Herbwife & Healer & Fantasy, part III
Nov. 29th, 2006 04:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bunnyjadwigaSo, where did this stereotypical fantasy herbwife/healer/midwife/witch come from?
She makes her appearance in the early 1970s. There's a number of factors going on here:
1. The rise of feminism, which comes into it in several ways. There's the development of fantasy, and the development of female roles, at the same time.
2. The rise of women's interest in and participation in the fantasy reader and writership. About 35 years ago, there was a surge in women reading and writing fantasy. The tradition of women in fantasy goes back further than that, but up to about 15 years ago, the major female fantasy/sf writers could be traced by a literary geneaology back to that Grand Dame of FSF, Andre Norton. The surge of fanfic, particularly by women, also dates to that era.
Early on, there was a surge in fantasy fiction role models of the type I think of as the Artemis, running-jumping-whacking-people kind. (Artemis was a major cult figure for the early women's movement: young, athletic, free-legged and free-loving, hanging out with Daddy and doing boy stuff, unencumbered by children, house, women's work, etc.) But there were some women and girls (I think it may be called third-wave feminists) who didn't feel able to identify with this picture. These Bagginses ("We have no use for adventures here, Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!"), among which I count myself, wanted someone to identify with, someone who might actually wear a skirt and not disdain nuturing, caring activities.
An example of this non-non-traditional heroine would be Maggie Brown, of Elizabeth Scarborough's Song of Sorcery and later books. Maggie isn't an herbalist, though her grandmother is; but what she is, is a hearthwitch of the most extreme kind; her magic can do all kinds of housewifely tasks, but to raise a cyclone, for example, she needs to tell it she wishes to whip a VERY large quantity of eggs, "right there." When I first encountered her as a teen, I was enraptured. Here was someone I could identify with.
She makes her appearance in the early 1970s. There's a number of factors going on here:
1. The rise of feminism, which comes into it in several ways. There's the development of fantasy, and the development of female roles, at the same time.
2. The rise of women's interest in and participation in the fantasy reader and writership. About 35 years ago, there was a surge in women reading and writing fantasy. The tradition of women in fantasy goes back further than that, but up to about 15 years ago, the major female fantasy/sf writers could be traced by a literary geneaology back to that Grand Dame of FSF, Andre Norton. The surge of fanfic, particularly by women, also dates to that era.
Early on, there was a surge in fantasy fiction role models of the type I think of as the Artemis, running-jumping-whacking-people kind. (Artemis was a major cult figure for the early women's movement: young, athletic, free-legged and free-loving, hanging out with Daddy and doing boy stuff, unencumbered by children, house, women's work, etc.) But there were some women and girls (I think it may be called third-wave feminists) who didn't feel able to identify with this picture. These Bagginses ("We have no use for adventures here, Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!"), among which I count myself, wanted someone to identify with, someone who might actually wear a skirt and not disdain nuturing, caring activities.
An example of this non-non-traditional heroine would be Maggie Brown, of Elizabeth Scarborough's Song of Sorcery and later books. Maggie isn't an herbalist, though her grandmother is; but what she is, is a hearthwitch of the most extreme kind; her magic can do all kinds of housewifely tasks, but to raise a cyclone, for example, she needs to tell it she wishes to whip a VERY large quantity of eggs, "right there." When I first encountered her as a teen, I was enraptured. Here was someone I could identify with.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-11-30 03:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-28 04:08 am (UTC)My personal bias is toward the Demeter / Athena /Hestia range of goddesses... hm...
no subject
Date: 2007-02-11 08:11 pm (UTC)You know, I was very surprised to see how warriorly depictions of Athena in Greece were. Though I "knew about" the art from when I was small, because the Athena inside my head, to whom I'd poured libations, was not very focused on that at all, I just didn't think about that aspect of her! And I'm still chewing on it.