresh," because each story is original and usually surprising, not in the cliched O. Henry surprise-ending way, but in the way of making readers see life and people afresh. Munro is not afraid to show us the "underbelly" of "ordinary" people's lives; in fact, often her stories contain a sense of unease; some even produce a slight touch of the ominous. Yet the overall feeling of her stories is neither negative or positive about life, just very real. Yet all of this is done without showy writing or pyrotechnics; in fact, her stories are often deceptively simple. I wish I had adequate words to convey the richness of Munro's writing and the rewards of reading her work; I can't do her work full justice here, so I can only urge you to find and read one of her short story collections: I suggest beginning with "Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage" (2001), "Runaway" (2004), or "Too Much Happiness" (2009).

"The Lovers"

Yvonne confronts loss, but also reflects on love, dissects love, experiences love, is pained by love, is let down by love, doubts love, is reassured by love, is supported by love, is pierced by love, and is surrounded by love: love from the past, love in the present, marital love, family love, love of new acquaintances, love of children, love of nature. The book is "The Lovers" ((HarperCollins, 2010), by the San Francisco writer Vendela Vida. Yvonne's reflections and experiences take place in the faraway country of Turkey, where as an American widow she has gone to remember her late husband and their honeymoon there almost thirty years before. In her rented house at the beach and in surrounding areas, her reflections are complicated by worries about her adult children, as well as by the various characters she encounters, influences, and is influenced by, with results varying from loving connections to great loss. Confused and overwhelmed by events past and present and by her own feelings, Yvonne is finally buoyed up by the love of her family and by her own inner strength. As I write this, I realize it sounds as if this novel is a sentimental, "inspiring," "I will survive" sort of book. But "The Lovers" is much more complex, more original than that. The story is both very specific in its details and universal in its portrayal of grief and love. Recommended.

Sex, Intrigue, and Women's Lives in 19th Century England

My new friend T. highly recommended "The Sealed Letter" (Harcourt, 2008), by Emma Donoghue. I am not a huge reader of historical fiction, but after starting this novel and then not being able to put it down until I finished it, I completely agree with her recommendation. Set in 1864 in London, the novel is loosely based on a true case of a notorious sexual scandal and divorce at a time when divorce was extremely rare. The novel portrays the limited lives and rights of women at the time, and the rigid constraints on their behavior -- the main "theme"; in addition, it portrays the small community of women working for women's rights, the psychologically complex interlocking lives of the four main characters (including one very manipulative character in a beautiful guise), the insidious influences of evil on innocence, the sexual mores of the time, and the intricate British legal system. But beyond being "about" the topics above, this is a gripping, suspenseful novel with surprises around every corner, up to the very end of the novel. "The Sealed Letter" is very well-written, by an author in complete command of her material.

"Bad Mother"

Berkeley writer Ayelet Waldman (whom I once briefly met at a bookstore event) believes in honesty, even when it draws harsh criticism from the public. She is famous (notorious?) for an essay in which she stated that she loves her husband, writer Michael Chabon, more than she loves her children; many people vociferously disapproved, and made sure to let her know of their disapproval. This experience, although painful to her, did not stop her from writing equally honestly and openly in "Bad Mother: A Chronicle of Maternal Crimes, Minor Calamities, and Occasional Moments of Grace" (Doubleday, 2009). She writes about motherhood, sex, marriage, co-parenting, abortion, being bipolar, work (she is a Harvard-trained lawyer who stopped practicing), being a stay-at-home mom, being a writer, the pressures that so many women face in trying to balance work and parenting, both appreciating and throwing up her hands at the exacting and unrealistic standards promulgated by "Berkeley mothers," hopes for her children, and more. Most mothers want and need to feel they are excellent in that role; it takes a lot of courage to admit publicly that although she dearly loves her children, she is not a perfect mother, and further, to detail the ways in which she is not. I should note that it is clear that overall she is doing fine, and that her children, despite some bumps in the road, are doing more than fine. This book is brave, candid, humorous, and even inspiring. It is also very readable.

