Why romance is classed as „women`s fiction” ?

Romance is not a subcategory of women's fiction. They are two separate categories that share this section. It is a matter of fact, but an unfortunate one, that the vast majority of readers and writers of the romance genre are women.

Women's fiction is stories about a woman's life experiences, where her friends and enemies are mostly women. There is no genre called "men's fiction". If you write a book that's all about a man's life experiences, where his friends and enemies are mostly men, they just call that general fiction, because male default assumption. For equality, I agree there should be both categories or neither. I prefer neither. I wish each gender would be interested in stories about the other, We're all just people. Many of our experiences are shared and we can learn about life whether those experiences are had by our own gender or the other.

Romance is a specific genre, not the same as women's fiction. In addition to its emphasis on the female main character and a love story, it needs that happy, optimistic ending where the couple is alive and together.

Women's fiction centers around female protagonists too, and it often contains romantic arcs, but it can focus on other issues and relationships too. And it doesn't have to have a HEA (though it often does).

I've seen publishers and agents that lump the two together in the sense that they say they they take both or maybe they treat romance as a subcategory of women's fiction for their own convenience (or because they feel there's overlap in target readership), but there are real differences between the two.

Now the issue of why a particular title might be considered "women's fiction" if it centers around female characters and relationships, but a very similar books is just "literary fiction," or "general fiction," or "historical fiction" if the characters are primarily male is another issue entirely...

Zaris said:

Thank you very much for the clarifications, I agree with all points.

Going a bit forward on your response.... I think the fact that are less male writers and readers of romance could be related to a number of issues, but the result is that on the market there is an overflow of works that tend to create a stereotype of the other gender.

There are plenty of romance novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”. From a literary point of view, i found these tendencies counterproductive

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The "strong hero/heroine," and "sexy biollionaire" are popular subtype of romance, but the most popular one is "friends to lovers." The RWA site does reader surveys, and they have rankings of relative popularity of different romance tropes.

https://www.rwa.org/p/cm/ld/fid=582

Zaris said:

Thank you very much for the clarifications, I agree with all points.

Going a bit forward on your response.... I think the fact that are less male writers and readers of romance could be related to a number of issues, but the result is that on the market there is an overflow of works that tend to create a stereotype of the other gender.

There are plenty of romance novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”. From a literary point of view, i found these tendencies counterproductive

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If you're talking about popular tropes, like the Alpha male, then yes, those exist. There are popular tropes and even stereotypes for all genres and even different mediums (ie. Action movies with stoic or badass dude--usually straight and white; etc.)

I do understand sort of what you're trying to say about cliches and stereotypes. There are many entertainment media that have stereotypes, not just romance books.

There tend to be some popular types that are preferred by a large portion of romance readers, so I do understand why it feels like there are lots of similar tropes/types.

However, not all romances have the same kinds of male characters or use the same tropes. Not all romances use stereotypes. We have AW members who write Romances. I would hope you would be respectful of their genre as any other genre writer on this forum, thanks.

Zaris said:

There are plenty of romance novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”. From a literary point of view, i found these tendencies counterproductive

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Sure, these books exist, and many people form particular views on romance novels without having read a single one, but the romance genre is quite large and varied.

Romance is popular, and I suspect the prospect of a happy ending is one of the reasons. But then, I'm one of those people who has been known to flip to the end of a novel to make sure the protagonist survives until the end. I'm a bit puzzled by all the hate for happy ending and romantic arcs that get tossed around on writer's sites. I'd hazard that happy endings and romantic arcs are common across genres (and not just romance), because readers find them emotionally satisfying.

I don't deny that a bittersweet or sad ending, if it makes narrative sense, can also be apt and satisfying, but the only people I've run across who say they prefer those kinds of endings as a rule seem to be writers. I think it's perfectly understandable that many people read to escape the helpless/hopeless grind of daily life instead of being reminded of how cruddy and unfair life can be.

I get the feeling that some aspiring writers want to punish their readers for getting attached to the characters they (the writers) have created. I've got no idea why. Maybe it's like those musicians who hate their fans?

Zaris said:

Thank you very much for the clarifications, I agree with all points.

Going a bit forward on your response.... I think the fact that are less male writers and readers of romance could be related to a number of issues, but the result is that on the market there is an overflow of works that tend to create a stereotype of the other gender.

There are plenty of romance novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”. From a literary point of view, i found these tendencies counterproductive

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[My emphasis]

Which pretty much covers every Hollywood movie in every category for the past gazillion years. It's not just romance.

(NB: May contain traces of hyperbole.)

Zaris said:

There are plenty of romance novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”.

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There are plenty of mainstream, action adventure and SF novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”.

It's hardly confined to romance.

Marian Perera said:

There are plenty of mainstream, action adventure and SF novels in which all male protagonists are most of the time extremely rich, extremely powerful and extremely handsome, while the female characters are the „damsel in distress” with the looks of a „porn star”.

