Mary's Reflections on American Print Culture

David Leverenz in "Men Writing in the Early Republic" argues that male writers were considered (or considered themselves) effeminate or de-masculated as writers and sought for ways, primarily fatherhood and having children, to rid themselves of the stigma. Often we think of women who chose to be mothers because that was the expected role for their femininity. We look back on history and bemoan their lack of access to education and opportunity. Leverenz indicates, though, that the prominent book writers of the early national period were equal male and female. Opportunity for equality between the sexes was not the issue. What type of opportunity and how this opportunity identified one was the larger issue. Though Leverenz does note the "market-driven aspects" of "authorial anonymity," he argues that authorship was linked symbolically to virility and fertility (352). I'm wondering why, if the word "author" reflected the idea of "one who brings or causes to come forth" was it not considered more masculine in book writing. Was a book more like a child who came forth from the womb? Thus, a man of ideas is a true author. A producer is merely giving birth to a form. These sexual connotations are very confusion, creating questions for me about power in sexuality. There is our cultural narrative that the sperm is active and and egg is passive receiver; yet, when we think about the birthing process, the woman is definitely more active than the male. I'm wondering if these ideas of sexuality were the same in this time period and if it effected the symbolic action of producing literature.

(Just another note to go along with sexuality and metaphors: Leverenz notes that Irving felt a sense of a "lack of manliness because he had not married and established a family" and that he "blamed his wandering imagination" (354). This description makes me think of that idea of the "wandering womb" associated with female hysteria. I wonder if men were afraid of being charged as hysterical because of their imaginative productions.)

It is also interesting that the male writers who did redefine masculinity, redefined it in terms of death and anxiety. Really, the ideas seem rather modern. When I think especially of Frederick Jameson's understanding of postmodernism, particularly in film, I see the same problems of masculinity and the same solutions: "death, depression, defeat, and the prospect of leaving no mark in history" (361). In some ways, while this solution may not appear to be patriarchally oppressive, I believe it has hindered progressive thinking even today, when we think about masculine films such as Fight Club, any Tarrantino film, or even comic books adaptations like Batman. The lone ranger, the depressed, lost man searching for his manhood through violence and death rather than cooperation and community has plagued our society for a long time now. I don't have a lot of time to develop this idea, but it would be interesting to see how this form of "male hysteria" has influenced American culture and has turned women (the original producers of hysteria) into scapegoats for this de-masculinity.