Beautiful if Eccentric

I initially picked up "The Bird Catcher" (St. Martin's, 2009), a novel by Laura Jacobs, because the reviews made it sound clever and stylish, and because it was set in Manhattan (regular readers of this blog will know of my affinity for that setting). It did not disappoint. The main character, Margret Snow, is certainly intelligent and interesting, as is her older professor husband; she is a dropout from her doctoral program at Columbia, now a windows artist for upscale department stores. The Manhattan setting does not disappoint: there are many admirably non-cliched scenes involving art, literature, music, fashion, dinner parties and other pleasures of Manhattan life. Jacobs also conveys the feeling of different parts of Manhattan very well, with very specific descriptions of walks and taxi rides through various neighborhoods and parks. The aspect that makes this novel stand out is foretold in the title: the main character is a bird watcher, a bird catcher, a bird artist, and finally, a bird taxidermist. This last item is the strangest one, and the detailed scenes in which Margret learns to stuff tiny birds and use them in her unique and beautiful art pieces -- pieces which provide a way to channel her pain and healing after a tragedy in her life -- are both repellent and fascinating. The author's strength is that she makes readers understand Margret's passionate love of birds and of these bird-related activities. Jacobs writes beautifully, even lyrically. The specificity of her writing is a pleasure, as are the convincing characters and the long, intelligent conversations she portrays. I highly recommend this novel.

Thank You, Translators

Translators are unsung heroes and heroines. I shudder to think of all the incredible writing I would have missed - an immeasurable loss - if there were no translators: the works of Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Flaubert, Colette, Camus, De Beauvoir, Proust, Dante, Mann, Lady Murasaki, Neruda, Tagore, and so many more, including the many, many translated older and contemporary novels, stories, and poems that I have read by authors from Africa, Asia, South America, and Europe. Some say "It's not the same as in the original language." Of course it's not the same, but the distance between "not the same" and "not at all" is vast! So thank you very much, translators! We owe you a great debt.

A Tribute to Carolyn Heilbrun

I recently read Carolyn G. Heilbrun's "The Last Gift of Time: Life Beyond Sixty" (Ballantine, 1997), but I have found myself hesitating to write about the book, and about the author, for fear of not being able to do justice to this wise feminist scholar and heroine. But I must try, because she is someone I admire tremendously; she wrote brilliantly about literature and about women, and was a pioneer in so many ways. This particular book is full of clear-eyed, honest wisdom about getting older, covering topics like long marriages, young friends, dogs, email, England, family, sadness, losses and gains. All of her books have been gifts to readers, especially women readers: scholarly but accessible, brilliant, fierce, feminist, humane, and informed by her deep knowledge of, and great love of, literature. So many of her books -- including "Toward a Recognition of Androgyny," "Reinventing Womanhood," "Writing a Woman's Life," and "Hamlet's Mother and Other Women," have been groundbreaking. And on top of writing these wonderful scholarly works, she wrote a series of entertaining, pointedly feminist mysteries under the pseudonym of Amanda Cross. She was one of the first women faculty in the Columbia University English Department, and she had to fight to be recognized there. After a long career and, eventually, great success there, she resigned in protest of the sexist treatment of other women faculty there. She also had a long marriage and raised three children. I was fortunate enough to hear her speak once, perhaps 25 years ago, and was in awe of her intellect, her originality, and her great focus on the fight for equity for women. I -- along with many other admirers -- was so sad when she died a few years ago, but the legacy of this strong and brilliant woman will live on for a long time. Thank you, Carolyn Heilbrun, for the joys of reading your amazing work, and for being such a brave and inspiring writer and woman.

True Confession: StephanieVandrickReads...Chick Lit!

Most of the books that I read, and that I post on here, are "literary." But it's summer, and sometimes what a girl (even an - ahem - mature girl) wants, what a girl needs is -- chick lit! I don't seem to be getting to many beaches lately, but once in a while on sunny summer days I crave a good "beach read." And so I just read "Beachcombers" (Ballantine, 2010), by Nancy Thayer. The title couldn't be a more blatant appeal to summer readers of chick lit/beach reads, but it worked for me. Ingredients: three young adult sisters spending the summer at their childhood home on Nantucket; much angst about life, sibling relationships, past and present disappointments, broken romances. But - surprise ! - new romances with handsome, sexy, attentive men appear like magic within a couple of chapters! Romances with ups and downs, sure, but that's part of the formula. Who could resist? Did I say formula? Yes, this book is pretty formulaic -- but in a good way, when one is in the mood for it. It is undemanding and goes down very easy. Fortunately, Thayer's writing is a slight cut above the usual beach read's, so there is only a little cringing involved on the reader's part.