It's hardly confined to romance.

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Nope. It's plenty common in books and movies written for male audiences too. James Bond anyone? And God, all those action movies where some guy in his 50s, like Tom Cruise, is cast opposite a woman in her early thirties or younger, as if that's just how things always are.

I'm not sure what point the poster was trying to make there. That (s)he doesn't like romance because (s)he finds the romance he's read to be sexist? That's fine, but not everyone agrees, and it's possible (s)he hasn't read the widest cross section of the genre.

Roxxsmom said:

Nope. It's plenty common in books and movies written for male audiences too. James Bond anyone? And God, all those action movies where some guy in his 50s, like Tom Cruise, is cast opposite a woman in her early thirties or younger, as if that's just how things always are.

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James Bond was exactly who I had in mind.

Heck, at least in romances, each extremely-everything guy only gets one woman. James Bond beats that by a factor of how much?

I'm not sure what point the poster was trying to make there. That (s)he doesn't like romance because (s)he finds the romance he's read to be sexist? That's fine, but not everyone agrees, and it's possible (s)he hasn't read the widest cross section of the genre.

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Agreed. Extrapolating Fifty Shades of Grey, or even Harlequin Presents, to all of romance will not provide an accurate overview of the genre.

Roxxsmom said:

Romance is popular, and I suspect the prospect of a happy ending is one of the reasons. But then, I'm one of those people who has been known to flip to the end of a novel to make sure the protagonist survives until the end. I'm a bit puzzled by all the hate for happy ending and romantic arcs that get tossed around on writer's sites. I'd hazard that happy endings and romantic arcs are common across genres (and not just romance), because readers find them emotionally satisfying.

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Detective fiction for example, where the bad guy must get his or her comeuppance at the end. There might be less 'happy' things about the ending too, but that 'Detective works it out, villain is jailed or killed' delivers the emotional satisfaction the crime reader is looking for just as 'the couple live happily ever after' delivers what the romance reader is looking for. I don't personally enjoy romance because I prefer villain caught or world saved as happy endings but there's no inherant superiority in those endings. I think I can guess why one is looked down on and the others aren't though and it's plain old sexism.

Many of the romance novels I've read have villains that are caught, mysteries that are solved, plagues to survive, kingdoms to save, or plots that are foiled by the protagonists. The main difference is that the villains, plots and mysteries are part of what bring the couple together. Of course there are plenty of genre thrillers, detective novels, mysteries, fantasy novels, historical novels and so on that have romantic arcs in them too, including HEAs sometimes, for the couple. It's just a matter of emphasis and whether the love affair itself is the primary source of character growth/change, or just one aspect of it.

I used to read a lot of romance, but these days I tend to read more fantasy and SF. Quite a lot of it has romantic subplots, however (actually, I can count the fantasy novels I've read over the years that don't have some kind of love story or romantic entanglement in them somewhere on one hand). But as you said, it's the focus of the story on the fantasy elements, conflicts, intrigue or whatever that are the biggest thing for me.

For the record, I don't care for alpha male billionaires at all. My guilty weakness is wounded male souls that need a little rescuing by somewhat better adjusted (but still not perfect) women.

The person creating the sub-forum meant that this sub-forum is covering both the genre that is known as Women's Fiction and the genre that is known as Romance. They did not mean that the two were one genre.

A good number of publishers, or specific branches of larger publishers specialize in these two genres together. However my publisher specializes in Romance,as a genre (among other things) but specifically does not publish women's fiction (although they briefly did at one point, but stopped accepting those submissions.)

The term Women's Fiction, confuses some people, but it is a standard well established category used by agents, publishers and book sellers, so whether one agrees with the name, or not, it just exists, and is used to sell a certain type of book to a certain audience.

Roxxsmom said:

For the record, I don't care for alpha male billionaires at all. My guilty weakness is wounded male souls that need a little rescuing by somewhat better adjusted (but still not perfect) women.

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Sigh. Yes, indeed. The perfect formula for romance, IMHO.

As opposed to billionaires. My mother once mentioned how, when she was a young woman, she had met a number of quite wealthy men.

"So why didn't you marry one?" I asked (being an annoying teenager).

"Never met one who was worth marrying," she said.

I have always suspected this to be the truth about most of them.

Haha! OTOH, my mother always said, "It's just as easy to fall for a rich man as a poor one."

She (and I) didn't take that advice. We both married wonderful, beautiful men who were/are decidedly middle-class.

morngnstar said:

They are two separate categories that share this section. It is a matter of fact, but an unfortunate one, that the vast majority of readers and writers of the romance genre are women.

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I've heard a theory as to why this is. I will preface this by saying I haven't researched the issue and don't know how much reality matches this theory. However, it seems plausible enough and it's interesting food for thought.

