description of the quest for manliness to being right wing, puritanical, cowardly, neurotic and fueled largely by a fear of woman. Taken as a group in total there is really no evidence to support that, but the exaggeration allows you to accept in some part and slight agreement with it, especially when it comes to neuroticism.The author then goes into a description of clothing, again exaggerating that all men who want to be considered real men needed to dress like cowboys and walk with a swagger. Though there are a good many men who are considered manly and have never set foot in a western wear store, the generalization and exaggeration, makes its point that immediate image of a man is the Marlboro man, not Richard Simmons. He does the same thing when talking about how a male writer had to be an outdoorsman to be considered a real writer while a woman writer nearly need to be a mother in order to be taken serious. He throws up the image of Hemingway, and indeed Hemingway does have that notion of a mans man, but Hemingway is by no means the only writer. A Tom Clancy, who would be considered to write about manly actions, is more like the typical lawyer that he is than he is like Hemingway, but again, the idea is to set up an image that can then be toned down.It is also here where he begins to reveal the ultimate idea behind the story, not that man have it rough or that he doesnt want to be a manly man, but that he feels that his distain for sports and actions, in some way negates his ability as a writer, as if writing was a contact sport rather than a mental pursuit. Does he really hate being a man, no, but what does bother him is that he would prefer to have his writing judge along with those efforts put out by women, rather than being classified as a male writer. Perhaps somewhere in the middle, is a place where all writers can be considered for what is on the paper and not for how they live their lives.Ultimately, what he reveal...
