Black Writers , your thoughts?

[richardmurray]

American Fiction Is Coming (for the Book World’s Neck)

By Zoe Guy, a news writer who covers film, TV, music, and celebrities

 

 

So you want Black representation in novels? Well, only a certain kind of Black story will sell in American Fiction. Jeffrey Wright stars as Monk in the trailer for Cord Jefferson’s directorial debut. He’s a poindexter writer type, frustrated by the fact that stereotypical “urban” novels dominate the Black book market. Nothing could have prepared him for a stop on Sintara Golden’s (Issa Rae) book tour, where the Oberlin-educated writer slips into cartoonish AAVE to read an excerpt from her latest. “Where are our stories? Where is our representation?” she says before reading, “Yo, Sharonda! Girl, you be pregnant again?” A white woman in the audience gives a standing ovation.

Monk might be just as upset over the minstrel-lite best sellers as he is over the fact that his own professorial books consistently flop. His ire leads him to jokingly write My Pafology, a book about a hardened gangster, based on the “true story” of his alter ego and pen name Stagg R. Leigh. To his shock, a publisher picks it up. Now, he must become the thing hates — a person who monetizes “Blackness” for white consumption. Worse, a white man just explained what a durag is on a call to discuss the book’s movie poster. The checks clearing might not be enough to tolerate all this. Jefferson’s satire is based on Erasure, Percival Everett’s 2001 novel. American Fiction lands in theaters in December. Stay tuned for real-life publishers asking, “Wait, is this movie about us?”

 

URL

https://www.vulture.com/article/american-fiction-trailer-cast-release-date.html

 

MY THOUGHTS

 

As a writer who knew and knows many Black Writers my problem with this film is the lack of a key point. No one is stopping anyone Black from buying the book of the Black writer played by Jeffrey Wright. No one. Jeffrey Wright's character isn't being blocked from making a book, it is on the market. It simply isn't selling. But whose fault is that. If a Black author publishes a book and it isn't selling then the Black book buying community either doesn't like it, hasn't found it, or didn't give it a chance. And the Black book buying community is free to do that but the idea that it is the white publishing firms who are to blame is false. Yes, white publishing firms support Black Urban Caricature literature. Yes, they do. But, in modern times, no one black has any excuse to not find Black literature  in all flavors. No one black has any excuse in modern media to not find a work by a black author that suit their taste. Find it folks. And if Black book buyers or film goers need white media firms advertisement campaigns to give black work a chance or to find black works then the problem is black buyers. 

 

My answer to the first question above is a book called Capoeira and the original Sun man. I would add my high john the conqueror book, but I think it is too big a publisher.

The second is over 50 . 

 

IN AMENDMENT

 

The point of the film is the owners of media in the usa , the money, are white+ don't allow for enough width of opportunity for those not white , in particular black folk.. And that is 100% correct. But, outside violence, what is the answer? You can't tell someone how to use their private money so... the only answer that can be controlled by back people is the creation of black publishing companies. But in modernity , the tools to publish independently are greater than ever before, so a proliferation of work from all writers is out there. The ability to have a successful publishing company financially is tough. But the idea that white owned publishing firms simply need to extend their opportunity for non whites is for me, not culturally honest. The USA isn't Star Trek.  

[Troy]

I watched the trailer but did not read your detailed response as I’ve want to see the movie first. I see it is based upon Percival Everett’s novel Erasure.

 

 Looks like I really should read that first.