Reflections on gender roles in Wheel of Time (till Book 3 – Dragon Reborn)

Reflections on WoT till now (Book 3 – Dragon Reborn)

So I have fallen into the trap again and started another high fantasy series. Sigh.

And now I clearly see my life – stealing moments of time as and when I can to peek into my phone to read series after series of high fantasy, as my TBR list of real, physical, worthy, knowledge-full books piled high up on by bedside table. Sigh. It's so easy to read on the phone, you have ten minutes and you just open your phone…. Not so easy to do with a real book at all. As for what they say about digital reading not sticking in the mind as much as physical reading does, well, what can we do about that, now?

So, here are some of my reflections, mostly about gender roles in the Wheel of Time.

Gender Roles

First of all, the gender roles in WoT are unlike any I have read in any other fantasy. Let me list out the some fantasy books, including some popular books and some new books I read recently, summarize gender roles therein, and then move on to discuss WoT.

Lord of the Rings – The women are not just invisible, but simply non-existent. There are only three women, one of them is the morning star, another is the evening star, and another one defies the expectations of beauty implied in these words by being the brave one. What are their roles? One day the hero feels happy to have dined with the evening star. And the evening star sews a banner. Hehehe. With all due respect to people who sew, we will discuss sewing further with regard to WoT. There are a few other women mentioned, like Sam's wife and the Ents' wives, but they are no more than names. It's an unrealistic world, where the presence of women is glossed over. Sexuality is nil.

Harry Potter – is scattered with powerful, interesting, women. But they are not the heroines. Walks the line between real and wishful. Adolescent sexuality of men and women both is portrayed, so realistic to a point. The heroes and most of the important characters are male though. Like the original feud is between Gryffindor and Slytherin, Rowena and Helga don't have much of a role, Helga is even stereotyped into a soft and gentle personality. It's the same in Harry's generation – the major players are Harry, Voldemort and Dumbledore, all men.

Game of Thrones – There are women. The world is full of women. The women occupy the entire spectrum – from good and innocent to wise to cunning to cruel. The world is realistic in the sense that the women are not given power in the social structure, and are no allowed professional roles. But they do scheme from the sidelines and are real, important players from wherever they stand, using whatever they possess. This is one of the best things about the book, and initially, what attracted me to it. What I praised it for over Lord of the Rings. Sexuality is front right and center. Again, realistic. There is some misogyny – for example the negative portrayal of Shae or the wife of Jonah as woman who loves riches or Lysa Tully who went fat and senseless. But then, on the whole, I was happy that heroines like Dany were not boxed into Madonna/whore categories – Dany is still a heroine despite having multiple lovers and husbands, some of them mistakes.

Dune – women have a worse standing here than in our world, or so it seems, from my cursory reading of the first book. Eg. The hero's mother is merely a concubine and her husband is still free to wed another, and she is supposed to be proud of it. I couldn’t read much of it though, so I am not sure. I am going to leave it out of the analysis.

Shadow and Bone – Women are everywhere and occupy all roles. The heroine is a mapmaker. The world is mildly sexually charged. We see some love and some lust, and some sexual abuse. So in that sense it is realistic. The way women occupy all professions is wishful in a good way.

Witcher – Women are everywhere. They occupy all roles. This is also a sexually charged world. There are sexual encounters, intimacies, and betrayals. Women are still stereotyped – Yennefer is the typical mysterious woman who cuckolds a man and gets away with it because she is beautiful. I have yet to read more of it though. Yet to see how Cirilla develops.

ACOTAR – Women occupy traditional roles. They are still fighting to occupy roles of more power. The heroine, Feyre, is an anomaly with her unusual power. We will see how it develops.

Wheel of Time – The women are everywhere. They occupy all roles – from queens to scholars, warriors to traders. In that sense, it is a dream world. I read Jordan's interview where he said that the world was a 'what if' world, what if the women's liberation had never had to happen, or was so far back in history that it is not relevant anymore? That would be the dream, wouldn’t it? A world where women can be anything they want? Where Egwene can run away from her home simply because she wants to see the world, and her friends take her along?

But then again, even in an equal world like that, I cannot imagine that some sort of restrictions will not be placed on a woman by childbirth and motherhood, some sort of premiums will not be placed on her sexuality. To imagine a world where a woman is never teased, taunted for being a woman, where sexist jokes are never made, a woman never inappropriately touched, threatened, or raped, is kind of impossible for me. This is Jordan's world, where it is completely safe to be a woman, and I cannot decide whether it is joyful or simply naïve, sigh. I do enjoy the dream, though.

Gender Roles in WoT in particular

But then, imagining a completely equal and safe world for women is not the reason the genre dynamics in WoT are unique. It's the fact that Jordan depicts women in their domestic roles without stereotyping them into 'happy goodwives' or completely glossing over the contribution that women make in a regular everyday life. It is the fact that he depicts women as they are, which is so revolutionary, especially considering that this was written 40 year ago when the dominant model of high fantasy was Lord of the Rings, where women are invisible.

