Women read more and engage more. Yet in 2021, only 37.8 percent of total works registered in Spain were credited to a single author. Industry experts consulted by EFE point to unequal conditions for creation and argue that publishers should maintain a peer catalogue to improve balance.
The latest edition of the study Reading habits and buying books in Spain shows that in spare time, a higher share of women read than men. In Spain, 69.6 percent of women read for pleasure, compared with 59 percent of men, a difference observed under the oversight of the Ministry of Culture.
Despite reading more, women are underrepresented in authorship: data from registered works indicate that 61.8 percent of the 66,371 books registered in Spain in 2021 were authored by men, while 37.8 percent were by women. The remainder includes collective publications or works registered under institutions or organizations. These figures reflect a broader pattern of gender imbalance in the literary landscape not only in Spain but in comparable markets as well.
For years the discourse has highlighted how women are rendered invisible and how their creative output is undervalued. A long-standing challenge is to recognize the value of women writers and to ensure they have access to the resources and networks that support sustained creative work. Montserrat Gatell, a collaborative professor at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya and a researcher in the arts and humanities, emphasizes that the evaluation of women’s contribution should consider its longer-term impact as part of the cultural canon.
Gatell notes that historically many societies restricted access to literacy and knowledge for women. From antiquity, women faced fewer opportunities to study and to participate in the production of knowledge. This historical imbalance is often cited to explain why the path to influential literary status was so uneven for women and why some arguments about opportunity persist in discussions of equality today.
Virginia Woolf in her famous essay A Room of One’s Own argued for a monthly income for women writers to sustain their work and create space for independent writing. The phrase a room is a metaphor for securing the necessary physical and mental conditions for creation. Gatell adds that the system has at times treated women as primarily caregivers, which can limit the time and energy available for literary pursuits.
Laura Huerga, editor and founder of Raig Verd Editorial, also spoke about publishing inequality. She describes a persistent concern among the industry and notes that even though women represent half the population, their share in publication output does not reflect that proportion. Each publishing house carries responsibility for building a parity catalogue that consistently includes women authors and women-focused perspectives.
Huerga highlights that literature by women often explores different themes and viewpoints, offering fresh perspectives on social and cultural life. The ongoing conversation frames women’s literature as not only a matter of representation but also a source of diverse storytelling that resonates with readers who seek varied human experiences.
There is a growing sense that readers want more stories told from women’s perspectives, a trend reflected in recent publishing outcomes. Yet debates persist about how parity is defined in practice, and whether appearances of female authors in a single title or anthology suffice to claim equality. Critics argue that parity must be measured across publishing lists, awards, and recognition in the literary community, not just in isolated instances.
Despite the push for equal recognition, historic disparities remain visible in literary awards. Since the Nobel Prize in Literature was established in 1901, only a fraction of laureates have been women. In Spain, prize distributions also reveal gaps: only a small number of Cervantes Prize recipients have been women, and the Planeta Prize has seen fewer women winners relative to men since its inception. These statistics highlight the ongoing work needed to broaden access to prize recognition and ensure fair evaluation of merit across genders. A broader, more inclusive approach to judging literary achievement could help demonstrate the value of women’s writing within the national and international literary communities.