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Misty
Veteran Poster
Username: Misty
Post Number: 72
Registered: 02-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 11:27 pm: | 
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I've nioticed that almost every black author writes about relationships and family as well as culture. This ius all good but i wonder why wqe don't feel the need to write about anything else.
There's also a huge shortage of black detective stories and post modernist pieces.
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Doberman23
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Doberman23
Post Number: 213
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 12:23 pm: |
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there are plenty of black writers who write about all sorts of subjects. they just don't get noticed because they aren't talking about relationships, family, and culture. there are a bunch of sci-fi writers and comic book artist/creators who are black ... i'm willing to bet that you've never been to a comic convention.
*note that i am not saying that i have been to a comic book convention, but a friend of mine went to one and said it was kinda cool  |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1925
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 12:36 pm: |
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This has been a topic that has had wide discussion in the black science fiction and comic book fan worlds--and in some of the white fandom, too.
Basically it comes down to this. Most of the fans of this type of entertainment are adolescent white males. Not only that, geeky adolescent white males. They have not proved to be very supportive of this type of entertainment--my own view is that, regardless of what lots of sci fi fans think it is an escapist entertainment. These fans wish to escape from the unpleasantries of a real world and black people to them are one of these unpleasantries.
There are blacks who have written sci fi--few of them have written sci fi with black characters and those who have are not very popular.
There is a stream of feminist/womanyst African and African American sci fi but I would bet that few of their fans are the typical sci fi fan--ie the adolescent white male geek, and most of them are femnist and womanyst women and women of color.
Most of the consumers of black fiction are black women and if you want to write for them you are going to have to write what they like. |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1928
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 01:32 pm: |
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Here is what one of the earliest black sci fi writers, the late John Faucette, had to say about it
http://www.angelfire.com/scifi/johnfaucette3/road.html
BLACK SCIENCE FICTION
THE ROAD TO BLACK SCIENCE FICTION
I was born many years ago in Harlem of Dorothy Mae Mosley of Atmore, Alabama and John Matthew Faucette of Durham, North Carolina. They came north as young adults to escape the hate, poverty and lack of opportunity in the South.
I attended P.S. 184 on 116th Street in Harlem. In the sixth grade I wrote a story about spaceships battling for the moon and the teacher announced to our class that Emmett Till had been lynched.
I have never forgotten either.
I did not realize it then, but those two things would bring into being a black science fiction writer.
As I grew up there were two things there was no question of: I loved science fiction, read it every chance I got—to the exclusion of everything else, and I lived in a hostile racist world.
When I was a freshman at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, it occurred to me I could actually write science fiction. I looked for a story—could think of none. But I had grown up during the gang wars of Harlem—before drugs decimated them—and thought it all so stupid. One gang would kill a rival gang member in revenge of one of their own killed and then the other gang would seek to avenge its slain member. Gangs avenging members killed by other gangs formed an endless circle of retribution. And so I wrote the allegorical novel WARRIORS OF TERRA.
I sent it in over the transom to ACE BOOKS. To my surprise I received a rejection letter from Donald A. Wollheim saying the novel was too complicated for his readership, but he'd like to see something else if I had it.
Something else? I had nothing else. Except an anger at a world that had enslaved my people and lynched them and hated us. Science fiction is the literature of 'what if?' It is magnificent in that way. And so I said, what if we would have vengeance? How would it be accomplished? What would it take?
Most of what I'd read to that point and for many years after that was science fiction. I did not know how to tell a story any other way. And so an allegorical tale of black revenge was born: CROWN OF INFINITY. The remnants of a humanity slaughtered by an overwhelmingly powerful enemy take to space and multiply and study and train against the day of vengeance.
Over the years I received comments from editors telling me how awful that novel was, that it lacked dialogue, real scenes and characters. They all missed the point that it was simply a battle plan, a blueprint for the deliverance of a long overdue wrath.
Their remarks did alert me to the fact that the literature of ideas wanted more than ideas. If all you have read is science fiction, if all you care about are ideas, that leaves you at a serious disadvantage. But what black man in this racist land is not aware of living life at a disadvantage?
So I began a long program of trying to get better at the art of writing.
But before that time arrived, when the sword and sorcery genre was big, I wrote one about a swordsman who had purple hair and purple skin. I called it THE AGE OF RUIN. Why did he have purple skin? Because it couldn't be black.
AGE OF RUIN satisfied the rebel within me ... for a while. It was evident the field was totally white and white oriented. I began to be dissatisfied with that. It was always a white man went to a planet and kicked the butts of the grey, brown, red, blue or green aliens.
In my ignorance I thought it was racism. I told Donald A. Wollheim I thought he was publishing racist material. I realize now it was simply economic self-interest. You don't publish what you don't think there is a market for—especially if it's believed publishing black subject matter and/or authors will drive away or alienate the audience.
It was only years later, after we went our separate ways, I learned Samuel R. Delany was black, that Donald Wollheim was actually publishing two black authors at a time when no one else was, to the best of my knowledge, publishing any. And so, these many years later, I would like to offer my apologies and thank him for publishing Delany and me.
But at the time I was not aware of that, I saw only the racism. I told him I wanted to write a black science fiction novel. Since the sword epics, led by the incomparable Edgar Rice Burroughs and his John Carter series and Robert E. Howard and his Conan stories, were popular, it would be of that genre: a black swordsman. I sought his go-ahead because I knew that if he did not publish it, no one else would.
I waited. Finally, he said do it. So I wrote the story of Justinian Elroy Black (yes, even his name was black), ex-college athlete hobbled by a knee injury who earned his living giving fencing instructions to rich whites. After running afoul of one client, he is sent at gunpoint to the world of the Two Cities and the Seven Valleys. There, in a land hammered by alien invasion and race war, he survives a string of adventures that climaxes in a coming to gether of the white, black and yellow races to live in harmony.
Don said he couldn't publish it. He never said why. I can attest it wasn't great literature, but certainly no better or worse than AGE OF RUIN or WARRIORS OF TERRA—and certainly much better than CROWN OF INFINITY.
So, feeling betrayed, I said things I should not have said and a short, intense relationship ended. I shopped MAROONED ON THE LEVELS around, but no one wanted it. One editor complained there was no dialogue in an extended battle scene. No dialogue?! Maybe they were too busy staying alive to stop and chit chat!