Supposedly men tend to be most easily aroused via external visual stimuli while women respond most readily to mental images. That's why the majority of pornography is marketed to and and purchased by men and the majority of romance and erotica novels are marketed to and purchased by women. Of course, as with any generalization, there are many individuals who don't fit neatly within this dichotomy, but the tendency is strong enough to shape the market.

Of course, the marketing itself can affect purchasing behavior, so it's difficult to determine if this split is genuinely due to inherent traits or simply caused by societal expectations.

What do you guys think?

But romance, and in part women's fiction, is about the LOVE story. And I think, in general, with the usual exceptions, men prefer plain graphic sexytime rather than the whole falling-in-love, yearning for one another, union-of-souls subtleties you might find in romance and women's fiction. They don't want to get too much into feelings. Women do. Never mind if that is because what is expected of the genders or not -- it's what, in general, is.

Speaking as a reader who skips the sex scenes as boring and only wants to see the development of love.

Pardon the interruption, but...

amergina said:

The whole "men are visual and women aren't" is bunk. (http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/sex-lies-men-myths-0217137)

It's more that women had to hide their sexual desires from men because women (in western culture) weren't allowed to have sexual desires. Women are only for men to have sexual desires about.

But books are and have always been subversive.

But the fact is, women absolutely get aroused by visual stimuli, including porn.

(See also the number of tumblr blogs dedicated to Chris Evan's abs. Or heck, check out the amount of female fans of Cockyboys (a gay porn site).

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I never said women aren't aroused by visual stimuli. People can be aroused by any sort of stimulus. Smell and sound can be as arousing as good looks. However, some stimuli are certainly more widely effective than others. Images of attractive naked people appeal to most folks while images of say, ballons, only arouse a small subset of the population. The only question is whether these tendencies have any biological division along gender lines. Clearly you're in the "No way" camp and you do have a valid point about erotica/romance being much more subtle. It certainly has the potential to be more easily hidden, but is that the reason women prefer it or simply a convenient bonus?

Now I'm curious about the porn vs. erotica/romance consumption habits of non-western societies. Is there a current or historical society in which the women consumed primarily visual sexual media while the men preferred the written word? Or a society in which the use of such materials is/was evenly distributed across both genders?

I think the bigger issue is that it has become, in only a few generations, an assumption that men *don't* have an interest in romantic stories. Even though they have been a staple of literature in Western and other societies for centuries, and many male writers have excelled at them. However, it suddenly became uncool for men to fall in love some time after WWII, and romance literature has been left to the ladies as if it were of no real artistic value.

Twick said:

I think the bigger issue is that it has become, in only a few generations, an assumption that men *don't* have an interest in romantic stories. Even though they have been a staple of literature in Western and other societies for centuries, and many male writers have excelled at them. However, it suddenly became uncool for men to fall in love some time after WWII, and romance literature has been left to the ladies as if it were of no real artistic value.

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Ah, so it DID used to be more evenly distributed! I'm learning new things today.

aruna said:

Speaking as a reader who skips the sex scenes as boring and only wants to see the development of love.

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Well, I'm female and I love sex scenes if they're well written. The emotional context is important too, and I'll take emotional metaphor over details about the plumbing, but I enjoy a bit of detail too.

Romance runs the gamut from erotica to sweet, though, so I'm guessing women vary a lot in that respect. I can't speak for men as much, though my personal experience is that they vary quite a bit more in their sex drive and in what they like in bed and in sexual entertainment than they admit to their peers sometimes.

If it's hard for a man to admit that he only wants sex once a week (or less), it's also very hard for a woman to admit that her husband only wants it that infrequently. The reason is pretty clear. If you admit that your husband is a relatively low sex drive sort of dude, one who gets annoyed if you wake him up for sex and needs to be in the right frame of mind, some guy in the thread (usually the one who's most loudly proclaiming that all men constantly want sex at the drop of a hat, while woman are coy and need everything to be "just so") will say that this is just because you're not attractive to your husband.

amergina said:

The whole "men are visual and women aren't" is bunk. (http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/sex-lies-men-myths-0217137)

It's more that women had to hide their sexual desires from men because women (in western culture) weren't allowed to have sexual desires. Women are only for men to have sexual desires about.

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Another interesting "everyone knows" thing that may be overstated is the notion that women overall have a preference for men who are powerful and wealthy (and often older), while men have a preference for women who are pretty (and probably younger). A study suggests that the income gap in a given country has a huge influence on mate choice in men and women, and in countries with a smaller income gap, women tend to take attractive partners over ones with wealth and power.

Or to put it another way, those gender differences we see with regards to mate preference may be more a result of actual socioeconomic differences in the status of men and women in a given society than a reflection of a hard-wired, biological difference between men and women.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22933455

The body of this paper is behind a paywall, I think, but here's a time article summarizing it.

http://healthland.time.com/2012/09/07/when-men-stop-seeking-beauty-and-women-care-less-about-wealth/