Well, Clive, all I can say is that this has been my experience, and the experience of many men I know. They sit there in filth and squalor and see nothing that needs doing - the women see it all, and can't bear to leave it messy.

Here is a graph of household work-loads from the UK:

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/CCI/nugget.asp?ID=288

And note this statistical fact:

Women were also much more likely than men to say they ‘like’ most household tasks.

Pat, bravo, and well-said.

Poetry, we know, is not exactly sought after by the masses...why fight about gender between us, create segregated boards, take on yet another cause in the mix when we should be united, men and women poets, spending our time writing, honing and promoting it ?

I agree. This reminds me of a quote I have posted on the site before, but there are always new readers:

"A class concept does fundamental injustice to the complexities and idiosyncrasies of individuals, who are by definition distinct from one another, and only alike in vague and gross ways. To know any individual, you do worst by starting off with the widest category she or he belongs to and do best by being most precise. I cannot ever know myself 'as a man', and can never find my 'true manhood', 'essential masculinity', etc. The class concept exists only as an abstraction, apart from actual human beings, each one different, none exactly fitting any class definition, unless that definition is to be diluted beyond significance.

The whole bloody planet - its species, primordial peoples, biosphere, differentiated languages, gene pools - is sliding fast into extinction. As the ship goes down, does it matter whether it's men or women who are the first to drown? Even victims can pull an oar."

- James Hillman

Although some men can't be bothered to to be neat, I do find that a lot of such men, their sloppy bachelor years behind them, eventually link up with a neat and organised woman who provides them with these things without them having to take the time themselves. That must be really great to know that there are so many women out there able and willing to provide these things! I can't imagine what that would feel like, to have such things taken care of. I have also known many women writers going into relationships with some ideal of sharing, genuinely and equally, but then finding that, lo and behold, their partners are just not good at cleaning, organising, or all the myriad things that comprise a domestic support system.

I too read the article on women in education. It reminded me that so many more women attend poetry workshops, and apparently are the main readers. So where are all these educated women in government/business/publishers/journals? Why do the numbers of women published not reflect this? Why do all the articles in same papers reiterate over and over how women still do lion's share of housework? Because the guys are, quite simply not good at it? I can less good at that too, especially if there's someone else who will do it for me? Why do the articles go on about pay inequalities? These articles just confirm the problem. (And of course one needs to see why boys are doing less well, which doesn't seem to affect their career prospects however!) Seeing this article about women doing so well in education just raises more questions.

Why do all the articles in same papers reiterate over and over how women still do lion's share of housework? Because the guys are, quite simply not good at it?

It's not so much that men aren't good at housework, Eva, but they just don't feel the necessity of it, as women TEND to. (All of these statements are generalised, Clive, and there will always be many exceptions.) So if the kitchen sink is full of dishes, men TEND to feel easier about leaving them there than women do. Men of course can be trained to do such things (for instance, I would never leave my mother's kitchen in a mess, because I know it would make her unhappy. My filth is confined entirely to my own quarters.)

But the biggest element in time for women would surely have to be children. And until the full-term test-tubes babies come on line, I can't see this factor changing. It is the main element, I think, in all of the questions you ask above.

Here is an interesting discussion, with some more stats.

http://feminism.suite101.com/article...f_womens_roles

Being an old leftie (who has become an even older centre-ie), I still suspect that the major disadvantaging factor in terms of poetry publication - as in everything - is class. Of all the men and women featured in those po-thologies, I doubt that more than a handful of them will be working class.

Well, they (slovenly men) don't feel the necessity of cleaning up after themselves especially if someone else will do it for them... same is quite true of children, who are happy to leave their toys all over the floor for someone else to put away.

I am a much bigger slob than my husband, who is quite tidy. Over the years I have learned to be a bit more organized, and he has learned more or less to put up with my chaos, if it can be kept within certain parameters. He went to (male) boarding school, I grew up in a certain amount of chaos. Here, I think, nurture not nature! Or if it is nature, it is an individual character thing, not a gender one.

Childrearing is another matter.

We would--all of us--write more if we had a traditional "wife" (of either gender) handling all of our day-to-day hassles, or a housefull of servants. Some writers' colonies provide this sort of atmosphere for brief periods (I was unbelievably productive at Hawthornden for a month some years back, with no telephone, having meals prepared for me, laundry done, etc.). What a luxury! But it does tend to be easier, for instance, for male poets with small children to take advantage of these opportunities than female poets, who are often--not always but, sure, most of the time--the primary caregivers. I could not take advantage of a month somewhere now.

Mary, you may well be onto something about women being, in general, less prepared to put up with a string of rejection letters. My poems were rejected by everybody for years How did I put up with it. I just thought the buggers were wrong and put it out of my mind. Pehaps that ability to ignore unpleasant truths is quite male. A silly example. When England lose a cricket match I simply refuse t read about cricket for a week and pretend it hasn't happened. Is the ostrich mentality more male than female. I suspect so. What do the rest of you think? You think it's bollocks, don't you? Very well. I shall simply, as the man said, treat you with complete ignoral.

My first thought when I hear about men confining their mess to their own quarters is: who takes care of it in the shared quarters? This is the bit that often "goes without saying". Even without children, the running of lives is time-consuming.

And then my train of thought takes to me A Room of One's Own, since usually I have found (in my lifetime experience, and observing writer friends and others) that any studies or extra rooms tend to go the man first. As I say, this is by and large. I mean think of ten examples - without trying to find the exceptions - and see what the percentage is.

My wife has not cooked more than 100 meals in 30 odd years, has not ironed much more than that, we share the washing just about equally, she or our youngest folds the washing and cleaning is shared work. She is far more thorough at cleaning than I am.

I do not see what the hell this would have to do with poetry. All the comment here seems to be a re-hash of stereotyping.

So glad to hear about exceptions. I'm afraid that the both anecdotal and statistical evidence points to this situation being the exception. In terms of the time and support needed to be writer it has everything to do with writing, believe me. Not seeing the importance of this is part of the problem.

I am sorry Eva but there are none so blind...