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Escalation of Romance Novel Heroines
I’ve been reading Kamble (NOT recommending this book! Altho I actually am pretty sure that the author is a really intelligent, really good human being, who is capable in many ways, and that this book was probably pretty difficult to make happen in any form, and none of what I am saying here should be construed as in any way negative about the author), in particular, the chapter about the trajectory of gay rights in culture and reading romance novels against that backdrop. This is a chapter where the relevance of the Marxist critique is comparatively low (vs. the first chapter, on the economic status of the hero and heroine, or even the second chapter, which was about warrior/soldier/spy heroes and was a critique of imperialism), and the chapter (so far — I’m not done with it) is largely a close reading of some romances that I mostly feel like could be read better as part of a general exploration of Orientalism in popular romance fiction, and how those themes evolved over time. I feel like that line of thinking would have more power to explain some of the weird dynamics between the hero, heroine, and the hero’s wife (!!!), but could also fold back to show how women participated in imperialism, not just men.
Anyway. That’s all largely irrelevant, however, to what I’ve been trying to figure out for days now (look I’m not backing away from the above line of thinking — it forcibly sprang to mind as I was reading, and more evidence in support keeps accumulating), which is: Kamble is Not Wrong to point out that romance fiction heroes have gotten to be More over the decades: taller, lower body fat/leaner, more muscled, more skilled at fighting, richer, better in bed/greater sexual repertoire and history and usually with an intense focus on evoking pleasure in the heroine not just assuming that she’ll be all hot if he forces himself /attentions on her. He dresses better, has better hair, is less likely to have facial scars (altho potentially more likely to have scars elsewhere), has a bigger and more impressive dick, has more friends, much more likely to be a leader, often has a massive kinship network that relies upon him extensively. More. More. More.
Some of this feeds into Kamble’s theory of needing to really hammer on He Is For Sure Het And Isn’t Gonna Waste Your Time. However, some of the specific more is directly opposed to her theory of how the genre accomplishes this. For one thing (and she may yet get to this), men in romance novels over the last couple decades are far more likely to have significant friendships with other men. (Probably this will be explained as: once the arc of gay rights was largely completed, everyone calmed down? *shrug*) I actually think a lot of what happened is that the audience for romance novels for a long time was women who were raised in a culture in which the Husband Was In Charge and must be Respected. We’ve been past the Whether Obey Should Be In the Vows thing for a while, but the Defer to the Man thing hung around for a really long time. If you are a woman who is successful academically / professionally / wtf, if you are a smart, successful, capable manager, if you are a highly sought after employee because your skills are valued — you don’t even have to be rich or powerful, per se — lots of women in the world of work learned that they are fucking amazing and that men would ask them how to do stuff because they knew, the men didn’t and the men were going to fail (and the business might fail) if the men didn’t find out from the women. You can bully a woman into going along with this whole Defer to the Man thing if her world is constrained (kitchen, church and children) and everyone is busy telling her that He Knows About the Real World. Once she’s out in the real world, she’s bound to figure it out.
The More hero, I would argue, is an effort to reconcile Defer to the Man / Respect the Man with the But Wait I Actually Know What I’m Doing Better Than He Does Problem. No matter who you are, there are people out there who know better than you, at least within some areas. Outside the Defer to the Man dynamic, this is solved with a collaborative approach and if a hierarchy is desired / required, then using mechanisms of transparency, accountability and consulting stakeholders in advance of a decision and considering their input carefully as part of the decision process. But the Defer to the Man nonsense never included any of that and what a job lot of old romance novels are about is the man learning to consult the stakeholder in advance of a decision and considering their input carefully as part of the decision process.
None of that, however, addresses the psychodynamic (I cannot believe I just used that word) problem caused when a highly competent woman participates in the Defer to the Man dynamic. It’s _really_ _important_ to separate this from when highly competent women opt out of the Defer to the Man dynamic. All the really delightful Beta Hero novels involve dyads which are operating in a Defer to the Man world and explicitly NOT participating. That is _why_ we love them. That is _why_ they are not particularly common, alas. (I’m overstating this, and if you have a Beta hero novel that doesn’t fit this set of statements, please tell me about it in the comments because I would like to know more.)
An audience of increasingly competent — and self-aware of their competence — readers who retain a commitment to a Defer to the Man dynamic is going to _require_ escalating competence from the Hero, in order to retain suspension of disbelief. The TSTL heroine is a dodge that _can_ work, but reader responses over the years in many forums indicate that it is only satisfying for an increasingly small component of the buying audience.
