Why Strong Female Characters Sometimes Frustrate Me

I feel that I need to immediately clarify my title. You see, it's not strong female characters in general that frustrate me; it's the characters of historical (especially Medieval) stories who cause my frustration. I'm sure you're asking yourself: "Who (other than a misogynist) could possibly object to a strong female character in any capacity?"

That is indeed a valid question. I do not, in fact, object to those characters. Please know that I still love the Mulans, Meridas, and sundry other badass historically fictional ladies (even the non-Disney princesses...none of which come to mind at the moment). You see, my problem is twofold. 

First, it frustrates me to see these representations that ARE so badass and spectacular, and yet see how little the world changed its views on women up until the 20th Century. And let us not limit ourselves to the fictional...Joan of Arc and Queen Elizabeth I were real-life butt-kickers. QE I ran the mother-lovin British Empire, but few (if any) laws changed to bring men and women to equality.  Joan of Arc saved France from the British and got burned at the stake for her troubles.  So while I greatly enjoy these depictions of women making their way in the world, it sometimes hurts to think about how they were seen as aberrations. These women (real or fictional) were seen as exceptions. As though no other woman of the time could possibly want the same things, like respect and a right to her own opinion. And we can't pretend that it was only the men living in these women's lifetimes who thought this way. While the real and fictional women may have inspired a small population of their female contemporaries, the majority thought them just as strange and unnatural as the males did.  Now I blame some of this on the fact that the ability to convey information readily and accurately didn't really become possible until the late 19th Century.  It's tough to fight sexism (or racism, or classicism, or any other negative -ism) when the information is being conveyed like a Broadway version game of 'telephone' across the known world.

My second problem is a little more in the now. It's also a little more difficult to articulate. The fact is, it's difficult to find what seems to be an accurate representation of women before the Women's Lib movement. While Hollywood and TV seem to be moving in the right direction, there always seems to be heavy disagreement between feminists of how women are portrayed. Women of the past are seen as either princesses, queens, mothers, nuns, witches, or prostitutes. There might be some mixes amongst those groups (Xena was a little bit of all of those at one point or another in her series), but we don't generally see much in the way of "common" women. As with most things, these tropes don't show us an accurate representation of a real human. And so people can never seem to agree when a woman is being shown in an accurate light.  Now, I do believe that many of those tropes came about for a reason.  For the most part, women could only be tropes (whether in stories or real life) because that was all they were allowed to be by the people in their lives.  Women before the Industrial Revolution weren't necessarily allowed to be complicated individuals outside their own heads (or families...if they married a particularly understanding man).  To do so would invite censure from the community, and in some cases incarceration in a mental institution.  Though let's face it, the ladies burned as witches or heretics definitely had it the worst.  Mostly, see all of problem one as to why my second problem exists.

Please do not take all of this to mean that I don't wish to see any more strong female characters in Medieval (or any pre-Industrial) setting.  In fact, I've greatly enjoyed the depictions of women in fiction like the Game of Thrones series (books and TV).  George R.R. Martin, David Benioff, and D.B. Weiss have done an amazing job of portraying women in several different roles.  While they do use those old tropes, I find their characters more three-dimensional.  Cersei isn't just a power-hungry queen, she's a mother who wants to protect and elevate her children at any cost; Sansa isn't just a sweet little innocent, she's a dreamer who learns to face a hard reality; Danerys isn't just a queen searching for her throne, she's trying to protect all of the people under her care; Melisandre isn't just the Red Priestess, she's a lady with a hidden agenda (seriously...what is that chick up to?!).  So far, my favorite ladies of Westeros are Arya and Brianne, as they are the truest female warriors (though I'm eagerly anticipating stories of the Sand Snakes).  I can't wait to see what this season brings them.

So really, I'm not calling for a complete cessation of strong historical females.  I just want these characters to be a bit more well-rounded.  I fully realize that women were limited in their professions before women started fighting for the vote, but that doesn't mean women weren't always fighting for their place in this world.  They just had to go about it a bit differently than we women would today.  And also, maybe writers could throw a farm-girl (or wife) in there every once in a while, so we can see how the 'common' women deal with all the shenanigans of daily life amongst these powerful women (and men).

All in all, I'm trying very hard to create a piece of fiction that contains these kinds of women.  Perhaps one day my work will stand alongside that of Martin, Rowling, and Gabaldon (author of Outlander...another awesome book/series with amazing women).