It makes me sad/mad that people who did Lit in their gcses/A level had to not only read sexist books where men were the main focus and violence on women was normal, but had to sit through hundreds of lectures dissecting and calling female characters whores and painting them as the villain. Like it genuinely upsets me because when I did my gcses, I'm so glad that the book choices were far far better. I did The Namesake and two plays, Journey's End and Death and the king's horseman - all which were incredibly diverse (one's about Indian immigration and cultural crisis, the other's about war/relationship and the last one's about duty and colonization.)
And the poems we did had so many feminist theme and female writers - Like a poem I vividly remember was 'Now let no charitable hope' about gender inequality and 'Forsaken wife', a poem where a woman calls out her husband for cheating (seriously check her out, the poem was super super bad ass). So, every time I here about young girls having bad experience with Lit, it makes me so sad because these girls deserved better. They deserved better than having to sit through their teachers calling that one characters wife a whore because she wore red nail polish or something. There are so many great female writers that should and can be included instead of same old sexist books. (Plus, I'm so glad I had a great female teacher!)
Small part of the poems I was talking about: Forsaken Wife, Elizabeth Thomas.
Show me a man that dare be true,
That dares to suffer what I do;
That can for ever sigh unheard,
And ever love without regard:
I then will own your prior claim
To love, to honour, and to fame;
But till that time, my dear, adieu,
I yet superior am to you.
Like??? The confidence in this woman to be like, fuck u, I'm superior to you??? I'm in love with her.
And the other poem: Now let no charitable hope, Elinor Wylie.
I was, being human, born alone;
I am, being woman, hard beset;
I live by squeezing from a stone
What little nourishment I get.
Do I even need to explain how great of a stanza this alone is?