"Joanna Russ - When It Changed" - читать интересную книгу автора (Russ Joanna)

Katharinason, about what will happen to Katy, to me, to my life. Our
ancestors' journals are one long cry of pain and I suppose I ought to be glad
now but one can't throw away six centuries, or even (as I have lately
discovered) thirty-four years. Sometimes I laugh at the question those four
men hedged about all evening and never quite dared to ask, looking at the lot
of us, hicks in overalls, farmers in canvas pants and plain shirts: Which of
you plays the role of the man? As if we had to produce a carbon copy of their
mistakes! I doubt very much that sexual equality has been re-established on
Earth. I do not like to think of myself mocked, of Katy deferred to as if she
were weak, of Yuki made to feel unimportant or silly, of my other children
cheated of their full humanity or turned into strangers. And I'm afraid that
my own achievements will dwindle from what they wereтАФor what I thought they
wereтАФto the not-very-interesting curiosa of the human race, the oddities you
read about in the back of the book, things to laugh at sometimes because they
are so exotic, quaint but not impressive, charming but not useful. I find this
more painful that I can say. You will agree that for a woman who has fought
three duels, all of them kills, indulging in such fears is ludicrous. But
what's around the corner now is a duel so big that I don't think I have the
guts for it; in Faust's words: Verweile doch, du bist so schoen! Keep it as it
is. Don't change.

Sometimes at night I remember the original name of this planet, changed by the
first generation of our ancestors, those curious women for whom, I suppose,
the real name was too painful a reminder after the men died. I find it
amusing, in a grim way, to see it all so completely turned around. This too
shall pass. All good things must come to an end.

Take my life but don't take away the meaning of my life.

For-A-While.


The End


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Afterword
I find it hard to say anything about this story. The first few paragraphs were
dictated to me in a thoughtful, reasonable, whispering tone I had never heard
before; and once the Daemon had vanishedтАФthey always doтАФI had to finish the
thing by myself and in a voice not my own.

The premise of the story needs either a book or silence. I'll try to
compromise. It seems to me (in the words of the narrator) that sexual equality
has not yet been established on Earth and that (in the words of GBS) the only
argument that can be made against it is that it has never been tried. I have
read SF stories about manless worlds before; they are either full of busty