For the Sake of Grace

For the Sake of Grace is a 1969 short story by Suzette Haden Elgin.

"For the Sake of Grace" depicts a patriarchal world in which women are virtually barred from higher learning. A young girl, in defiance of the example set by her aunt (condemned to live in solitude for attempting to take the poetry exam), desires to also take the exam.

Intertextuality

• "The Two of Them" by Joanna Russ took the characters and settings from Elgin's short story "For the Sake of Grace".

Publications

• F&SF May 1969
• Donald Wollheim & Terry Carr's World's Best Science Fiction: 1970
• Isaac Asimov's Wonderful Worlds of Science Fiction #2: The Science Fictional Olympics, ed. Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg & Charles G. Waugh (Signet 1984)
• The Norton Book of Science Fiction, ed. Ursula K. Le Guin and Brian Attebery, Norton 1993

Commentary, reviews, analysis

• * Paul Brians, "Notes on Selected Stories from The Norton Book of Science Fiction", Aug. 25, 2005.

"What effect does it have on this story that it is set in such an extremely sexist future? Are the lessons conveyed by this story applicable in any way to our own culture, which is much less sexist? What ancient culture historically valued people primarily on the basis of their knowledge of poetry?"