Ok, let's start from the beginning. WoT depicts a fantasy world where magic comes from a power called 'The One Power,' which has male and female halves. The male half has been corrupted by the dark one, so only the female half can be used. This leads to a world where there are regular men and women, and then powerful women called the Aes Sedai who can wield magic. The power of Aes Sedai is unusual, in that it is given by nature, and not socially constructed. Still, such a powerful group of conniving women portrayed positively is a surprise.

Among the regular women, we see that women can be anything – there are women scholars, warriors, advisors, healers, queens, illuminators …. You name it, you find it. So even when power is socially constructed, women have it. Just now I encountered Aludra, the chief of the illuminators' guild. Also, there is Elayne, born of Morgase, the daughter-heir, over her stepbrother Gallad. So it is apparent that most of the roles are gender neutral. Here and there, we see women traveling. Peasants, high ladies, tinkers. Women wearing divided skirts for riding. And then there are the Maidens of the Spear, women who taunt warriors to 'dance' and then kill them off like flies, women who outrun horses with easy lopes.

I love how Jordan portrays women as having a hunger that was onl reserved for men in much of literature. Look at how hungry Egwene is, for growth, for experience, for knowledge, glory, everything. Egwene knows it is dangerous to enter the world of dreams, but she still chooses to do it, because she knows she can and she wants to do new things. In that sense, I AM Egwene. If, as a teenager, I could have run away to see the world like Egwene, I would. If, like, Egwene, I was entrusted a ring and told that it is dangerous but I will learn new things from it, I would have hastened to put it on and slept with it every night. I thank Robert Jordan for portraying women as hungry as men.

No Madonnas and no whores

Also, interestingly, women don't have to give up on their femininity to attain any of these other things. In so much of women's portrayals, women have to give up on their femininity to be considered worthy in a man' world. And this is where the Wheel of Time is really special. I sometimes reflect in how toxic Little Women is when it comes to dividing women (I love Little Women and I love Jo, but still) – you are either talented and asexual, or you are feminine and housewife, there are no crossovers, with even the feminine woman judged for enjoying a day of prettiness. I am wondering what would have happened, to me, to my ideas of gender, if, at the age of ten, I had read Wheel of Time instead of Little Women.

Sure, modern fantasies like Hunger Games have taken some strides to make crossovers. I loved that Katniss, being such a badass hunter and one who had hardened her heart due to hunger and poverty, can still find the heart to admire the gorgeous dresses she encounters. That Hermione can still want to shorten her teeth and wear a frilly frock. That Ginny can curl her eyelashes.

But here in WoT, there are no such boundaries, no such Madonna-whore complex that the Little Women immortalized. At all. You can be pretty and feminine and have a boyfriend and be talented, like Egwene, or you can be pretty and uninterested in coquetry and talented, like Moiraine and Nynaeve, you can be pretty and lascivious and talented, like Alanna, you can look anyhow and hate men and be talented, like the Reds, or you can be ugly and talented, like Anaiya. Or you can be asexual and talented, like the Whites or the Browns. And you can be a goodwife and be a respected member of the community, not dismissed as a goodwife. And probably you can be a goodwife and other things, like an illuminator, or a queen, or any other thing allowed in this world, because only the Aes Sedai don't marry, but I am sure women of other professions do.

In an aside, I wouldn't have thought that the relationship of the Reds with men would be so straightforward. Ok, they hunt men who can channel. I was thinking that would give them a more of a perverted attraction to men, maybe even the men they hunt, so something like, sly flings going on by the side. But there has not been anything like that yet, which surprises me. I mean, I sure understand that some women don't want to be with men, but there too, it is not necessary to assume that scholarly women are asexual. Like the whites. Or the browns. Or the grays. That's even more weird. I would expect diplomats like the grays to have fling after fling. Why are only the greens having loves and marriages, I wonder? I would have expected most women to be a varying degree of sexual and some to be asexual, because, if I was to choose between knowledge and men, I wouldn't want to choose. Still, the greens are not reviled for their love of men, which is great. Still, I would expect, at least the reds, to have furtive flings, and not finding them is a disappointment. Although the show made an effort with Liandrin, I am mostly concerned with the books.

Women are equal, and more

But even more than all of these things, what makes WoT truly unique is how women in general are portrayed – as more than men. Here, all women, including queens and scholars, magicians and goodwives, are women first. They treat all men with a kind of disdain – with the assumption that men know nothing. For example, Mat is lying in bed sick, and the women gather around him to minister to him, talking over him and his protests. And Mat feels like, "his mother and sister immediately take ten years off of him as whenever he was sick. These women are the same."

In this world, men and women are in a constant battle with each other. It's the way men and women do things in real life – constant kich kich over the nitty-gritty of daily life. But then, we are so used to hearing the male perspective of it – aimai ko gharelu kich kich. And in the men's stories, it is the men who always win. They just leave this kich kich, put themselves on higher ground, and go. It is refreshing that here, we get to hear what women think of men. And how they disparage men, and men's knowledge of life and the world, in everyday life.