In the meantime, Belmont published WARRIORS OF TERRA. They wanted another novel as part of the same series. I wrote SIEGE OF EARTH—the first novel not written from the gut. It shows it.
I put MAROONED away. It still gathers dust. Someday I will rewrite it—I've learned a lot since then. I did not return to the sword novel for more than twenty years. When I did, it was in the most unexpected way and with two of the most incredible characters ever. But first to continue the road to BLACK SCIENCE FICTION.
I wrote and had published DISCO HUSTLE, a story of the black discos as I experienced them, my first mainstream novel (though some critics might argue that). In writing it, I realized science fiction was my first and, perhaps, only love. So I went back—and received form rejection after form rejection. They only hardened my resolve: I would learn the craft of writing, I would go beyond science fiction and read the great works and authors of literature. I took short-story, novel and screenplay writing courses at NYU's Continuing Ed. I read hundreds of books on writing and every literary biography I could find.
I wrote every day.
I still received endless rejection after rejection.
But that was okay. I was doing what I loved to do, creating characters and worlds that absorbed me, characters and worlds I found nowhere else. A writer writes. I was a writer and so I wrote. I did not need an audience. I wrote for myself.
The world changed. I began to hear talk of self-image and how the lack of black presence in science fiction (i.e., the future) damaged black kids. People began to ask where are the black science fiction writers? I would say to myself, "I'm here writing away. I'm not a Delany, so you'll never see my stuff in print."
Spike Lee came along and suddenly there were black movies where there hadn't been since the days of blaxploitation. After that, Terry McMillan arrived and overnight publishers saw there were black women out there who actually, believe it or not, read books.
I began to look around again and noticed the science fiction field had not changed much from the day I asked Donald Wollheim if I could do a black science fiction novel. True, there was a handful of gifted ones, but where were the rest, the ones such as myself? We'll never win awards or be bestsellers, but still, we love the genre and we keep working away at it.
One of the tasks I set myself was to go back and rewrite my early novels, incorporating all the things I'd learned over the years. The first was CROWN OF INFINITY—the generations long battle plan for revenge. It became THE EARTH WILL BE AVENGED. No more bobbing and weaving—a black hero up-front, commander of the starship Harlem. I queried agents. No interest. Okay, so I still had a lot to learn.
I began another novel—and stopped. What point in spending years writing a novel that will be ignored, that no one will publish? I would still write but I needed to do something new. Moreover, I needed to write something so good no one would reject it for any reason. Three years ago I decided to switch to short stories. I did so reluctantly.
I'd never been a fan of short stories. I like to spend time with characters I find interesting. Just as you're getting into a short story, it's over. Plus, novels had made up most of my recreational reading. I felt comfortable with novels. I knew what had been done in them. In short stories, I would be a novice—without any knowledge of what had gone before. I would run the risk of being called ignorant of the field. They would be right. So I looked for a way to avoid that. The answer was twofold.
I started a crash course in reading the best anthologies of literature and science fiction. I studied the sf collections to see what stories weren't being published. I saw two gaping holes: black stories and the biggest one of the 20th century: sex/gender/reproduction. Since these stories were not being done, I would not run the risk of inadvertently duplicating prior ones.
Why is sex/gender/reproduction one of the great stories of this century? Think about it. In the West, especially the United States, women gained the vote. The microwave, clothes washers and the Pill, which meant small families and shorter mothering periods, liberated them from the home. Women can have lives that go beyond the raising of the next generation.
The Pill and abortion-on-demand meant sex could be a recreational activity engaged in without concerns of pregnancy.
Amniocentesis can reach into the womb and tell the health or sex of the fetus before birth. That simple medical breakthrough irrevocably changed whole continents and societies. And now add the even simpler ultrasound.
Women's sports leagues.
A freedom from the male and an equality with them unprecedented in human history.
In reproduction, cloning and other advanced techniques regularly help fertility-challenged couples become parents.
Surrogate mothers.
Sex change operations.
The gay and lesbian revolution.
The incredible explosion of pornography. We went from French postcards and hard-to-find little magazines to dingy theaters to the videocassette to Internet porn. For thirty dollars I can buy a program called Mister-Pix. I key in a description of the type of sex I want and it comes back with a thousand pictures from around the world—within minutes. It is fascinating to see the fetishes of various societies. Porn today is only a keystroke away.
Breast implants.
Life threatening sexually-transmitted diseases, the most serious of which is AIDS.
We have gone from it being illegal for a woman to bare her legs at the beach to the thong.
And yet, with exceptions here and there, this is all ignored by science fiction.
I began to write stories like THE SPERM COLLECTOR, ALWAYS A VIRGIN, BY THE WAY MOM, ALIEN PERIL, THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE, BATTLE QUEEN CINDEREL LA, THE SCUMSHIP and others.
The rejections came.
Despite Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Cointelpro, the Civil Rights Movement, The Freedom Riders, racial profiling, Rodney King, the Black Panthers and so many other things in recent years, science fiction has continued with business as usual: black heroes need not apply, black themes not wanted.
I wrote black stories: THE STARSHIP HARLEM, EVIL NEVER MAKES IT EASY, THE PROMISED LAND, THE OUTRAGE, CINDERELLA 3000, THE BIGGER FOOL, THE MAN AND THE QUAGIS, THE SLAVE AND THE TIME MACHINE, THE VIRGIN'S WALL....
More rejections.
I returned to my old love—the fantasy swordsman: EVIL NEVER MAKES IT EASY, BATTLE QUEEN CINDERELLA, THE VIRGIN'S WALL and the one that came out of nowhere to hit me between the eyes when two black Amazons walked into my living room and squatted beside me and told me to write their story: the AMAZON trilogy.
Yet more rejections.
The road to BLACK SCIENCE FICTION was still unconceived.
My brother Joe has for years urged me to selfpublish. "Stop begging them to publish you!"
I never thought I was begging. My sister Marie has said the same: "Do it yourself." And my answer always was, the money isn't there. Nor the distribution. And, although I did not come right out and say it, the confidence in my own writing wasn't there. If I were any good, I wouldn't keep getting rejected.
The Internet mushroomed. In the black chat groups, the question arose again and again: Where are the black science fiction writers? The black stories?
The ebook came into existence. So did print-on-demand technology. Interesting....
I began to see stories in the best-of anthologies that I didn't think were that good. But of course I was biased. One's own stories are always more interesting. Clearly I was deceiving myself. The unending rejections attested to that.
