Dee Savoy

Thanks to all of you with the fortitude to come back to this topic. As promised yesterday, this part of the piece will talk about books. Without a doubt, the landscape for black publishing has changed greatly in the last two decades. Time was, the only folks who could hope to be published were the Toni’s, the James’s and the W.E.B.’s of the world. These days black authors have exploded into every genre, from romance to mystery to horror to whatever, while still maintaining a literary tradition. For that I say whoopee!

But an interesting phenomenon has happened along side all this progress known as the blacks only fiction section of the bookstore. In my local Barnes and Noble it is right there in the front of the store, but in my mind it occupies the same spot at the back of the bus blacks were once relegated to.

There are some black readers and authors who see this as a bonus. For readers it is one-stop shopping. For authors, it ups the opportunity that their core market will be able to find their book. But that’s only the surface effect.

Back to Ms. Hill for a moment:

If we as a people sit back and allow another group of people to dictate where we can sell, what we can write, who it can be marketed to and where it can be shelved, then everything that our ancestors fought and died for was a waste.

Where the problem of ghettoization has arisen is in the intentional mis-education of the Negro. We’ve been hoodwinked, tricked, bamboozled into believing that the segregation of Black books is a good thing. We’ve been conditioned to return to that place when all the good Negroes stayed in their place, were happy with the shack down the road from the big house and the left overs tossed our way.

Because we have adapted to a society that sees us as inferior it’s simply easier to take what they give us and keep it moving. After all, if we really wanted to make a stink, somebody back then made it possible for us to do just that.

To me, this is the crux of the issue: who is determining where my and other books are placed and more importantly WHY. When most authors sit down to write, they don’t formulate their stories thinking to exclude readers. We write on universal themes anyone can enjoy. I don’t write for blacks or women, but for anyone who enjoys a good book. To relegate our work to the blacks only section cuts into potential sales and to marginalize black books, black authors and readers of every stripe.

Imagine you went to the bookstore and saw above a stack of books “Greek Fiction.” If you are not Greek, would you go to that table? You might, once, out of curiosity. But when you discovered that ALL Greek books were lumped together, as if the only thing of importance about them was that a Greek person wrote them, you had difficulty determining what was Greek romance, from Greek mystery, from Greek horror to Greek whatever, would you come back? Isn’t it easier to stick with tried and true divisions of books by genre? If a Greek book was there and it caught your attention, wouldn’t you buy it?

What bookstores do when they segregate fiction by race is to say that the only people who will find any value in the books placed in this section are people of the same race. If this is true, why is it that when I sign books in stores, I sell to a variety of people–rich, poor, old, young, white, black and everything in between. If my books are so lacking in interest to those outside my race, why have I sold to white grannies who put back books written by white authors so that they could afford to buy my books instead. Why is it when I read my fan mail, lots of readers tell me they are white or Hispanic or Pakistani or whatever and they have started reading more black romance or romantic suspense after reading my books? And I’m just one author.

This is not to say that I am running off catering to non-black readers. If the only folks who want to buy my books are black, that’s fine by me. But the bookstore shouldn’t be making sure that no one beside blacks gets a chance to see them.

Once more to Ms. Hill:

That’s what we’ve done with our literature, we’ve drifted off, so damned pleased that not only can we write and get published, we can write any piece of crap we want and it goes up on a shelf for sale. And while we are lulled by the fog of a full belly we got tricked into believing that life on the plantation is a good thing. “All you negras just stay ovah there, out da way.”

I bolded part of this text, because I think it is an important aspect of the black publishing industry. If you read the first part of this topic, you know what I think of the present state of hip-hop culture. It’s worse than an opiate to the masses, it’s an outright detriment. But now we have hip-hop literature, as well. Stories of thugs, hos, and other demimonde characters for our entertainment pleasure. Stories like these have been told for generations, but not with the frequency and financial backing from publishers they now receive. It seems that now that the publishing industry has determined that, yes, black folks do read and what they really want is criminals, over the top drama, and smut. Publishers are gobbling up these books to the point that many mainstream authors find they can no longer get a contract. Personally, I’m appalled.

To some extent, you can’t blame publishers–if that’s what people go out and buy, then why shouldn’t they produce more of it? To some extent, you can’t blame authors who, wanting to have a career that will sustain them financially, give readers what it appears they want. To some extent, you can’t blame readers, who clamor for stories about people who they feel they know or with whom they identify.

But what are we saying about the black community when the book that sells the most copies is the one that shows us at our worst. I’ve been at book signings where customers have told me they don’t read romance because it’s not real. Duh! By definition genre fiction is fantasy of one sort of another. Romance is a fantasy about love; mystery a fantasy about justice; horror/sci fi a fantasy about human nature. You pick your poison. But what many of these people mean is that they have bought into another fantasy–that black life is all about the ghetto, the bling and the booty. No other reality need apply.

Now in many circles I would get a lot of flack for what I’ve just said. I’d be accused of hating, being jealous or bringing negativity to the race. Well, I do hate this stuff, so what? Completely my prerogative to do so.

Am I jealous of their sales? You betcha! I’d love for my work to be read by more folks, but it doesn’t color my opinion of someone else’s work. If that were the case, I’d be calling James Patterson all kinds of (insert your favorite swear word here).

One of the most frequent arguments I hear as to why I should appreciate the urban/street lit genre is “They’re making money, they’re getting theirs. You should leave them alone.” Lots of things make money that serve no useful purpose. Do I need to get my Pet Rock out of the closet? By that logic, I should get my son to give up his paper route and sell drugs on the corner, since then he could make some real loot. After all, isn’t it the money involved that makes any endeavor worthwhile?

Am I bringing negativity? I don’t think so. To speak your mind and say you believe something is wrong is not being negative, it’s trying to bring about change. And if that is wrong, God help us all!

But I don’t seek to ban urban/street lit. It is a viable genre and those who read it and write it have every right to enjoy it. But let’s realize what it is: the same hip-hop glorification of the things in our community people used to work to escape.

One last visit to Ms. Hill:

But the root and foundation of every society throughout history can be found through their literature. They tried to bury our stories for centuries and they would have succeeded had it not been for the voices that would not be silenced.

And they are trying again, by giving us just enough of the American pie to appease us, while slowly and systematically continuing to relegate our stories to the shack, down the road and away from the big house. So that when company comes they won’t notice. They’ll just trot out the chosen few negras to show them off.

But there are voices now that will not be silenced, that are speaking up for the cause,for the right to be treated equally–because we should be. The question then will become; if a culture is judged by its literature what will history have to say about ours?

Good question, Ms. Hill. Anybody got an answer?

* Long-assed post