Nynaeve – Just because you carry knives like men doesn't mean you have to think like them. (i.e., be more sensible, woman. Think of things like food and healing and shelter, don't just run around like a useless hero just because you have a knife.)

Moiraine – Men will kill someone for revenge and call it justice. Most men would not have the stomach for true justice. (And just like that, it upends all the previous books and movies which end by killing the villain. Like I always say, that is NOT the solution, not even a tenth of the beginning of it, but will end here because they have no more conception of the world.)

This is the banter of a couple who knows each other very well, but here, the wife is always right. And in that, I am surprised, that a man wrote like this. But then, perhaps, it is only a man who can write like this, who can see things this way, women are too busy being themselves, too busy fighting with men, pretending that what men say has any sense. Women don't have the confidence to say these things. It is only someone who observes, compares, and admires women who can portray them this way. (Jordan did say in an interview that his world was full of strong women who ate up the men. Figures)

And this part, this frank acceptance of witchy, conniving, bossy, women who run the world, is exhilarating. A happy one.

And talking of running the world, let us go back once again to sewing that came up in Lord of the Rings. Women in WoT also sew, but here they sew in addition to everything they do. Egwene decides to divide her skirts for riding, and she does it by sewing. Later, it is the turn of Elayne, and Jordan mentions that the daughter-heir "sews up a fine stich." It is the inclusion of this kind of femininity that I find so exhilarating. The fact that in real life, women know and do everything required to run the world, and they do it over and above the professional things that men do, and that women will always do and be more than men, because men won't do it, because men don't see the necessity of these things and turn up their noses at it, because men cannot be bothered to learn the minutiae. I see the space and sincerity that Jordan gives to women's minutiae, like the stitches in sewing, or the curtains that a goodwife may have in winter versus summer, and it just wins me over.

In a funny way.

Because, when you really pause to look at it, how women are portrayed, it is funny how realistic it is, especially the body language. I remember this particular sentence about Nynaeve, a particularly angry woman who regularly slaps and cuffs people, and it always makes me double up in laughter. So Nynaeve enrolls in a school of magic. But as village wisdom, she has been in a position of authority for a while now, so she finds it hard to be a student. So this happens who she gets a lecture as a novice. "Nynaeve was attempting to appear meek, and succeeding only in looking as if she had a sour stomach."

Here, the women are bossy, impatient, always tapping their foot, liable to call their men louts and eggheads while they take care of them, and still win, still get their way. And even among the women who choose to be homemakers, we see that every town has a separate men's council and women's council, and the women's council don't let anyone interfere with them. Here, too, the women and men quarrel incessantly, and ultimately, what happens is what the woman wants. There are only men who cannot see it, do not accept it, and puff around trying to appear manly and powerful, like Mat, and men who get it and simply get on with it.

I understand that this kind of representation is getting a lot of flak online, and most of the flak is from men, who call the women insufferable, unlikable, manipulative, and what not. Hahahaha. These are the men who don't get it that this is how real life works, and that women are not really likable in real life, and that if you expect women to be sugar and spice and all things nice like they are portrayed in most of literature, I can only laugh. Hhahahaha. I am just going to laugh and add more examples of what I love.

Wishful

Despite this dose of reality, there are places where this world can get unrealistic. This is a truly equal world which doesn't seem to be much GBV. I don’t see any examples of husbands beating wives, or men harassing women for femininity. I don't see women worry about being raped, or their honors taken, or whatever. Women travel alone, fearlessly. Women are captured, and beaten, and enslaved, but I don't see any man come near to touch them. For all the license there is in this world, there is surprisingly little sexual interest flying around. And this may change as the series grows, but this seems to be a world of deliberate whitewashing of sexuality, which means that sexual depravity is not portrayed wither. The world posits an innocence, like the world of HP or LOTR. And that is unrealistic.

Not that a book has to have everything, I never liked the criticism of HP for not encompassing these intense teenage themes. But WoT is an epic fantasy spanning 14 books with a vast amount of world-building, so it follow that the gender dynamics should be comprehensive. I am trying to understand what kind of world it is, and it seems just not realistic that women are never abused for being women. Can it be true? Can there be a world where women are taken at face value, for whatever they want to be, rather than as just their bodies?

At first, this world full of possibilities is exhilarating, I wish I was in this world. It is also sad, because it is not realistic. Some would call me foolish for looking for reality in a high fantasy, but then, I do believe that the closer a book is to reality, the stronger it is.

All of these might change as the series goes along. For now, I am just going to enjoy this world full of possibilities.

Some other things – the WHEEL in the wheel of Time

The book begins with a Hindu idea – that time is circular, and not linear like in Christian thought. But then there is the whole Christian ideology of the last war all over again. And Jordan does manage to ruin the idea of circular time by saying that this time, time will not be circular. If this time the dark one wins, he will win forever. He will fashion the world in his own image. Sigh. I guess the Bible I just too influential, huh. If you must use the Hindu idea of circular time, then use it well. Do not make it linear all over again? But then, I must follow the book through to the end to find out how it ends.