Then a strange thing happened. I noticed I'd been getting contrary rejections for some time: ALIEN PERIL—cool story. THE SPERM COLLECTOR—Sorry to keep this so long. We were considering it for publication, but decided to go with another story. THE VIRGIN'S WALL—This caused quite a bit of controversy in the office. In the end we decided that although very good, it is not irresistible. THE VIRGIN BLADE—Well-written, interesting characters but reads like an introduction to a longer work. (It is.) EVIL NEVER MAKES IT EASY—The action sequence was very good. THE SLAVE AND THE TIME MACHINE—Like the care you took with this. THE VERIFIER—Beautiful story. And on and on.
There was an announcement on the black egroup I was a member of that there would be an anthology of black science fiction called DARK MATTER. I immediately contacted the editor Sheree Thomas. I was too late. The deadline for submissions had passed.
I waited breathlessly for it to appear. The idea of an anthology of black science fiction, even though I would not be in it, was fascinating. Wow!
One day Ian Strock of ARTEMIS, a science fiction magazine, called. He wanted to publish PETS, my story of alien abduction. He added he thought it was very good. Incredible. I did not know what to say. After all these years an editor said something I'd written was good and he wanted to publish it.
After my website was up and listed with the search engines, I received a letter from a man who said he'd read WARRIORS OF TERRA thirty years ago. It inspired him to become a writer. He now had over two hundred short stories published and wanted to collaborate with me!
After Ian Strock published PETS, I received an email from a man who said he'd loved CROWN OF INFINITY so much he'd committed it to memory. And another to say CROWN had made him a serious sf fanatic. And yet another who was glad I'd finally written something else and urged me to write more!
One of the members of the egroup I belonged to was Cecil Washington—aka Creative Brother. He is an incredible young writer— with more talent in his right eye than I have in my whole body. Relentless, creative—and a shameless self-promoter. He'd published his fiction on his own website and countless others, in an ebook and a paperback. He had in effect said to the whole sf establishment, 'I don't need you.'
Surely, I thought, if he can do so, so can I. Construction began on the road to BLACK SCIENCE FICTION. It did not take long—the stories were already written.
Now the road is complete.
Here is BLACK SCIENCE FICTION.
I hope you enjoy it. I am no Hopkinson, Delany, Butler or Barnes. But I try. I will always try. Till the day they bury me.
Good luck. I love you all.
John M. Faucette Jr.
New York City 2001
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Doberman23
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Doberman23
Post Number: 215
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 02:17 pm: |
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what a cry baby! if his stuff was that good someone would have bought it. his titles even sound like crap. i remember seeing this movie called "a brother from another planet" it sucked so bad it hurt my eyes. i imagine this guy being on the same wave length as the dude who made that god awful movie and trying to convince everybody that garbage was oscar material. now that i think about it spike lee's movies have been garbage as of late too.
now when it comes to sci-fi i like the matrix and xmen and stuff like that. star wars, lotr, and star trek aren't for me ...but one things for sure they have black ppl in them (except lotr) second of all spawn who is a black character was one of the best selling comics of it's era and it single handedly carried image comics enough to battle dc and marvel.
"Basically it comes down to this. Most of the fans of this type of entertainment are adolescent white males. Not only that, geeky adolescent white males. They have not proved to be very supportive of this type of entertainment--my own view is that, regardless of what lots of sci fi fans think it is an escapist entertainment. These fans wish to escape from the unpleasantries of a real world and black people to them are one of these unpleasantries."
sci-fi is just another form of art
chris you have got to show me some stats on that, because most folks who are into that stuff aren't just kids, and if you go to one of the conventions you'll see about as much racism as you would at a hash bash ....they maybe geeky, but there not racist. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 4167
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 02:41 pm: |
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Tannarive Due books are in the sci-fi/horror vein. The rights to her first book were rumored to have been sold to Blair Underwood who was supposed to be making a movie out of it. Brandon Massey regularly releases anthologies of sci-fi/horror stories by black authors. And right here on this board we have people whose writings loosely fit this category. SisGal, Diane Dorce, has a book that just came out entitled "Devil in the Mist" which is about a black detective becoming involved with the mystery of deadly virus in danger of being spread. Dracula's second cousin, Chrishayden, has written a book about Vampyres. And of course we are all familiar with Kola latest book of science fiction, "The Dairy of a Snake Girl" - or whatever. |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1931
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 10:31 am: |
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Doberman:
Only a zip damn fool would look at what the man wrote and say what you did. You can't read because if you had you would have seen that he DID sell books but they had to have no black people in them.
Showing you anything would be a waste. Look it up yourself, you shiftless lazy bum!
This is the reason why we are in the shape we are in.
Cynqiue:
Tananareve Due's fans are mostly black women. And her books are classified as suspense and horror, not sci fi. Show me how many best seller lists Brandon Massey's books are on, how many sci fi websites they are on, how many Hugos and Nebulas they have won. The rest of your stuff is not even worth going into. Your lust to kiss up to white folks is astounding. They don't even have to pay you and here you are saying, "Oh no, they ain't racist!"
How can they lose?
As a living cartoon character, you know full well why all I am saying is true. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 4169
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 10:56 am: |
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Chrishayden, the comment made by Mysty who started this post was:
"I've nioticed that almost every black author writes about relationships and family as well as culture. This ius all good but i wonder why wqe don't feel the need to write about anything else.
There's also a huge shortage of black detective stories and post modernist pieces."
My response to her was certainly as relevant as your knee jerk response to any sentence that has sci-fi in it. YOu were apprently reponding to the title of the thread, and I was responding to the person who started the thread. |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1934
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 10:59 am: |
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Man this is incredible. An author who actually WROTE and tried to SELL Science fiction tries to tell it like it T-I-Z and some nobodies living in a dream world or another planet somehwere try to shoot it down.
It boggles the mind.
More from somebody who actually is WRITING the genre (and thus has some real experience) below.
Nalo Hopkinson Subverts Science Fiction
Click on title to order book from
Warner Aspect's First Novel Contest winner Nalo Hopkinson on genre-jumping, voodoo, and the inspiration for her magical novel.
