A wind of change and opening has been blowing on the literary world since the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020 at the hands of a white police officer in Minneapolis. Denial is no longer possible. Initiatives abound, free dispatch of manuscripts for black writers, free editorial advice from publishers, initiatives to fund the cost of applications for writers’ residencies and more. Visibility is an important step in building a career as a writer.
In America when a white editor passes on a manuscript, a story or a poem written by a person of colour because it is hard to understand the work or to feel a connection, you need to understand the racial makeup of publishing: White (83%), Hispanic (5%), Asian (4%), Mixed race (4%), Black and African American (3%).
Cúirt International Festival of Literature and National University of Ireland Galway developed Breaking Ground Ireland, a landmark project showcasing and celebrating writers and illustrators from ethnic minority backgrounds from the island of Ireland. I had the opportunity to join the first cohort of Diversifying Irish Poetry, a sustainable mentorship program in Ireland for poetry critics from under-represented, minority ethnic groups whose access to critical culture is hindered by structural racism and migration. This program supported by Irish Research Council, Poetry Ireland and Maynooth University run in collaboration with Ledbury Poetry Critics, lead to publication in mainstream print and online platforms. In summary talent is nothing without opportunities and authors like me need more opportunities.
At first sight we could rejoice at all this passion but wisdom calls on us to be more prudent as, like every phenomenon born from legitimate emotion, it rises and then falls even faster. In other words, should we see it as a passing fad or as a groundswell?
I lean more towards it being a fashion trend as the way in which things are done is more like a headlong rush to plug a loophole rather than a considered strategy for a real, long-term and in-depth change. Guardians are committed to participating in the ongoing conversation and practice regarding inclusion and equity. To this end, they encourage submissions from underrepresented voices and writers from marginalized communities. However it is one thing to encourage participation and another to get resources to understand and ultimately published literary works of transformative power from historically marginalized writers.
It’s not enough to say “let’s open the temple doors” for a few hours, the mechanism of exclusion must be fully understood in order to implement measures to have an effect over the longer term.
First, it’s necessary to understand who these temple guardians are and what logic is inspiring their actions. The temple guardians that I call “guardians” in a wish for simplicity are the individuals who decide the present and the future of a given discipline. Depending on the situation they will defend the status quo, they will promote a system that everything seems to discredit or will be open to change.
You will find in this category interns working in the publishing industry, literary agents, contest judges, the selection committee, the writers, the literary critics and finally the publishing houses. Some, if not the majority, have a BA or an MFA in Creative Writing thus comparable minds. Humankind is like that and functions better with everything that is familiar to them. Homo Sapiens are odd, emotional creatures. We are all the products of our families, of our respective environments and of our reading and intellectual influences.
The process for the evaluation and selection of literary works does not escape this logic. Thus, from the creation of the work to its publication the chain of selection is dominated by individuals who share the same tastes and opinions. For this reason we find ourselves faced with the phenomenon of the social reproduction of the elite. What is deemed talent is thus defined by a closed group. No ill-will or vice should be seen in this but simply an implacable logic that wants human beings to turn towards the familiar. One hundred and fifty generations of intellectuals have read Ulysses, eight generations have read Gilgamesh and perhaps only one generation has read Soundjata Keita. Thus, it is a purely mechanical question. When the guardians find themselves deciding on the fate of a work, a consensus will come about more easily around something that speaks to each of them. It is not necessary to darken the picture more than needed. Sometimes you will find some representatives of minorities at the heart of these decision structures but without any real power. They will be seen at worst like token samples and at best as in-house experts of a particular genre to get the majority group off the hook and above all let them avoid making the necessary effort at training. Is a literary critic who has not read the authors promoting the black cause equipped, or above all, legitimately justified to judge an author whose works deal precisely with the black cause? Such a critic may give an opinion on the style but their work will not be fairly judged if the critic does not understand the subject in a more general way. The temple guardian must not be excluded or disqualified but must do the work necessary to be well informed and educated. Simone de Beauvoir was rebuked for writing about the female condition while not being a mother herself. She explains in a clear way that her work as a sociologist deals with the question of all women and that it’s not necessary to be a crow to write about crows. Similarly, I believe that it is not necessary to be Black or be part of a minority to decide to work on the subject but there should be an intellectual effort made to acquire some knowledge.