Where Have All the Years Gone?

On 7/6/10, I wrote positively about Joan Frank's book "In Envy Country." I have now read two more of her books (they are short!): "Boys Keep Being Born: Stories" (University of Missouri Press, 2001) and "The Great Far Away" (The Permanent Press, 2007) (a novel which I will refer to here as GFA), and liked both of them very much as well. These two books, and especially GFA, focus on Baby Boomers who started their adult lives in the 70s, sure that their "alternative" lives would be different than those of their parents. They were going to avoid the "Straight Life," because "They were meant for better things, they knew" (GFA, p. 15). The novel takes place in a small town in Northern California, where a "tribe" of young people gathers, enjoying their freedom, their music, their weed, their relationships, and their heady sense of living their lives in a purer way than their forebears. Naturally, as they mature and gain families, more traditional and better-paying jobs, and houses with attendant mortgages, and as they experience sad losses and disillusioning betrayals, they find that life is more complicated than they expected. In addition, the town itself becomes bigger, more overrun by houses and chain stores, and more a part of the larger world. The tone of the novel is elegiac and a bit wistful, as it harks back to a time when life was simpler for these characters and for their town. These Boomer ex-hippies (for want of a better label) wonder where the time has gone, and can't quite believe they - and their contemporaries and their enchanted worlds - have gotten so much older and changed so much. Being a member of this generation myself, I can relate. And I suddenly had a flash of the Who's iconic 1965 song "Talkin' 'bout my Generation"....

"The Big House"

My friend Mary recommended a wonderful book I have just finished reading: "The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home" (Scribner, 2003), by George Howe Colt. Thank you, Mary! The book is bursting with so many ideas, so much lovely description, and so much feeling that a paragraph on this blog can't possibly do justice to it. Although I am a very happy longtime resident of the West Coast, I have always been fascinated with the East Coast, especially New England, and the very words "Cape Cod" elicit all sorts of images and feelings. So I couldn't help but be enchanted by this depiction of a family's long history of several generations' spending summers at a huge, ramshackle, delightful old house on Cape Cod, eating meals around the big table, swimming, fishing, sailing, playing tennis, drinking, and talking, in the midst of old furniture, photos and family memories. The author is also realistic in acknowledging family problems, illnesses, and estrangements over the years. But the predominant impressions are of family, love, tradition, and continuity. The issue of social class privilege hovers over the book as well; the author deals with it head on, and the truth regarding this issue is more complicated than one might think. My very favorite part of the book, as Mary predicted, was the evocative description of the thousands of books scattered throughout the house, accumulated over decades, and of the pleasures of curling up and reading in various rooms in the house. If you can get access to a copy of this book, and if you read nothing else, do read pages 230-236, all about books and reading in the Big House.

Romantic Memories and Current Reading

I have written about associating certain books with certain times or places in our lives. Do we also associate certain authors or literary works with certain people we were close to, perhaps especially with romantic attachments? A friend -- whom I will call "Z" -- tells me (in response to one of my blog posts) of the effects of a youthful romance on his appreciation of a certain author. His romance with a sophisticated older woman -- let's call her Y -- in a glamorous city -- let's call it NYC -- included a mutual devotion to a certain young, well-known, understatedly hip author. Z and his lady love Y even met this author -- let's call her A -- at a reading. Now, some 20 years later, when Z lives another life in another city with another woman, he no longer reads A's work, and tells me that this is partly because in his mind A is too much associated with memories of his romance with Y. I find Z's story intriguing, and try to remember if there were a similar situation in my life. I rack my brain, hoping for an equally glamorous memory, but -- nothing! Before my long marriage began, I had the requisite romances, and I like to think that some of them were glamorous, intellectual and literary, but somehow my stories don't measure up to Z's in this regard. Sigh. (I did, however, just now have a moment of feeling a bit Carrie Bradshaw-esque, tapping away on my laptop about sophisticated romance in the big city...I can almost hear the voice-over...we get our glamour where we can....)