Modern science fiction was originally conceived as adventure stories for boys, and the genre's writers and heroes reflected that bias -- they were all men, almost all white, and never poor or disenfranchised, unless it was by an evil alien empire. As society has matured, so has science fiction, and Nalo Hopkinson reflects a new wave of authors who are breaking things wide open. Hopkinson was born in Jamaica in 1960 to a Guyanese father and a Jamaican mother. She lived in Jamaica, Guyana, and Trinidad until age 16, with a stint in Connecticut before settling in Toronto. She was a voracious reader, and early on she discovered the science fiction section of the public library. Hopkinson started writing in 1993, and in 1994 her short story "Midnight Robber" tied for second place in the Short Prose Competition for unpublished writers, sponsored by the Writers' Union of Canada. In 1997 her first novel, Brown Girl in the Ring, won Warner Aspect's First Novel Contest, which was judged by Warner Aspect and SF author C.J. Cherryh. The contest received close to 1,000 entries from around the world. Amazon.com's Craig E. Engler recently caught up with Hopkinson and asked her about her novel, a near-future tale of mystery and magic.
Amazon.com: Brown Girl in the Ring is as much magic realism as it is science fiction. Do you consider this book to be SF, or is it something else?
Nalo Hopkinson: I consider it to be speculative fiction, which for me encompasses all the genres of science fiction, horror, fantasy, and magic realism. When I was writing it, I didn't think to remember to make a split between technology and faith. That kind of split doesn't operate in life (unless one chooses to live that way), only in genre fiction. I don't see why a book that talks about a particular belief system can't be set within a contemporary reality with its concomitant high levels of technology. So much technology is everyday for us now. When we read a contemporary work of magic realism in which a character gets on a plane, we don't immediately think, "That's genre-jumping!"
Amazon.com: You say you see the book as "subverting the genre." What do you mean by that?
Hopkinson: When I go into SF bookstores and look around, I see book cover after cover on which the humans are white and the aliens come in colors. Which may or may not reflect what's happening within the pages. It's changing, but in the West, SF is still predominantly written by white people for white people. At some metaphorical level, the message I get is that white people are humans and people of color are aliens. It's a genre that on the face of it is very much about "us" and "other," but is still largely written from a perspective of being on the outside trying to fathom the "other." It doesn't feel like a deliberate exclusion of other voices--more like a systematic deafness to them. We're almost invisible. And it's hard to claim space in a gathering when no one can hear or see you. According to SF I seem to be one of those unfathomable aliens, but I've also read SF since I was a child. It's a fine and wonderful genre and I love it. I think other voices can claim a place in it, as "new wave" writers and feminist writers and queer writers did and are doing. When I write, it's from a dual place of being simultaneously within the genre and excluded from it. Sometimes the most effective way to make change is from within. And the great thing about SF readers is they're just as likely to be open to what I'm trying to do as they are to any other new thing the genre throws at them. It's a literary form whose readers like to be challenged.
Amazon.com: Did you think "subverting the genre" was a difficult task to take on for your first novel? Do you think you were successful?
Hopkinson: I think that the statement was a bit of chest-beating on my part, but I think I have made a start on a personal project of bringing my voice and some of my experience to SF, yes.
Amazon.com: What made you decide to combine Afro-Caribbean culture and voodoo with the more traditional SF setting of a future dystopia?
Hopkinson: Just like any other writer, I usually start with characters whose community overlaps mine. So I don't decide to write diasporic Caribbean characters, they're my default place. That is what my SF looks like. It's what a lot of my Toronto looks like, for that matter. The first character I wrote when I started Brown Girl in the Ring was a young woman who's having visions, and when I searched her world view for what would make sense of that experience, I came upon Orisha belief systems. The "disintegrating city" setting has been done by many before me, I know that. But it seemed such a logical outgrowth of some of the punitive politics that are finding a foothold today. When a government stops investing in a city's quality of life, that city decays.
Amazon.com: Much of Brown Girl deals with voodoo and obeah. Do you practice voodoo or obeah yourself? Were you exposed to either during your time in the Caribbean?
Hopkinson: I'm not a practitioner. I had to go to the library and do research into Orisha worship. As a child in the Caribbean, the few references I did hear to practices such as Pukumina, Shango, Voudun (note my spelling), and the like led me to believe they were forms of Christianity. I didn't realize until a few years ago that they were distinct belief systems. I'm not a devotee, but I do honor and give respect to the Orishas. Some traditions have it that they are the oldest ancestors of African people. Orisha beliefs feel bound up in my history and my body; the beings in it look like me. If I am in a space where they are being addressed, I take part as much as I can in the ritual.
Amazon.com: The book is filled with quotes, phrases, and sayings. Where did these come from, and what impact do they have on the story?
Hopkinson: I love using quotations. It feels like acknowledging the other creative people whose work has inspired and challenged me. There is a quotation from one of my late father's poems in the novel. I like the idea of being able to have a literary dialogue with him in that way. I quote a few Jamaican and Trinidadian proverbs, and some lines from ring games, and one call-and-response chant. I use them to set mood and tone for the scene and to locate my work in a specific cultural context. I quote from "Ti-Jean and His Brothers," a play by Saint Lucian writer Derek Walcott. The play is a fable about three brothers who battle the devil. At a certain point during the writing of the novel, it occurred to me that I was writing about three generations of women who are battling a long-standing evil in their lives; and I saw the parallels between that and Walcott's play. Quoting from it is my way of acknowledging that.
Amazon.com: You chose to use a distinctive dialect for your characters, which can be hard on readers who aren't used to speaking or reading that way. What made you decide to go this route?
Hopkinson: Again, I'm only reflecting the way that some of my friends and relatives speak. In Vurt and Pollen, Jeff Noon writes the way people from his part of the world speak. Amos Tutuola wrote in Yoruba English. Hip-hop is in a distinctive dialect. Those all seem to go over pretty well. Come to think of it, hard SF and high fantasy have distinct dialects of their own! I went with the belief that many SF readers enjoy the challenge of figuring stuff out. Some of the characters in Brown Girl in the Ring speak in Trinidadian English, some in Jamaican English. One woman is from another part of the world entirely. She speaks some Rom, which I had to look up (and I'm sure I'll be told if I got any of it wrong). I know that figuring out a dialect can be hard on readers. That's why I stick to conventional spellings of words, rather than trying to represent the pronunciation phonetically.
Amazon.com: Where does the title Brown Girl in the Ring come from?