Readers form an idea of making a choice in their reading through the prism of the guardians’ expertise. Readers have the illusion of choosing books themselves but, in reality, the choice is already made for them well in advance. The reader thinks he or she is free but in fact is a prisoner of the guardians’ prejudices. Infernal cycle. According to the New York Times article “Just How White Is the Book Industry?” by Richard Jean So and Gus Wezerek, only 11% of books published in 2018 were by black authors.
This figure will certainly increase in the coming years. Black writers are going to be confronted by malicious attacks and attacks on the requirement of their legitimacy. They will be told that their publications are due to Floyd’s death and not because of their talent. In short, they serve as a quota. Women know the same attacks today on their legitimacy. In business companies’ men think and say that women who get a promotion don’t merit it. The nomination is made simply because it’s in keeping with the times . These men, the majority of them white, in fact refuse to accept competition from newly arrived women or visible minorities. For centuries, the white man was a protected species who is now wakening to a society where he has to accept being in competition. A hard awakening.
As a black author, from a visible minority, to communicate and survive in a world dominated by the predominant white culture of the guardians, i must have read the classics of the Western world. In addition, I must read the authors who are close to my preoccupations and my battles. I must have read Arthur Rimbaud, Thomas Mann, Goethe, Gérard de Nerval, Jane Austen, Fernando Pessoa, Sylvia Plath, Heinrich Böll, Victor Hugo, Grazia Deledda, James Joyce, Albert Camus, Sigmund Freud, Giacomo Leopardi, Walt Whitman, Assamala Amoi, Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn, Patrick Modiano, Harold Pinter, René Char, J.M.G Le Clézio, William Faulkner, W.B.Yeats, John Steinbeck, Dino Buzzati, Emile Zola, Günter Grass, William Shakespeare or Emily Dickinson but also António Jacinto, Cheikh Hamidou Kane, Léon Gontran Damas, David Diop, Jean- Joseph Rabearivelo, Ntyugwetondo Rawiri , Etzer Vilaire, Jean-Baptiste Cinéas, Zora Neale Hurston, Achille Mbembe, Martial Sinda, Joseph Zobel, Amiri Baraka, Lucille Clifton, James Baldwin, Beryl Gilroy, Mame Younousse Dieng, Olivia Umurerwa Rutazibwa, Cheikh Anta Diop, Trifonia Melibea Obono, Jessie Redmon Fauset , Stokely Carmichael, Ntozake Shange, Ferdinand Oyono, Suzanne Césaire, Alioune Diop, Nicolas Guillen, Jacques Stephen Alexis, Maryse Condé, Claude Mac Kay, Hemley Boum, Es’kia Mphahlele, Gloria Jean Watkins alias bell hooks, Diana Ferrus, Maximin Daniel, Ousmane Socé, Nele Marian, Bernard Dadié, Guy Tirolien, Denise Ferreira Da Silva, Samuel-Martin Eno Belinga, Aïda Mady Diallo , Teresa Cárdenas, Phillis Wheatley, Florent Couao-Zotti, Karen Press, Anténor Firmin, Tchichellé Tchivela, Derek Walcott, Ana Paula Tavares, Countee Cullen, René Maran, Jean-Claude Bajeux, Yambo Ouologuem, Okot p’Bitek, Ndouna Depenaud , Nawal El Saadawi, Camara Laye, Octavia Butler, René Depestre, Nadia Yala Kisukidi, Audre Lorde, Haki R. Madhubuti, Alex La Guma, Edouard Glissant, Yara Nakahanda Monteiro, Mariama Bâ, Emmanuel Dongala, Henrietta Cordelia Ray, Seloua Luste Boulbina, Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida, Léopold Sédar Senghor, C. L. R. James, Toni Morrison, Ken Bugul, Bernard Nanga, Sony Labou Tansi, Amy Ashwood Garvey, Namwali Serpell, Anaïs Duplan, Yassmin Abdel-Magied, Steve Biko, Gwendolyn Brooks, Seloua Luste Boulbina, Mongo Beti, Aminatta Forna, Ousmane Sembène, Paulina Chiziane, Peter Abrahams, Aminata Sow Fall, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Tanella Boni, Cheik Aliou Ndao, Pagni Aminata, Olympe Bhêly-Quénum, Birago Diop, Andaiye, Aimé Césaire, Zuleica