A Utopia of Dystopias

utopia - 1 ( usually lowercase ) an ideal place or state.
            2 ( usually lowercase ) any visionary system of political or social perfection.

Dystopia - noun, a society characterised by human misery, as squalor, oppression, disease, and overcrowding.

I can't help noticing the influx on the YA (young adult) reading scene of the 'dystopian novel'. It seemed to catch fire (see what I did there?) with The Hunger Games and has continued with the Divergent series. Both sagas have been made into films.

There are so many of these novels on the shelves now. Uglies, Matched, Gone, I'm sure you could name dozens. 

Of course dystopian novels are nothing new. There was 1984 and Brave New world. The brilliant Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep (filmed as Blade Runner) and Fahrenheit 451.

But lately two things have struck me. The first is that they are very firnly aimed at young adults rather than adults and the second that they seem to also be aimed at girls. Female leads and heroines have been popular for a long time, Mina Harker in Dracula, Julia in 1984 to name a couple. But suddenly it seems the female lead is back with rather a bang!

Suddenly the 'feisty' (I hate that word!) female is the norm, the woman that notices the rot in the supposed utopia, revealing the horror beneath. The young girl  that dares to kick out against the society that controls everyone including her.


Is this only a blip? Or are our authors (male and female) seeing the important role the female lead can have in society?


Or maybe, they just realise that it's still the girls that do the most reading...


What do you think?


(and are there any great Dystopian Novels I've missed, with excellent female leads?)

 

Mr and Mrs, what's in a name?

I listened to radio 4 on the way to work. This is always a bad idea and always annoys me, but like a car crash I seem draw to it..moth to a flame etc

This morning' topic was that in France they plan to stop using a married woman's husband's surname by default on official correspondence, using instead her 'maiden name' as this is more in keeping with equality.

The rationale behind this is that she does not become her husband's property, she is still a woman in her own right, marriage doesn't change that. All sounds perfectly logical ...

Except .. your 'maiden name' is so called due to your remaining a 'maid' (ie virgin) until marriage. A concept rarely kept nowadays. Your 'maiden name' is your father's name. It is not 'your' name any more than your husband's is. As a woman you do not have a name of your own!

So while initially this all sounds very proper and politically correct it serves no purpose at all. In fact, as one guest said, it detracts for the new unit you have formed with your husband and maybe your children, a new team where you all share a name.

Apparently the French have no title of Ms. and I have no idea if they plan to use Madame or Mademoiselle with the 'maiden name' .. either would surely confuse.

When I got married I was proud to become #teamCanelloni (not my real name though it is Italian!) But if I hadn't wanted to take my husband's name I guess I could have ask him to take mine, or we could have chosen a new one entirely, I certainly wouldn't want us all to have different names.


What do you think? Storm in a tea cup? Much ado about nothing? Or an important rung on the feminist ladder?

Father's name, Husband's name...does it make a difference? Should we all consider a new name for a new (married) life or is marriage itself outdated? Do you like people to know your marital status or is it secret? (I made a public declaration when I got married so I'm happy to keep it very public that I am married!)

Love to read your thoughts.

Image credit: isaxar / 123RF Stock Photo