Kirstine Stewart, vice-president of Twitter, has a new book out about female leadership. (Flare posted an excerpt.) No doubt Stewart has many stories to tell. And I’m always eager to hear the experiences of women, because the female experience is rarely articulated—and females are often not articulated to.
I was lamenting recently that there are many so-called classics I simply can’t read for more than a few pages, even though I’ve tried many times. I won’t name names, but suffice to say they’re all written by males. I love these topics, I thought. Why can’t I just read these already?
Then, as I was perusing Goodreads, I read a review in which a woman stated she couldn’t read Bonhoeffer, because what did he have to say to her, a woman and mother?
And suddenly I understood the problem: The unreadable books don’t address me. They explicitly assume male readership by using sexist language; and they ignore female experience by assuming a certain lifestyle that most women couldn’t possibly pursue because of social (family/caregiving) obligations.
Undeniably, my favourite writers address people, plain and simple.
Good writers know their audiences. But, as Gretchen Rubin is fond of saying, the opposite of a truth is also true. In this case, good writers must also recognize whom they might be alienating, if only to see themselves more authentically. Maybe Rubin would write, “Recognize outsiders to reveal the validity of your message to insiders.”
Any message of truth is a message for all.