Then, you have Van, who is somewhat of a happy medium. While Terry serves as the sexist alpha-male, Jeff is the more feminist voice. Still, Gilman’s decision to have Van as the narrator has its benefits. A first-person narration with their thoughts on the men and their way of life could have been really powerful. While the men – Van, Jeff, and Terry – have all been around women in their lives, those who live in Herland have never encountered a man. I think Gilman does Herland a disservice by not having one of its women provide a first-person account of life there. It’s a choice I’m not sure if I’m personally on-board with. But instead, she chose to take the voice of a man. Gilman, a woman writing about an all-female society, easily could have written from the perspective of one of Herland’s inhabitants. Couple Herland with the author’s poem, “ The Cattle Train,” and one must wonder if Gilman herself was vegetarian. The author was, of course, a feminist, but it seems that back in the early 20th century, she was making a connection between women’s rights and animal rights that so many vegans discuss today. The fact that Gilman chose to make her utopia vegetarian is interesting, to say the least. In Herland, there is no war, conflict, or domination. Well, Gilman covered that: the women reproduce reproduce via parthenogenesis, or asexual reproduction.Īccording to the author, this leads to an ideal society – a utopia. “But what about reproduction?” you might ask. That’s right: it’s been centuries since there have been men in Herland. In Herland, three men stumble upon a society made up exclusively of women – and this society has been this way for many, many years. This novel, published in Gilman’s magazine The Forerunner in 1915, does not shy away from subverting the male-dominated system. Herland is the second book in a series, but it can easily be read on its own.

Herland book