Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/02/05/american-dirt-was-too-big-to-f.html
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The “glass floor” strikes again: the powerful and influential people and institutions that invested themselves in this author weren’t going to allow her to fail. See also Stephen Glass, Jonah Lehrer, James Frey, and countless other wunderkinds in the media-industral complex.
Also, this is a must-read:
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Hey remember when Green Book won an Oscar?
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5 posts were split to a new topic: Arena Acts
I loved LOVED Lovecraft Country. I was mildly disappointed to learn the author was a “white dude”. Ultimately though? I don’t really care. Is this novel executed so poorly? Not going to read it just not something that would show up on my reading lists. Authors need to be able to write about characters that are outside of their personal experience so I hope the anger is more about the execution or the way it was promoted than calling it “brown face” because the author’s a different ethnicity then her characters.
Somewhat related I’ve been listening to audio books lately. Almost all of them are narrated by a single voice actor. I’ve been listening to a sci-fi novel that centers on a Midwest business man in Thailand. I kind of cringe whenever the presumably white male narrator speaks the part of any of the Asian Characters with an accent. Is there a backlash to this? or is this “acceptable” ? I don’t believe there is any malice on the part of the voice actor it’s not Simpson’s Apu level of disrespectful/mockery at all…just doesn’t sit right with me.
1. Research is only the beginning, and barely even that.
12. Have you considered The Why, and have you considered The No?
This process requires soul searching and feeling uncomfortable. Without discomfort, we can’t grow. Sometimes, folks skip over the most basic questions: Why do you feel it falls to you to write someone else’s story? Why do you have the right to take on another’s voice? And should you do this? The answer isn’t always no — as writers, we are constantly entering other people’s heads. But too often we don’t stop to consider whether it’s the right thing to do. Sometimes, the answer is no.
Don’t fret over the fact that it’s Buzzfeed, Daniel José Older knows what he’s talking about here. Frankly, I will take his word and experience dealing with the publishing industry as an “other” before I will Stephen King and certainly before random commenters on a blogsite.
Based on her own admissions, Jeanine Cummings fell down at the first hurdle.
Oh, and despite the defensive white people in the comments to that article, he’s not saying “don’t write anyone different from you”, he is saying be careful how you do it. Because it is very easy – especially when coming from a dominant culture and writing about one with lesser power – to fuck it up royally.
Also:
But her critics did. Yet even here, there’s people looking to defend the “poor author”.
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Quick white women! To the book stores to save Oprah’s pick!!! /s
Ugh… fellow white women… stooooooooop.
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Who’s defending her here? there aren’t that many comments here.
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Makes me think of Ready Player One, the movie rights to which were sold long before the book was even published.
(I guess the film version of Armada is still happening? Seems a lot of people were even more profoundly dissatisfied with that book.)
Really? I remember reading Ready Player 1 and thinking this could never be a movie b/c securing the rights to everything in it would be near impossible. I really enjoyed the book, the movie was forgettable but not sure how it could’ve succeeded really.
@MalevolentPixy said “in the comments to that article”, which clearly referred to the article to which she linked at the beginning of her comments.
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50% of the references in the book (Ready Player One) were to Steven Spielberg properties. So there was one obvious choice.
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