Romay Guerra, John Henrik Clarke, Chinua Achebe, Bessie Head, Seydou Badian Kouyaté, Vangile Gantsho, Pierre Louis Monchoachi , Hortense Spillers, Patrice Lumumba, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nascimento Beatriz, Juliana Makuchi Nfah-Abbenyi, Williams Sassine, Yaba Badoe, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Aoua Kéita, Jean Price-Mars, Gaspard and Françoise Towo-Atangana, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Elizabeth Éwombè Moundo, Amílcar Cabral, Louis-Joseph Janvier, Chester Himes, Pepetela, Barbara Chase-Riboud, Thomas Sankara, May Ayim, Sarah Parker Redmond, Jean-Baptiste Tati Loutard, Lamine Senghor, Leila Aboulela, Jean Price–Mars, Goretti Kyomuhendo, Rashidah Ismaili, Wangui wa Goro and others.
And if my literary production is influenced by the work of Cornelis Gerhard Anton de Kom, María Dámasa Jova Baró, Ama Ata Aidoo, Awa Thiam, Tchicaya U Tam’si, Deolinda Rodrigues Francisco de Almeida, Jacques Roumain, Frederick Douglass, Buchi Emecheta, Manuel Rui, Linton Kwesi Johnson, Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Wole Soyinka, Valentin-Yves Mudimbe, Cheikh Aliou Ndao, Djibril Tamsir Niane, Naguib Mahfouz, Edouard Maunick, Lorraine Hansberry, Frantz Fanon or Frankétienne and the publication of my writing is decided by someone who has not read these authors and, as a consequence, is not able to understand my work, then this writing will fall through the cracks. It is necessary to read and understand a text before being able to promote it in a reading panel. The process of exclusion does not rest only on the basis of a racial factor but rather on an intellectual and cultural base, on an experience and on know-how. Books written by Black authors are given only brief notice by critics of the literary establishment because they did not understand Black authors. Race plays a part of it but also culture, intellectual influence and personal experience.
If it is necessary to have a multiracial personnel in the chain of decision, there must also be guardians who have knowledge about general culture that will allow them to be receptive and understand different works. First example “Please note that we do not consider unsolicited pitches for interviews, portfolios, or reviews. Our content is generated in-house by the editorial staff and its contributing editors.” In simple language: social reproduction of the guardians. Editorial staff and contributing editors share the same background and the same profile.
Second example. The main criterion for selection is quality, but the best way to determine what might be accepted is to read what has already been published. In simple language: social reproduction of the guardians. If you want to be published, write and think like us. Period.
Let’s take some additional factual examples:
Every author, whether White, Black, Asiatic or Latino must publish in order to exist; their writing must be submitted to literary journals or reviews directed by guardians who, without being hostile, at the very least don’t have the keys to understanding some writers. Thus, there is a pure statistical logic that will mean that the authors who will be able to publish the most will be those authors who have lots in common with the guardians. We will then enter into a “snowball effect”: the more you get published, the more you establish your reputation as an author and the more doors that will open to you. You will find an agent more easily, be invited to become a special editor for an issue or you will be asked to choose in your turn 50% of the texts by means of a call to contributions within your network, indeed you will exclude those who are not part of it. The infernal cycle. Even when the judge of a literary competition is from a minority group the finalist texts submitted for assessment are selected by a majority of white readers.
