When it comes to womens writing and womens literature, as Wolitzer points

out, there is a clear hierarchy of what is considered good literature (and she
makes the assertion that it is writings done by men) and what is bad literature
(womens lit, apparently).
In middle school, I was a budding literature snob. My idea of good literature was
as follows:
Shakespeare
Divine Comedy
Edgar A. Poe
Salinger

Middle school is a time where people are starting to

establish social status. Because my group of friends were
self-proclaimed nerds, the ensuing race for Alpha
Nerdiness was wholly dependent on the kinds of book you
read. We were too good for the kids who still read young
adult literature, and laughed and scorned those who were
reading the Twilight series. For me, I decided that the only
literature worth reading was exalted, canonized, mens

literature.
I didnt even especially like Shakespeare, and I only really skimmed Inferno, but this
was the literature I thought I was to read if I wanted to call myself a literature
scholar. No women made this list, and I even remember explicitly thinking that
dead, British men wrote all the good literature: which is sort of exactly how
canonical literature gets continually re-canonized.
In high school, I looked back on my middle school self and guffawed. I was so closeminded, I thought. I was old enough now, a blossoming literature snob, to expand
my horizons. Good literature wasnt just dead, white British menit was dead
American and French men as well! The list expanded to this:
Albert Camus
Vonnegut
Fitzgerald
Salinger

Notably, there was still a lack of women. I felt like I had been
silly for forgetting about writers that werent purely British (as I
had grown up an Anglophile) but I somehow never felt weirded
out by the idea that I did not consider womens literature to be
good literature yet.

Once upon a time, I sat in an abandoned elevator in Old Dublin with a friend of mine
(who was seemingly much better than me at absolutely everything: reading, art,
music, knowledge in general and everything else I can still think ofshe goes to
Harvard now). We started talking about women writersand why none of them
were very good.
Well, Jane Austens a huge bore. Romance novels arent real novels.
Yeah, and Gertrude Stein really only was a good copy editor for Hemmingway and
Fitzgerald. Like, none of her stuff is as famous as theirs.
JK Rowling doesnt count, its a fantasy series.

I never cease to be astounded at my ignorance, but also that the ignorance wasnt
just perpetuated by my friends, but by the school system as well. I didnt read
literature or poetry written by women until my junior or senior year, and by then it
was only a sprinklingno real nourishment for my blossoming literature flower. At
least at the collegiate level and independent reading that not just me, but other
people have been exposed to the amazing thing written by women that get
completely stunted in the canon.