Hopkinson: It's words from the first line of a ring game song, perhaps the only one that's known throughout the English-speaking Caribbean. It's played by girls. One little girl is in the middle of the circle, and everyone else sings, "There's a brown girl in the ring, tra-la-la-la-la, and she look like a little sugar plum." That gives the girl in the middle time to think, because then the circle sings, "Gal, show me your motion, tra-la- la-la-la," which is a challenge to her. She has to demonstrate some kind of fancy move which the others try to copy. She picks the person who's the most skillful at it, and they switch places. The next person becomes the new brown girl in the ring. In my novel, the protagonist is a young woman facing the challenge of discovering and demonstrating her own survival skills, quickly, as her life becomes increasingly endangered. The song seemed an apt metaphor for that experience, particularly when I paired it with a song from another ring game, "What can you do, Punchinello little fellow?" The rules are pretty much the same, but the song asks the question more directly: "What can you do that's so special? Show us."
Amazon.com: Who are your influences in terms of science fiction? Who are your favorite SF authors?
Hopkinson: Oh, the list is endless, and I'm bound to leave people out. Samuel Delany. I love the complexity of his prose, and the ways he makes you think about sexuality, power, and race. Canadian Candas Jane Dorsey is another. She only has one novel out so far ( Black Wine), but what a novel! Similar themes to the ones that interest me in Delany's work. Gene Wolfe, for the way he can make SF seem at first like fantasy. I think it's because he describes the technology from the point of view of the users, not the creators. I don't know what makes my taps give water or the switches on my walls give light, I just use them. Might as well be magic. Wolfe writes like that, and he gives his worlds all the griminess and ignorance that the real world has. Ursula Le Guin, for her prose style and characterization. Octavia Butler, whose work I find grim and compelling. Karen Joy Fowler's quiet, insidious humor. Keri Hulme, whose female protagonist in The Bone People is a delight; a mean, ornery, chunky woman with a bad attitude, tons of silver rings that double as knuckle dusters, and a black belt. And whole portions of the dialogue happen unapologetically in Maori. Pat Murphy, whose characters manage to be simultaneously human and out of the ordinary. Ray Bradbury, for sheer, breathless delight and fancifulness. R.A. Lafferty, who has that same madcap breathlessness, but in a grimmer vein. Emma Bull, for writing a love interest who reads like a courtly version of the musician Prince, and for Bone Dance, which also talks about Voudun. Too many more to mention, really.
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Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1935
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 11:02 am: |
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More
Monday, January 30, 2006
Black sf writers and white sf
My friend Pam Noles has written an wonderful essay for The Infinite Matrix about the way that black people have been left out of science fiction. Science fiction characters -- and writers -- are overwhelmingly white (this is likely self-reinforcing; white writers write white characters and attract white readers, some of whom grow up to be white writers, and it begins anew), and to make matters worse, the occasional black cast of characters, like those in LeGuin's Wizard of Earthsea books, are magically changed into white people when they're adapted for the big screen.
Pam's a talented science fiction writer in her own right, and her discussion of her journey from being a black kid watching an all-white science fiction universe on her TV, to discovering Earthsea, to her career as a writer, to the betrayal she felt at the adaptation of Earthsea is moving and eloquent.
Usually it would be just me in the basement sprawled on the floor surrounded by snacks, Legos and books to read during the commercials. If he was off shift, sometimes Dad would come down and join me in his leather recliner by the stairs. Every once in a while Mom called down from the kitchen Are you letting her watch those weird things? And we'd lie in unison, No. If she came down to check for herself, Dad would get in trouble.
Dad had his own names for the movies.
What's this? 'Escape to a White Planet?
It's called 'When Worlds Collide.' I'm sure I sounded indignant.
'Mars Kills the White People.' I love this one.
Daaaaad. It says it right there. 'War of the Worlds'. I know I sighed heavily, but was careful to turn back to the tv before rolling my eyes.
Once he asked me which was more real, the movie or the skits between. I didn't get it, and told him that they were both stories, so they were both fake. He didn't bring it up again until a skit came on. I can't remember if it was a 'Soulman' skit or one of the caveman gags (the cavemen were multicultural — basic white, Polish, Italian, and black). But I remember Dad saying, how come you never see anybody like that in the stories you like? And I remember answering, maybe they didn't have black people back then. He said there's always been black people. I said but black people can't be wizards and space people and they can't fight evil, so they can't be in the story. When he didn't say anything back I turned around. He was in full recline mode in his chair and he was very still, looking at me. He didn't say anything else.
Pam and I went to Clarion together, and the issue of race and voice came up in our critiquing sessions more than once. Some of my other Clarion classmates, like Nathan Ballingrud and Becky Maines have weighed in on this as well, as has my friend Nalo Hopkinson, a brilliant Caribbean-born Canadian sf writer whose work often treats with racism and race politics. Link
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Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1936
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 11:06 am: |
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Finally a discussion of this from PROFESSIONALS (read that again) PROFESSIONALS in the comic book industry about why Black Books and Black heroes DON'T SELL
If you don't get it there is no hope.
There is no hope, is there?
Why Don't "Black Books" Sell?
By Alan Donald
Print This Item
“Why aren't there more mainstream titles that feature minority characters in prominent roles, and why don't "black books" sell??”
Bill Rosemann: "A tough but necessary question. Is it because most comic book writers are white males, often 'write what they know', and so they choose to make their protagonists white males like themselves? Is it because the characters that are popular today and star in the most books (i.e. the superheroes that have been around since the 50s and 60s) just happen to be great characters, no matter what the skin color is beneath their masks? Obviously, companies would love to publish series with minority main protagonists (i.e. DC's Steel and Milestone line, Marvel's Black Panther and The Crew), but time and again, readership hasn't been enough to keep them going. Basically, I don't have an easy answer...but if readers want to try a book with a black protagonist--that also generates plenty of great reviews--then I humbly suggest they give Negation a try! No matter what his race happens to be, Obregon Kaine is just a cool character, and ultimately that's what people want to read about."
Alan Grant: “Most comic heroes are minority characters. Batman is in a minority of guys whose parents were murdered before their eyes. Superman is in a minority of babies saved from exploding planets. Lobo is in a minority of maniacs who destroyed their own world. Judge Dredd is in a minority of people dedicated to justice.
I've no idea why "black books" don't sell. I've heard uncorroborated reports that DC's "black" line of the 90s folded as much because of editorial profligacy as disappointing sales. I'm pretty sure "black books" sell okay in Africa (Brian Bolland and Dave Gibbons began their careers working on Power Man for--I think--a Nigerian publisher).”