Anyway. TL;DR: as more women participated broadly in the world of paid employment and moved up status ladders in that world, they needed Heroes in their fiction that they could plausibly defer to. They had learned at work that they didn’t have to defer to Just Any Man, so why would they do that in a relationship.
ETA: I’m not the first person to observe the “Problem” of Het Relationships for Powerful Women. I know that. Believe me, I know that. I will note that anyone wandering around thinking that this thing is Solved so why is it still hanging on in Romancelandia is pretty delusional.
Anyway. That’s all largely irrelevant, however, to what I’ve been trying to figure out for days now (look I’m not backing away from the above line of thinking — it forcibly sprang to mind as I was reading, and more evidence in support keeps accumulating), which is: Kamble is Not Wrong to point out that romance fiction heroes have gotten to be More over the decades: taller, lower body fat/leaner, more muscled, more skilled at fighting, richer, better in bed/greater sexual repertoire and history and usually with an intense focus on evoking pleasure in the heroine not just assuming that she’ll be all hot if he forces himself /attentions on her. He dresses better, has better hair, is less likely to have facial scars (altho potentially more likely to have scars elsewhere), has a bigger and more impressive dick, has more friends, much more likely to be a leader, often has a massive kinship network that relies upon him extensively. More. More. More.
Some of this feeds into Kamble’s theory of needing to really hammer on He Is For Sure Het And Isn’t Gonna Waste Your Time. However, some of the specific more is directly opposed to her theory of how the genre accomplishes this. For one thing (and she may yet get to this), men in romance novels over the last couple decades are far more likely to have significant friendships with other men. (Probably this will be explained as: once the arc of gay rights was largely completed, everyone calmed down? *shrug*) I actually think a lot of what happened is that the audience for romance novels for a long time was women who were raised in a culture in which the Husband Was In Charge and must be Respected. We’ve been past the Whether Obey Should Be In the Vows thing for a while, but the Defer to the Man thing hung around for a really long time. If you are a woman who is successful academically / professionally / wtf, if you are a smart, successful, capable manager, if you are a highly sought after employee because your skills are valued — you don’t even have to be rich or powerful, per se — lots of women in the world of work learned that they are fucking amazing and that men would ask them how to do stuff because they knew, the men didn’t and the men were going to fail (and the business might fail) if the men didn’t find out from the women. You can bully a woman into going along with this whole Defer to the Man thing if her world is constrained (kitchen, church and children) and everyone is busy telling her that He Knows About the Real World. Once she’s out in the real world, she’s bound to figure it out.
The More hero, I would argue, is an effort to reconcile Defer to the Man / Respect the Man with the But Wait I Actually Know What I’m Doing Better Than He Does Problem. No matter who you are, there are people out there who know better than you, at least within some areas. Outside the Defer to the Man dynamic, this is solved with a collaborative approach and if a hierarchy is desired / required, then using mechanisms of transparency, accountability and consulting stakeholders in advance of a decision and considering their input carefully as part of the decision process. But the Defer to the Man nonsense never included any of that and what a job lot of old romance novels are about is the man learning to consult the stakeholder in advance of a decision and considering their input carefully as part of the decision process.
None of that, however, addresses the psychodynamic (I cannot believe I just used that word) problem caused when a highly competent woman participates in the Defer to the Man dynamic. It’s _really_ _important_ to separate this from when highly competent women opt out of the Defer to the Man dynamic. All the really delightful Beta Hero novels involve dyads which are operating in a Defer to the Man world and explicitly NOT participating. That is _why_ we love them. That is _why_ they are not particularly common, alas. (I’m overstating this, and if you have a Beta hero novel that doesn’t fit this set of statements, please tell me about it in the comments because I would like to know more.)
An audience of increasingly competent — and self-aware of their competence — readers who retain a commitment to a Defer to the Man dynamic is going to _require_ escalating competence from the Hero, in order to retain suspension of disbelief. The TSTL heroine is a dodge that _can_ work, but reader responses over the years in many forums indicate that it is only satisfying for an increasingly small component of the buying audience.
Anyway. TL;DR: as more women participated broadly in the world of paid employment and moved up status ladders in that world, they needed Heroes in their fiction that they could plausibly defer to. They had learned at work that they didn’t have to defer to Just Any Man, so why would they do that in a relationship.
ETA: I’m not the first person to observe the “Problem” of Het Relationships for Powerful Women. I know that. Believe me, I know that. I will note that anyone wandering around thinking that this thing is Solved so why is it still hanging on in Romancelandia is pretty delusional.