Can men write women?

I just finished reading The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde. Silly, fun book but the main character, literary investigator Thursday Next - left me a little...flat. She didn't seem like a credible woman. She was strong, independent and stubborn - but was strangely alienating in her desire to marry the man she loved.

To me, she seemed like a man's mind put into a woman's body.

It makes me wonder - can men REALLY write women?

I'm thinking of Stiegg Larrsson's Lisbeth Salander or the women of Fitzgerald's books - they were certainly interesting and captivating characters but were they credible women? Was Dickens eccentric Miss Havisham and cold calculating Estella real women? Compared to the Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre or her sister's Catherine in Wuthering Heights - male authors seem to make their female characters, unique - more than just the typical "woman". While their men tend to be more often than not, typical Joes that do something extraordinary.

What do you think? Who are your favourite female book characters? Can men write women? And how about women writing men?