Terry Moore: “I can't answer that question, but I've also noticed most comic shops are owned by white people and comic book conventions attendees are predominantly white. There's a nice ethnic mix sure, but everywhere I go it's mostly white. I don't know about you, but when I'm in a room full of white people now it gives me the creeps... makes me feel like I'm at a Klan meeting or something. It's just wrong, y'know? It's not reality. So why doesn't Strangers In Paradise have more African-Americans in the cast? Because most of the book is a satirical attack on conservative America from within the ranks. I think the barbs sting more if they come from within the ranks and not across race lines.”
Professor William H. Foster III, Comic Book Historian: “’Why aren't there more mainstream titles that feature minority characters in prominent roles, and why don't "black books" sell?’
Actually these are two different questions so let me try to answer them one at a time, and as succinctly as possible.
The first questions asks why aren't there more... And as a comic book historian who specializes in the image of African American in comics, my next question is "More than what?"
What would be the magical number of people of color appearing in mainstream books to be properly "visible" or "enough"? I suppose it depends on your point of view. For comic book readers who have always seen some characters of colors in their reading, and for comic fans from the Silver and Bronze ages of comics, the answers are going to be totally different.
I have a very long view, and look at how much things have changed since the beginning of comics to the present day. With that view, the number of characters of color in comics is very large, very diverse and still increasing.
The problem sometimes appears to be what kind of characters have been presented in the past. If people of a particular race or ethnicity are all represented as one-dimensional stereotypes, that's a real problem. If all women are represented as brainless, helpless victims, all white men as kind-hearted and benevolent heroes and all black people as jive talking evil minded criminals, those are problems.
But in the various worlds created by comic creators where there are is a wide diversity of characters representing both positive and negative points of view, the numbers become less important. If there is only one black character in a comic book and he is a cowardly clown, I am quite naturally upset by that representation. But in a world where there are any number of characters presenting points of view pro and con, good and bad, intelligent and stupid, I don't have a problem.
And let's get real for a minute. Comic books aren't immune to the taint of institutional racism or prejudice any more than any other segment of American society. We want everyone to feel that we are treating everyone the same, when we know that we don't treat everyone the same. It is the cache 22 of racial politics. And yes, there are people who still think if we don't talk about the racial divide in this country, it will go away. Guess again.
There are people who look on any effort to expand the scope of the diversity of comic book characters as communist inspired, and those who feel that more can always be done to change things up a bit. Such is life -- get used to it.
And to answer the second question, actually black books do sell. I just received a message from a long-time African American comic book creator who sells almost exclusively at Black Cultural Fairs and he says he pushed an incredible number of units this past summer. And I have yet to appear at a venue where I am speaking about the history of Blacks in comic books without having a number of people stop me and ask where they can find the titles I spotlighted. My problem has been I can't always readily tell them where to look. Even I have to look very hard to find titles.
Back in the 1990s when Milestone and DC Comics teamed up to produce racially diverse titles, I was told by some of my friends who own comic shops that they weren't sure how to market the titles. So they do sell, it's just that, well, there are some problems to work out.
As I stated earlier, I am very optimistic about the variety of characters of color in today's mainstream comic books.”
Lee Dawson: “I think it's just a question of who's making the comics for who. Most comics creators are young (or not as young as they used to be!) white males. Most comics readers are young white males. I think if there were a more diverse creator base creating comics reflecting their unique experiences and perspectives then the audience might also reflect that diversity as well.”
Brandon Thomas: “Because people are afraid.
The problem begins with the nonsensical classification that is the “black book”, presumably meant to signify a title in which either “black things” are more likely to occur, or one that chronicles the exploits of a number of black characters. Following this train of logic, Superman, Batman, and the Avengers should be appropriately branded as “white books”, but between you and I…that doesn’t make any sense does it??
Instead, the label only creates a heightened sense of awareness that creates books that often play at the most obvious of stereotypes in the hopes of addressing a need for authenticity that is not only completely irreverent, but clearly unattainable, as it doesn’t exist. Either that or the books’ defining characteristic is that it’s filled with minorities, which can also serve as a statistical kiss of death, regardless of inherent quality. Pardon my usage of the terminology, but often too much time is spent being “black”, and not enough time being “books”. Instead of publishing accessible material driven by minority characters, we get tired approximations of things that companies think “black” readers would respond to. So white readers are completely alienated, and what little black or non-white readership exists, groans collectively because someone is under the impression that by slapping a bubble vest, gold teeth, and Timbs on it, it automatically becomes “black”.
Things remain this way, because there are not enough creators working in comics with a personal and emotional investment in correcting it. It’s no one’s fault in particular, and reversing the tide isn’t enormously difficult, because someday (hopefully sooner rather than later), a writer will sit down. After he/she sits down, they’ll begin creating this fully realized environment populated with characters of layered personalities and emotions, the kind of fictional 3-D world that a great majority of readers will find at least something relatable…
…and then they’ll turn everyone black.
Stereotypes will be assaulted, expectations will mean nothing, and finally, FINALLY, there will be no such thing as “black books”, just books with black and minority characters, that aren’t defined by their ethnicity, or playing into a routine meant to establish a “realness” that ensures they’re speaking to no one. The industry just needs someone to care enough to make it happen. Do you??”
Fredrik Strömberg: “As I have stated several times in my book "Black Images in the Comics", I think that sadly, most Black characters in mainstream comics are created, and treated, as representatives of all Black people. This symbolic nature, of course, makes them rather limited as characters. Also, considering that this question really is about matters in the USA (even if this is not stated), it seems to me as a European that the fact that your comics are sold in speciality shops, and thereby only reaches the fans and not the general audience, is another important factor. The comic fans in the USA seems to be mostly white boys, a fact that works as a catch-22 to make sure that other groups like for instance female readers and creators for the most part are locked out of the action.”
Craig Lemon: "Why aren't there more black-superhero books? Because they don't sell. Why don't they sell? The same reason that female-led superhero books don't sell very well. Because the primary audience for superhero is white males. And the main way you can get female-led superhero books to sell is to plaster them with cheesecake art - step forward Greg Horn and Michael Turner. I also believe that most white males are closet racists - even if just subconsciously...oh, you could argue that someone reading a superhero book puts themselves in the place of the hero, and white males cannot identify with black heroes for some reason...I would venture that that reason is racism. Why are there few arabic superheroes in US comics? Why are there few hispanic blah blah blah? The answer is the same.