"In Envy Country: Stories"

I had read Joan Frank's book reviews in my local paper, The San Francisco Chronicle, but only a few days ago did I pick up and read one of her own books, "In Envy Country: Stories" (University of Notre Dame Press, 2010). Although Frank doesn't directly say so, many of the stories take place in and near San Francisco, with side trips to Europe. So the familiar names and locales were part of the pleasure for me, but the appeal of the book was so much more. The stories are very much about the characters, and the characters are very familiar, sometimes painfully familiar. Who hasn't met the self-made boss who everyone has to pretend is clever, or the self-righteous, arrogant colleague who can't let any grudge go? Who hasn't had beautiful friends that came to a bad end? Who doesn't have married friends who fight too much? Who doesn't sometimes become frustrated or disillusioned with a family member one simultaneously desperately loves? Who doesn't have friends who show off? Or old loves from the past that show up at inopportune times? Although these situations are familiar, as are the marriages and families Frank portrays, they are also unique and original in Frank's hands. I can promise you that you will not be bored by this collection of observant, touching, wry, realistic, and sometimes wrenching stories.

Do We Really Want to Know?

Literary scholars and readers disagree about whether we should consider authors' biographies when we judge their books. Some say yes, that knowing about their lives enriches our understanding of their books. Others say no, the books stand alone. What about you? Do you like to know a lot about authors before you read their books? Are you disappointed when the author blurb at the back of a book is too short and unrevealing? Do you like to see an author photo on the inside of the back book cover? After you find favorite authors, do you read up on them and their lives? Do you attend author lectures and readings? Watch their appearances on TV? Speculate about whether or not their stories have autobiographical roots? Do you like literary gossip? Or does all of this seem irrelevant and uninteresting to you? Do you even purposely avoid learning too much about authors, in case that knowledge negatively affects your appreciation of their books? We readers are all different in this regard. Personally, I enjoy learning about authors' lives, and I will confess to an interest in "gossip" about them. I admire writers -- especially writers of fiction -- immensely, yet find it reassuring to learn of evidence that they are not perfect beings but are instead very human and fallible. I am not consistent, though; if I learn something really terrible about an author, I find it hard to put it out of my mind and continue reading and enjoying his or her books.

"I Was Told There'd Be Cake: Essays"

Sloane Crosley has been compared to Dorothy Parker, David Sedaris, and Sarah Vowell; I think these are overstatements, especially regarding the first two (I don't particularly enjoy Vowell's work). In her first book, "I Was Told There'd Be Cake: Essays" (Riverhead, 2008), now in paperback, Crosley tells mostly humorous, somewhat sarcastic, somewhat painful, mostly entertaining stories of her life. Some take place in her childhood and teenage years, but most are set in her twenties and early thirties in Manhattan. My daughter, who is in her mid-20s and lived and worked in Manhattan for a couple of years (actually only three blocks from where Crosley lived) found the stories intermittently insightful and funny, but overall not funny and engaging enough. I just finished reading the book, a very quick read, and agree with my daughter's appraisal.

Well-drawn Female Characters by Male Authors

Some people believe it is hard, perhaps even impossible, to portray believable characters of the opposite sex. Others assert that the talent of good authors allows them to transcend the limitations of their own identities and experiences, and that their imaginations provide the material to portray characters who do not share the author's gender, race, class, age, or other identities. To be more concrete, I have been thinking about which female characters by well-known male authors are realistic and truly convincing. Even after some pondering, a quick consultation with my bookshelves and with the Internet, and a little conversation with and help from my friend B., I could only think of the following outstanding examples: Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Thackeray's Becky Sharp (in "Vanity Fair"), Flaubert's Madame Bovary, Henry James' Isabel Archer (in "Portrait of a Lady"), and Forster's Margaret Schlegel (in "Howards End"). Readers, do you have other examples?