Does our writing reflect who we are as a person? If someone put a book in front of you and told you to read the entire thing, would you be able to tell if a male or female wrote it?
If someone did not know that J.K. Rowling wrote all of the Harry Potter book, would they know that a woman wrote it? Or if someone read the Notebook would they guess that Nicholas Sparks, a male, wrote it?
It is a tough question, but I do believe that men and women write differently. I think that each gender takes a different approach on how they write. They write their characters differently, the emotions, their tones, their word choice, etc.
I AM NOT SAYING THAT ONE GENDER IS A BETTER WRITER THAN THE OTHER! (Girls rule, boys drool)
Now that I am thinking on this subject, all of my favorite books were written by male writers. I am more into the science fiction types of books and all of the ones I have read were written by men.
Some can argue that male writers get to the point sooner, jump directly into the story and don’t hold back. Other people can argue that male writers are too blunt and they don’t have any build up or background on the story for their readers.
Every writer is different.
The Publishing Culture 
I agree with you that men and women write somewhat differently, much in the same way that they think differently and speak differently. Obviously, there are exceptions; writing style is always a reflection of a person as a whole and what influences them. This post made me think about all the things that influence a person’s style. There are probably certain things that influence men and women in different ways and result in different writing styles.
LikeLike
Do you think that all of your favorite books are written by men because you prefer their style, or because you simply haven’t read enough books written by women? I mean, I’m on the same boat as you. I’m a classics girl and all of my favorite books have also been written by men, but I try to rationalize that with the fact that until (fairly) recently, women weren’t published nearly as often as men were, and even though the percentage of women writers has definitely gone up, equality is till far away.
VIDA, an American association for women in the literary arts, has compiled some really interesting statistics on the gender disparity between men and women in publishing, which you can look at here: http://www.vidaweb.org/the-count-2010/
LikeLike
While it’s probably popular to write the narrative in the gender of the writer, we know It’s not always the case. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein in the perspective of a man and I would have never known the difference. Horror books and psychological thrillers aren’t all written by murderers after all, the author assumes the role of the characters they wish to describe. It might be fair to suggest therefore that a talented author remains incognito behind the veil of the pages, when the character doesn’t reflect their own image. I think ultimately that a female writer might resonate as such, if her plot is built around female or feminine characters. However, if a female writer wishes to employ a muscular bearded man as her protagonist, wouldn’t she do best develop her style accordingly?
LikeLike