Why are there no black superheroes fronting big-name books? Because all the iconic heroes in existence today (with the exception of Wolverine) were created between the 1930s and the 1960s, when black characters were taboo, or poor caricatures at best (see the early stories of The Spirit to see how even Will Eisner didn't escape this attitude). There have been pitifully few successful superheroes created in the last twenty years, black OR white. So new books with predominantly black casts don't sell...but neither do new books with predominantly white casts...it's not just The Crew that was cancelled recently, but The Eternal too.
Why are there no successful black characters in "mainstream" (i.e. Marvel & DC comics)? But there are. Look at 100 Bullets. Look at Gotham Central. Minority groups represented in quality comics, bought by a vast range of purchasers. And why do these work - because of the Star Trek factor...they feature an "ensemble", a large group of characters from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
You could say why are there no major supporting black characters in Spider-Man? But I think you'd find that beyond the original set of characters created in the 60s, there have been no NEW supporting characters of any colour for a consistently long period of time. It's the same with Superman, with Batman, with whoever...superheroes created in 1960s and earlier had no black characters due to the situation that existed at that time (which is where the racism angle comes back in) and these superheroes haven't changed in the intervening time - the supporting casts have remained the same throughout the decades.”
Kyle J. Baker: “Why aren't there more mainstream titles that feature minority characters in prominent roles, and why don't "black books" sell??”
Doesn't the second question answer the first one?”
Alonzo Washington: “Why aren't there more mainstream titles that feature minority characters in prominent roles? The answer is quite obvious.
RACISM!!!!!!!!! Although, the attitudes are complicated to explain. Most White people are uncomfortable with people of color gaining power. That's why affirmative action & immigration are always controversial topics in America. Therefore, the concept of a super hero of color is an uneasy thought to most White Americans. Moreover, the image of a super hero is one of perfection & morality. For years the mainstream media has always force fed the American public with the most negative & immoral images of Black people (murderers, gang bangers, thugs, pimps, video tramps, whores, rapists, gangsta rappers, criminals, etc.). Therefore, the concept of a Black super hero is almost a joke in the minds of most White people. That's why a number of Hollywood films are made with a Black super hero as a comedy release (Under Cover Brother, Meteor Man, Pootie Tang & Blank Man). I have turned down a number of Hollywood producers who want to make a MOVIE WITH MY BLACK SUPER HEROES AS A COMEDY. Moreover, most of the creators in the comic book industry (not all) are White nerds. What do they know about Black people or any other people of color? These guys are creating a fictional world where they are all powerful and quite frankly they don't want Black people in it or anybody who is not White. Have you ever wondered why the two most popular super hero icons (Superman & Spider-Man) are former nerds in their secret identities. Most of the time when a Black character (The Falcon, Storm, Green Lantern, Agent J, Captain Marvel, Cyborg, Pete on Smallsville, etc.) emerges in the world of mainstream comic books he or she are simply a watered down side kick or a modern day slave to the White characters in the comic book. The Black characters have no agenda of their own. Storm in the X-MEN movies might as well had been a maid with the few lines she received. The Black characters that stand on their own are normally super stereotypes like Power Man (Cage) the ex-con or the monster heroes like Blade & Spawn. Most White comic book creators & collectors like monsters more than people of color. Comic Books are filled with monsters and barely people of color. The comic book community is basically White. I attended Comic-Con this year with my wife & six small children. Everywhere I went security hounded us like we were not supposed to be there and our passes were clearly displayed upon us. They acted like I could put the Comic-Con in my pocket. I think it is the same scenario exists for Black super heroes & super heroes of color in mainstream comic book titles. Many White creators don't feel like they are supposed to be there.
Why don't Black Comic Books sell? Most White people don't want a Black savior. Super Heroes are saviors. Unlike African Americans & other people of color who accept White super heroes as their own. Most White people think a BLACK SUPER HERO IS ONLY FOR BLACK PEOPLE AND THAT IS RACIST. I remember I was doing a presentation at the public library and a White kid asked me if my Black character (Omega Man) was for people like me (Black). I answered his question with a question. I said "is Super Man & Bat Man only for people like you"?
Black titles don't do well in comic book shops. However, I have made a great living selling Black independent comic book titles for eleven years. Most of my customers are Black or White people who want to see another image of super heroes. Another reason Black mainstream titles don't sell is because most of the characters are crappie. White creators always seem to limit their Black super hero creations. Even the cool Black heroes (Blade & Black Panther) struggle to appeal to White readers. Racism is hard to overcome for most White comic book fans. Spawn is more a monster than Black. Moreover, his mask & burned flesh helps White readers forget about his race. I challenge all who read this article to read a real Black super hero comic book. Check out Omega7 Comics. Don't let race pick your super heroes.”
Alan Donald: “I’ve spent two weeks thinking about this answer and still I’ve gotten nowhere. I’ve seen the Panellists answers coming in and I agree with most of them. Racism is a big factor and so is simple economics. What is being done to address these problems would be an interesting question. There must be many black comicbook fans out there who are being fed an incredibly homogenous image of large US cities. I’m not calling for Superman to ‘go black’, a good character is a good character irrespective of colour. The backdrops in the comicbook universes need to reflect the real world more. Writers need to request a realistic mix of people in the books and artists need to use their initiative if no race is given for a new character in a book. On the other side of the coin everyone should give new characters a chance and judge them based on the quality of the tale rather than the colour of the protagonists skin.
We’ve got a few coloured heroes now. We’re starting to see a wider mix of background characters (take Batman for example, there are several African-American cops (including the Commissioner), there’s Rennie Montoya and…um…wait, couple more, Batgirl is of an unknown Asian origin and Dick Grayson is Romany) but Milestone has gone and Steel was cancelled a while back.
What of the creators? It’s a vicious circle. I hardly ever see any non-white faces at my local comicbook shop but then again I hardly ever see any non-white faces in this part of the country, it’s a pretty sad state of affairs. I do see more and more people from various ‘ethnic minorities’ at the Bristol comicbook Festival and I have seen several black artists having their portfolios very seriously pored over by DC and Marvel so perhaps thing might change soon.
This question has made me examine several things in my life. I hadn’t considered just how white comicbooks are. I didn’t have a clue which creators were black, white or whatever. Not being racist is not enough. Complacency is a terrible sin. The current situation in the comicbook industry is wrong and definitely racist. We should think about this, we should examine it and we should act. It doesn’t stop there, the industry is homophobic, very sexist and it is generally prejudicial. Think about it. Act.”
