Mary Shelley
The author of one of my favorite novels of all time, Mary Shelley was a pioneer in her time. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, the author of The Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) and is often considered to be the first feminist. Her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, was one of the major English Romantic poets, but Mary totally overshadowed him by writing Frankenstein. She started writing the novel when she was just 19 years old. When I was 19, my greatest accomplishment was marathoning all of The Office in a week.
Her novel influenced popular culture for at least a hundred years, with several adaptations of Frankenstein such as Tim Burton's Frankenweenie, and the newest adaptation coming to theaters, Victor Frankenstein. It's said that the plot for Frankenstein came to Mary in a dream about a scientist who created a monster, and Shelley is normally credited as writing the very first science fiction novel, so you're welcome Doctor Who fans.
Gillian Flynn
I wanted to shake it up a little bit with this list because there are just so many worthy women authors from every generation, and Gillian Flynn is one of those ladies. She wrote the uber popular Gone Girl, which tells the story of a crazed, yet brilliant wife who leads her husband on a wild goose chase that only ends in a straight terrifying way.
Flynn began as an Entertainment Weekly reporter and TV critic before making her way into mystery novels, so she has the haunting ability to delve deep into the media aspect of Gone Girl and Dark Places. I've read both, and had to have a pillow right next to my face throughout the book, just so I could either scream or hide from how beautifully disgusting the writing is.
Dark Places is officially gracing movie theaters! I personally cannot wait to see how the adaptation into movies goes for that complicated novel. Although I'm not a huge fan of Charlize Theron as the main character, the rest of the cast looks perfect.
Toni Morrison
This talented woman came into my life in the form of a college literature class. We were assigned to read Beloved, one of her classics. I didn't know what I was getting myself into, but by the end of the book, I was crying. Morrison's ability to strike deep into the hearts of her readers is flawless. Her characters are broken, damaged and gorgeous.
Morrison herself is a force to be reckoned with. She was the first African-American woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize in Literature in 1993, and attended Cornell University for her Masters. In 1988, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved.
Anne Rice
I've always been a fangirl of Rice's work, so it's obvious that I would add her to my list of favorite women authors. Ann Rice has written so many powerful novels in the fantasy world. In my humble opinion, she dominates the vampire genre. When I think of vampires, Twilight certainly doesn't come to mind. The Vampire Lestat does though.
I have a personal love for Rice's work because she actually attended the same college as me, San Francisco State University. Even better, the first publication of Interview with the Vampire was published in SFSU's Fourteen Hills, one of the literary magazines on campus.
J.K. Rowling
Where do I even start with this magical woman? She started from the bottom and now look where she is. Her story is truly one of inspiration and dedication to the craft of writing. Sometimes it still blows my mind that an entire universe was just hanging out in her mind. Not only is she one of the reasons I truly believe in the magic of writing, she gave so much love to gingers. Weasley family, represent.
Maya Angelou
This graceful woman has some of the most quoted, and most lyrical, poetry ever written. She also had quite the wild life. Her real name was Marguerite Johnson. After divorcing her first husband in 1954, she started a nightclub career in San Francisco and dropped her birth name, taking on the name Maya Angelou. Get it, girl.
She had a rough journey in life, being sexually abused at just eight years old by her mother's boyfriend. The man was arrested, but only spent one day in jail for his crime. Four days after his release, he was found dead. It's rumored that Angelou's uncle sought revenge.
Angelou went on to drop out of high school in order to work and become San Francisco's first African-American cable car conductor. She later went back to high school and graduated while pregnant. She partnered with Malcolm X in 1964 at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, and helped expand his Organization of Agro-American Unity, moved back to Africa to discover her roots, and was a Calypso singer and dancer. She also wrote Hallmark greeting cards and cookbooks. To put it shortly, she got shit done. Angelou's life story has always been incredibly inspiring to me. She put her full self out into the world, and didn't really care if you liked it or not.
Well, those are my six totally kickass female authors! Believe me, I know there are so, so many more beautiful book babes that could be on this list, but that would be the longest blog post known to women. Who are your favorite female authors?
No comments:
Post a Comment