Well, Women Aren't Perfect Either

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

Translated by Ros Schwartz

Pages: 184 Genre: dystopia, sci-fi

Rating: 2.5 Star

Kindle Notes & Highlights

"Deep underground, forty women live imprisoned in a cage. Watched over by guards, the women have no memory of how they got there, no notion of time, and only a vague recollection of their lives before." The fortieth prisoner is the youngest of the women, who feels outcast from the others. One day, though, she begins making discoveries that will lead to their escape, and the rest of their lives.

I guess I should've known better from the title, but I wasn't expecting this book to be as male-focused as it was. This brand of "feminism" is unfortunately a little too TERF-like than I'm comfortable with, but I also have to wonder if that was the goal. Was this book actually attempting to be a feminism novella? I don't really think so. Perhaps it should've tried harder to do so, because as it was, I found this book lacking.

It was really disorienting to be given a world where gender dynamics are so central to the conflict and then really ignore anything that isn't the straight, white, cis female perspective. Throughout the whole thing, relationships that weren't with men (either platonic or romantic relationships between women) were treated as a consolation prize. It positions life without sex or romance as lesser than, but also makes sure to specify that sex is only real if it's between a man and a woman. Oh, and don't forget that your ultimate goal is to have a child (which is a fascinating perspective from a book where none of the women seemed to be very maternal).

Could you argue that this is the point? That women are, in many ways, our own oppressors who police other women into believing wholeheartedly in gender roles even in extreme circumstances that take men out of the equation? Maybe. If I were writing an essay on it, that's the perspective I would take. But I don't believe the book really backs up that being a bad thing. The moments that it uses to emphasize these beliefs are not central to the plot, and, even when she's on her own, the main character never thinks beyond them.

It was also very odd to me that in the face of Nothingness, with truly no expectations or chance for growth, that no one was interested in creating. There was one singer. No storytellers, no artists, no heart, no soul. Similar to the open distain the women felt towards one another, this just felt unrealistic to me. Humanity has always created and found community with one another, even in the face of tragedy. You want me to believe we'd give all that up?

I was intrigued by this story, and it did make me think, but I was underwhelmed by its execution. Instead of actually exploring any of the complex ideas that it was bringing up, we spend a long time watching the Child simply not know things, learn them, and then know them. It got old, and it made the whole thing ultimately unforgettable.