Summary: This is a very difficult one to summarise. Racism and economics seem to be the most basic factors when one boils it all down. One thing is clear and that is that the current situation is intolerable.
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This Week’s Panel: Bill Rosemann (Publicist, CrossGen), Alan Grant (Judge Anderson, Batman), Terry Moore (Strangers in Paradise), Professor William H. Foster III (William H. Foster III has been a writer since the age of eight and published since age twelve. Poet, essayist, playwright and editorialist, he has written ten books and seven plays. He is presently an Associate Professor of English and Communication at Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury, Connecticut. Professor Foster has a BA from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, MA, and a Masters degree from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT. A long time comic book collector and researcher, Professor Foster has been an expert commentator for both CNN News and National Public Radio. He was a consultant on the history of Blacks in both comic strips and comic books for the Words and Pictures Museum of Fine Sequential Art in Northampton, MA. His exhibit on the “Changing Image of Blacks in Comics” has been displayed at a variety of venues across the country, including Temple University’s Paley Library, The 1998 Comic-Con International/Comic Arts Conference, and the 2000 Festival of Arts and Ideas. He also has presented his research at the 2001 bi-annual conference of The International Association for Media and History in Leipzig, Germany and most recently at the 2002 Conference on Analyzing Series & Serial Narrative at John Moores University in Liverpool, England), Lee Dawson (Publicist, Dark Horse), Brandon Thomas (comic book writer and SBC Columnist), Fredrik Strömberg (Editor Bild & Bubbla Scandinavia's largest, and the worlds second oldest magazine about comics and author of Black Images in Comics), Craig Lemon (Boss type person here at SBC, 1 step from the top), Kyle J. Baker (top comicbook creator) and Alonzo Washington (Founder Omega7 comics and toys).
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Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1937
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 11:19 am: |
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Misty:
What you see is governed by what gets published. When editors and agents approach a writer or a book they are asking themselves "Can I sell this book or person?"
Marie Brown, who is the dean of black agents, has stated that the hardest thing for her to sell is a literary novel by a black male.
Why? Cuz they ain't good? No. Because nobody will want to buy it.
There are ten times as many white folks as there are us. If white readers are not interested in a book there is very little chance it will be a blockbuster (make the best seller lists, etc)
For the most part white folks don't want to read black post modern novels, detective novels, etc.
Black males read, but they mostly read non fiction. I WRITE fiction and I read mostly non fiction.
Black women read and can make a book a best seller but they don't want to read detective books or post modern novels. Just don't.
Many writers rail and cry about wanting to change this and I think they are wasting their time. May as well ask why more NASCAR dads don't go see ballet. They ain't and they won't.
Regardless of what Cynique and Doberman, two know nothings, think and say. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 4171
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 11:32 am: |
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What a cop out, chrishayden. Trying to disparage and distort my cogent answer by seeking to impress others with your vapid "expertise", all the while, looking up the cow's ass while I was talking about its head when I gave a specific answer to Mysty's question. You're such an ego-infested phony. |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1938
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 11:36 am: |
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Cynique:
Yeah but I'm YOUR ego-infested phony! You know you LOVE it!
Hahahaha!
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 4172
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 12:13 pm: |
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Your ego-infested phoniness drives you to hope what you say is true, chrishayden. Sorry to shatter your dream. Now go curl up somewhere and try to deal with this rejection. |
Doberman23
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Doberman23
Post Number: 219
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 02:59 pm: |
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i forgot to mention that fantasic four was directed by a black dude... i forgot his name but a brother did direct for sure. |
Doberman23
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Doberman23
Post Number: 220
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 03:25 pm: |
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i guess i am a lazy bumb, because i'm not reading all of that.
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Msprissy
First Time Poster
Username: Msprissy
Post Number: 1
Registered: 03-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, March 11, 2006 - 08:19 pm: |
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Hey. I'm new here and not quite sure how to post an answer to a comment. Fingers crossed, hope this works. Are you aware of Leslie Banks's Vampire Huntress Legends and her detective novel, Betrayal of the Trust, not to forget our resent loss, Octavia Butler's Fledgling? I have written shorts about vampires (Catharsis)as well. |
Kaotic
Regular Poster
Username: Kaotic
Post Number: 40
Registered: 02-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 04:48 am: |
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Dobie23 said:
I guess I am a lazy bum, because i'm not reading all of that
Kaotic says:
OMG.... I thought I was the only one!
whew! |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1941
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 04:27 pm: |
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Doberman and Kaotic:
You have sewed up the Amos an' Andy Step n Fetchit ZiggaBoogaloo Award for the first decade of this century.
Can you read that?
Cynique:
Kiss my feet. Get all down there where you can get at the TOEJAM!
Ms Prissy:
Thank God someone INTELLIGENT weighed in on this discussion. I was about to give up on the whole black race.
If you notice you along with others have named almost everybody who is anybody black who is known in the field of speculative fiction. There are hundreds of authors who have written thousands of books over the last couple hundred years.
Oh there have been others--but unless they were writing white on white in white space fantasy their stuff is sitting in the drawer.
It has become a subject of comment and an issue but not one dwelt upon for long by Sci Fi fandom because they don't want to read nothing black. That's why they are reading Sci Fi in the first place.
Some people have trouble with that--but you gotta figure an adult black sci fi fan probably does not have a good grip on reality in the first place. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 4184
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 05:33 pm: |
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Every author I named in response to Misty's original question was black, chrissy-boy. and YOU were right there to discount them. You are soooo full of BS that your stench permeates the screen of my monitor. Ugh. |
Doberman23
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Doberman23
Post Number: 228
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 09:30 pm: |
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Doberman and Kaotic:
You have sewed up the Amos an' Andy Step n Fetchit ZiggaBoogaloo Award for the first decade of this century.
Can you read that?
Thanks Chris! that's my first award this year!
Thank God someone INTELLIGENT weighed in on this discussion. I was about to give up on the whole black race.
man you'd, give up on us so easily? oh well... glad i didn't really care what you thought anyways. |
Libralind2
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Libralind2
Post Number: 337
Registered: 09-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 22, 2006 - 07:53 pm: |
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Ya'll slay me with your responses..whew..now who answered Misty's question..?
LiLi |
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