The financial aspect must also be taken into account. It would be a euphemism to say that emerging writers are not rich. Some literary journals accept manuscripts without any fees but for the vast majority it’s necessary to pay on average USD3 and the bill can mount quite rapidly. For a file for literary residency you must pay on average USD20. For a literary competition there is an average of USD15 to be paid. And I’m not even mentioning the costs of creative writing courses.
Solutions exist with the boom of self-publishing. You can publish a book of poetry or fiction online but once again, as a writer from a visible minority, you are going to encounter a new form of exclusion. If another writer wants to write a review of your book well then getting this review published will be hard. Traditional literary journals only accept book reviews published by the mainstream publishing houses. The message is very clear and simple: We do not review work that has been self-published. The classic path of publication is full of obstacles and you are not admitted onto parallel routes. In a nutshell, double jeopardy.
The literary world needs to have a greater openness of mind in order to offer to the public works that engage with all the problems of modern society. Works of marginalized writers get labelled as “untold” or “hidden” stories, this is wrong. These narratives are already out there; they just haven’t been invested in. As a Black author, a French writer with ethnic origins in Angola and in Cabinda, I have more work published in the English-speaking world than in my birth and home country France. The short stories “Isidore” published in 2009 in Afroeuropa: Journal of Afroeuropean Studies and later republished in Grain Magazine (2019) in Canada, “Fanta” published in Fiction International (2016) in USA or “Ramata” published in Wizard in Space also in USA (2017) talk about all the disturbing topics of European and Western society (racial or ethnic profiling, police violence, racism, access to employment or the condition of black women in French and European society). These works are not widely published in France or in Europe because they do not speak to the French or European guardians. The main criterion for selection is not only literary quality and merit but also a connection between the decision maker and a specific cause.
Having negative stereotypes of other groups is, like it or not, a rather normal vice in all societies. There is nothing we can do about it. But when the stereotypes become a way to block a group from search of happiness and a normal life, employment, education, opportunities, expose a group to police brutality and violence, and they are repeated again and again all over the world , this is something else. This is a danger for democracy.
Floyd’s death is the metaphor of our society. A black man on the ground with a white man’s knee stopping him from breathing. The white man going about his business because he thinks that the black man is exaggerating when he describes his condition. The video of the death puts an end to denial. It is no longer possible to look elsewhere.
Floyd’s death is not only the death of a Black man. It is the death of a human: a friend, a father, a son, an uncle, a nephew, a brother, a brother in law.
I walk around with the poem “L’homme qui te ressemble” by René Philombe. The writer and the poet must be a watcher on the tower looking for danger then responding to it with verses of hope:
“Nos Morts”
Lorsque nos morts seront les leurs
Lorsque nos larmes sècheront
sur leurs joues
Alors
Alors seulement
Nous cesserons de rougir
Nous cesserons de jaunir
Nous cesserons de noircir
Nous cesserons de blanchir
Et de notre gosier renversé
S`élèvera la juste et frêle devise :
Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité.
“Our dead”
When our dead will be theirs
When our tears will dry
On their cheeks.
Then
Only then
Will we stop going red
Will we stop going yellow
Will we stop going black
Will we stop going white
And from our back-tilted throats
Will rise the just and frail slogan:
Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.
Inequality is a danger for society as it affects one of the cornerstones of the human race: hope.
And hope is the oxygen of democracy. If the guardians finally understand that, perhaps the words of Gianna, George Floyd’s daughter, will have meaning: “Daddy changed the world”.
¹Prince of minerals, first of the dead buried in the city of the wind (Angola/Cabinda)