In Competition No. 2889 you were invited to submit an extract from an imaginary novel written from the perspective of a female chauvinist author.

There are man-haters everywhere, it seems, from children’s telly to high culture. Charges of sexism have been levelled against the creators of the Daddy Pig character in Peppa Pig. Daddy is portrayed as a hopeless bumbling idiot while Mummy Pig is the embodiment of good sense. And Harold Bloom argues that there is ‘a strong element’ of misandry in Shakespeare (whereas misogyny, he says, is hard to find). Commendations to Sergio Michael Petro and Sandra McGregor. The winners take £30 each; Adrian Fry gets £35.
 

Looking down at the dead girl, Detective Inspector Malmsey vowed to find her killer, the catch in his voice signifying both his self-importance at the apex of a phallocentric hierarchy and the arousal of his flaccid libido by a woman whose passivity and unreadable blankness rendered her sufficiently undemanding for sentimental objectification. The case would demand total concentration; a diet of vindaloo and whisky, total dereliction of familial responsibilities and the maintenance of a temper shorter than a list of famous female classical composers. Male hegemony excused such eccentricities; even his unironed shirts proved badges of dedication, not cause for disciplinary action. Whether aggressively harrying suspects or hypocritically reprimanding subordinates for misogynistic canteen banter, Malmsey would take complete responsibility for the case, monotasking his way to an insecure conviction, testosterone pumping too hard to permit his glancing into the victim’s diary where the perpetrator’s identity had been astutely anticipated. Typical!
Adrian Fry
 
The dismayed voice came from behind her: ‘I’ve tried switching it off then on again, but it doesn’t help.’ It meant Roger’s ancient PC was down again.

‘Have you tried running a full scan with credible antivirus software?’ Hillary made god-help-me faces as she answered.

‘A what?’

‘Never mind. Go and feed the cat and I’ll reconnect you.’ By the time Roger returned to enquire where the cat food was she had restored his screen and was emailing instructions to her New York and Tokyo offices while planning a dinner-party menu and trying on some new shoes.

Men, she thought with amusement: once scientifically bred to remove their aggressive Alpha mentality, they were throwbacks, amiable but un-evolved simpletons who struggled with the most basic of tasks and hunted old DVDs of Top Gear in the Outer Zone markets. And to think they’d once had the vote.
G.M. Davis
 
‘Good morning, Fiona. We rise and shine, do we not?’ The Professor of Moral Theology’s cruel rapist’s thoughts were shielded by his assumed look of benign wisdom, but Fiona felt the vicious double-entendre like a punch in the face. None of the other men in the SCR raised a voice in protest as they chatted about football, complained of man ’flu or swapped vagina jokes in a cloud of cheap aftershave. By lunchtime they’d be in the pub, pumping up their egos with the alcohol that gave them the bravado to grope secretaries and expose themselves to cleaners before heading home to beat their wives.

Fiona’s field survey had established that 68 per cent would do just that, hence those big swinging dicks of the all-male editorial board at Contemporary Social Studies had returned it with a snotty comment, invalidating women’s knowledge.But phallocracy would not last for ever.
Basil Ransome-Davies
 
His sense of entitlement enraged her as he shuffled his zimmer on to the zebra crossing and waved his white stick in a phallocentric gesture of domination. To avoid losing speed she had to hand him off, rugby-style. He slumped to the kerb, doubtless concocting feelings of victimhood. She cycled on to the lab.

Bad news. Crispin, her clueless post-doc, had overheated the chromatids and, yet again, left the lid up on the centrifuge so that his homogenate had splattered everywhere. She sent him, disgraced, to the fume-cupboard to vaporise some rogue zygotes. Naturally he didn’t understand the real objective of their research: PRYC (planned redundancy of the Y chromosome) aimed ultimately to eliminate involvement of males in human reproduction.

From the fume-cupboard came sounds of an explosion, Crispin’s screams, then the smell of burning flesh. Driven by primeval, selfish male instinct, he seemed determined to sabotage the whole project.
Hugh King
 
‘Do you not think Jane Fairfax would make a good match for Mr Churchill?’ asked Mrs Weston.

‘And why should not Mr Churchill make a good match for Jane Fairfax?’ replied Gemma. ‘Though, in truth, whether subject or object in the sentence, she would be subject to him in real life within the male-privileged hegemony. Besides, we must acknowledge the latent heteronormativity in this assumption. Could not Jane Fairfax be equally happy in a relationship with Harriet Smith?’

‘But does not a wife benefit from the direction of her husband?’ said Mrs Weston.

‘Why, that old trope!’ responded Gemma. ‘And when did a man ever ask for directions?’

‘What does Mr Woodhouse think of the match?’ asked Mr Weston.

‘Gender-typically, he thinks no further than his man flu,’ replied Gemma.

‘Will you stay and drink another cup of tea with us?’ asked Mrs Weston. ‘Remind me, do you take sugar?’
Philip Machin

No. 2892: consequences

You are invited to submit an irregular quatrain, in which you bring together two rhymed people from the world of the arts and then add a couplet describing the consequences. Here is an example: ‘If Damon Runyon/ Had met John Bunyan/ Might Harry the Horse/ Have taken a different course?’ Please email entries to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 1 April.