Loved this blog! I was there. In the room at NYTAF when the bomb, I mean question, was dropped. Being SouthAsian and one of a few non-white authors in the place I didn’t know whether to stand and applaud or crawl under my chair and hide. I did approach the woman who asked the question and give her a copy of my first book. Because it and the sequel are painted with diversity. My personal opinion is that you can write a great story with characters that don’t resemble you personality-wise so why doesn’t the same principle apply to race. I think research is necessary and no one person represents their entire race so, as we all know, haters are gonna hate, and you can’t please everyone. Having said that, I think we just need to dig into our
Crayon boxes and not be so afraid to use the colors that we’re not used to. After all, some of the best stories happen when we color outside the lines!

Best,

Raj (Rajdeep Paulus)
Author of Swimming Through Clouds and Seeing Through Stones

Where is the root of the problem?

The root of the problem has to do with the almighty dollar. That’s what everything boils down to. If minorities sold like hotcakes (Yes, I’m full of clichés today!) you better believe publishing houses would be all over themselves to sign up the next Latino/Asian/African-American/…author. Yes, I know, it’s a business, but businesses need to move with the times or they become stagnant. In the not so distant future, minorities will be the majority.

I think part of the problem has to do with agents and publishers underestimating what Caucasians will read. Jaime Ford’s bestseller, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet was about a Chinese boy falling in love with a Japanese girl during WWII. A love story is a love story and if the writing is good, does it really matter that the MCs are white in a novel for a Caucasian to read it? I don’t think so.

Is it the largely white make-up of the publishing industry?

Of course! Read my answer to the above question. It’s not that there aren’t minorities writing manuscripts, it’s the agent/publisher fear that the book won’t sell enough copies to break even.

Are we weeding out material by and about experiences we simply don’t understand?

Let me ask you, do people live in some far away galaxy or in some other dimension or futuristic world? No, yet writers of sci-fi/fantasy find publishers. So, your question:

Is there an institutional racism that hasn’t been broached yet?

I think you, being an insider, can answer that question better than I can, Jim.

Is the problem that people of color aren’t encouraged to pursue careers in writing?

Is anyone encouraged to pursue a writing career? I don’t think so, or not many. Most writers write, regardless of race, because they have a desire to say something, not because they’re going to make tons of money. Most writers hold a regular job and write on the side.

Is it possible that there aren’t enough of these books being published because there aren’t enough being written?

No. That “writing desire” I spoke about above doesn’t just happen to Caucasians! But you tell me, how many manuscripts about minorities have you turned down? (Not because the writing wasn’t good, or great, but because of a fear factor that the money wouldn’t be there.) That’s another question that you can answer better than I can.

The last question you asked – only you can answer.

(Thanks, Jim, for bringing on this conversation!)

(i agree that the question a hard one to pose to the authors on the panel. but the question needs to be asked in mainstream spaces. it can’t just be discussed at diversity cons or diversity panels, etc. so i’m glad that person asked that question at a big NYC Teen Author Book Festival. NYC–KNOWN for its diversity.)

It’s a topic that goes back to the 1800s, when slave narratives had to be prefaced by a white writer. It’s a topic that goes to the Harlem Renaissance, when Carl VanVechten’s Ni##er Heaven made headlines (for various reasons) and Langston Hughes’ novel did not, when white patronage helped black artists get published and a public, when authors like Jean Toomer passed (or at least didn’t specifically say they were African American) and, later, when authors like Richard Wright wrote dangerous prose that was banned and the 1960s when Amiri Baraka called for poems that kill.

It goes back to the development of American Literature as a discipline (back in the 1950s), when the books that were selected as classics helped to solidify what students were taught in high schools as well as colleges (which, surprise! had everything to do w/ testing out this newfangled thing called the paperback), and even to the 1980s, when African American Literature started to gain a foothold as a separate and legitimate discipline (and was often ghettoized in departments as such). It comes full circle, when I see many many many of the reviews for a friend’s awesome YA book with a strong, smart African American male protagonist gets meh reviews on Goodreads because the main character wasn’t “likable.”

This is a historical issue with present-day resonance. It’s an issue that occupies the intersections of business and emotion and of writer and reader. It’s an issue that uncovers uncomfortable truths about our present-day situation in this country and a longer issue that’s always been part of American publishing. An issue that needs to always be placed in that large context of literature and books and literacy in America.

And it’s such an important conversation to have.

There are so many answers to this questions, and I don’t think any of them are correct or incorrect. The issue will have to be dealt with from more than one angle.

From a purely publishing standpoint, books written by black people (I’m only speaking for black people because I am black.) are often marginalized. Most times you’ll read how the book was written by an African American (ad nauseam), African Americans will love this book, this book is for the urban (code for black) reader. And that pretty much says to a potential audience, if you aren’t black don’t read this book. You won’t get it.

From the reader standpoint, there’s this idea that reading a book with a MC of color is going to be somehow different, i.e. material or experience we just don’t understand. I think that’s a bit of a cop out. I’m going to venture a guess that very few can relate to Katniss and Tris, or even Eleanor and Hazel. I can’t, (and not because they’re not black) but I love those MCs. Who knows, though. Maybe I’m that way because there wasn’t much choice in the bookstore when I was a kid. You had to read about white people, as do my children today.

That said, we aren’t just writing “issue” or “black experience” books anymore. Our subject matter is as varied as we are. Maybe if that were more widely recognized by readers things could begin to change.

P.S.- Please listen to Mr. Simien. Being the only black friend is a tough job.

Start by dumping your ideas about who we are. Tragic? Romantic? Primitive? Savage? Dump all of that and start reading books by Indigenous writers. See the list of Indigenous Masters at Betsy Bird’s blog at SLJ.
http://blogs.slj.com/afuse8production/2014/02/26/top-100-books-by-indigenous-masters/

Read my site — I’m a respected critique and am pretty thorough in my analyses of what went wrong in this or that book. http://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/

I have several author friends of color, but by far the most successful of these started her own publishing company and proved readers would like her before she managed a traditional contract. The fault is on a circular cycle with readers, too–because most books are ‘so white’ people of color are more likely to choose less mainstream literature which makes publishers think ‘well that isn’t the demographic that reads’ when in fact people read more when they find more to identify with. I think it’s CRITICAL that YA literature gain in diversity. Adults will find what they want to read and there are genres that feed desires, but I think it’s important for young people to not feel excluded when their peers are talking about books.

In our supposedly ‘post-racial’ world we have forgotten the importance of dialog and celebrating differences and cooperation between people who intentionally reach across cultural divides and the anger and tension about it is bubbling up (check out the Twitter #BBUM campaign if this doesn’t ring any bells). I think we all could benefit from being more cognizant about who is present in books and really think about who cares about who is absent.

(and on another note–your Captcha is the most picky-jerk of an interaction I’ve ever had–I’d really recommend getting rid of it. Trying now for the 5th time to get this to post)