Ramanujan Redux

Read this post by Razib this weekend, and it got me thinking, which is always a bad sign. It usually means something stupid’s about to come out of my mouth, so bear with me.

One thing that Razib points out is the fundamental difference between gender and genre. Males enjoy plot-driven stories, escapist fiction. We don’t want to focus on characters and their development, we want storyline and plot. Get to the point, get to the next point, etc. Women enjoy more of the character development stuff, the writing prose, etc. etc.

So I was wondering–is our interest in certain books wired into our own primitive desires? Do we like certain books because they fire up a part of our own evolutionary structure?

Think about it. Men enjoy plot-based books, with an aura of mystery but also of adventure and exploration. Books have the power to take us away. It takes us away from the burden of work and responsibility, provides us refuge from the toil we endure. We have traditionally been the ones to carry the load for our families, and while the gender gap has made dramatic shifts in the past 200 years, our brains don’t evolve nearly as fast.

Just like the supposed theory that our bodies have supposedly not caught up to agricultural products toxifying our body, our brains have not yet fully caught up to the idea that women can now bear equal responsibility, so it takes our own growth and development in life to adjust to this. Because of the growing amount of entertainment options in the Internet age and the relegation of books to a niche activity among the XYs, many of us never do.

Women, on the other hand, have traditionally been groomed to find mates. Unlike male, whose work, intelligence, wealth, and physical stature defined him, a female was traditionally defined by the strength of her partner. So it became important for her to find that character, and that required deep examination of human psychology to attract suitable mates. So isn’t it natural that females would enjoy books that involved deep character study and soothing words of comfort and seduction?

(Another possibility is that if females were not happy with the mates they got, they could dream up their ideal Cassanova to escape the doom and gloom of their situation. Hence the continuing popularity of harlequin novels for women in completely unsatisfying marriages.)

I’m not sure how far I’ve gotten, but the last work of fiction I read was Kafka on the Shore, and it touched me so profoundly because of how mystical and otherworldly it was. I felt like I was being transferred away from this world and into a dream. It was…liberating. I certainly felt like I was in another world, and didn’t have to worry about the one I was in now.

Sound familiar?

There’s my crock theory. Someone please tear it apart.

On the train back from Napoli to Roma this summer, I notice a beautiful bella sitting across the aisle two rows diagonal to me. I decide to test how much of a charmer I’ve become over the past few weeks. I give brief fleeting glances her direction, flashing the occasional goofy smile with slightly narrowed eyes (that is the confident look these days right?). All in innocent fun; thirty minutes to spare and a father in tow, there won’t be anything happening here.

Deep brown eyes stare back, narrowing a little. Very tender lips curve slightly upward at one or two glances. The casual T-shirt/jeans look that does wonders to accentuate her firm, yet delicate attractiveness.  I am eliciting some response, whether it be attraction or disgust.

Somehow I manage this idle flirtation without my father noticing, although he does raise his eyebrow at all the weird smiles I’m throwing at right.

As we turn into the station, she steps out of the car to take a light (train’s final stop is Milano).  I step off the train and meet her eyes , flashing one last dopey grin. She tilts her head downward (shyness? Who is that creep?) and gives me a faint smile, with cigarette hanging right between her lips. Maybe there was some promise. Maybe I could say, “Ciao, bella”, and she could start talking in Italian …or I could just give her our Euro cell # and we could chat (most Italians learn English right?)…or just ask for her name and address until the train started leaving, setting up a future romantic rendezvous in Milan…

But I am with my father, and I must rush to keep up with him. I quietly walk past her into the station and back into Rome.