A Perfect Day to Go to Gilmour

I like good writing. I read lots of books. I have enjoyed the splendid fiction written by these women: Colette, Pat Barker, Jane Gardham, Mavis Gallant, Gertrude Stein, George Eliot, Rosemary Aubert, Beryl Bainbridge, Nina Berberova, Edith Wharton, Esi Edugyan, Anne Tyler, Muriel Spark, P.D. James, Kay Boyle, Simone de Beauvoir, Ethel Lina White and Jean Rhys. There are others and there will be more. If I didn't think women could write as well as men I wouldn't buy or borrow their books.

That said, I find myself defending David Gilmour's decision to exclude women writers from the undergrad course he teaches at U of T. He has to be passionate about an author's writing or he can't teach it, says the G-G award winner. Gilmour has explained that he's not saying that women don't write well, but that hasn't placated those who live to be outraged or think he's engaging in rank sexism. They've taken to social media with a vengeance and given Gilmour the proverbial raking over the coals. Even Jared Bland, the Globe and Mail's newish Books Editor, opened up on the tall, raffish man about Hogtown. In today's paper Bland - when he wasn't banging on needlessly about his undergrad years at U of T - urged Gilmour to open up to new reading experiences. Excellent advice as far as it goes, but beside the point. What Gilmour has done is display his deep commitment to a certain type of writing by a certain type of writer. Those who take Gilmour's course will certainly profit from that commitment. Would that all lecturers were so committed, so candid.