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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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Your Top Five Pulp Heroes that you wish were better known? By Pulp Hero fans, I mean. Since pretty much all of them except Conan and Tarzan are fairly unknown.

It’s actually quite hard for me to narrow it down to just five, because I’m having to choose between characters that are my favorites that I wish were more well-known and appreciated (which is all of them), and characters that aren’t quite my favorites but I very much think should have achieved great popularity for a myriad of reasons. So instead I’m going to pick some of each. These are not necessarily ranked by their importance or my personal taste, just 5 characters I felt like highlighting in particular.

Honorable mentions goes to characters I already talked about prior and don’t want to repeat myself on. These aren’t “lesser” picks, just ones that I already talked about: Imaro (who in particular definitely feels like he could, and should be, a pop culture superstar if he was only more well-known), Kapitan Mors (who’s got a lot in common with one of my favorite fictional characters, Captain Nemo, but also has a lot of interesting things going on for him as his own character). Sar Dubnotal (a character that appeals a lot to me and I think should be included much more often in pulp hero team-ups). The Golden Amazon (again, definitely a character that feels like it’s just begging to have a pop culture breakout, even comic books rarely if ever have female supervillains this ruthless and over-the-top), The Mexican Fantomas (who absolutely deserves a better name than what I’m calling him here, because he’s incredibly awesome and leagues ahead of just being a knock-off). And of course my homeboy, The Grey Claw, whom I would consider Number One of the list if it wasn’t for the fact that his obscurity has left him untouched by copyright and I got plans of my own for the character that wouldn’t be possible if he was more well-known, so I guess I’m ultimately glad he’s obscure (even if I’m still bothered by how little he’s known).

Allright let’s go:

Number 5: Sheridan Doome

Sheridan Doome appeared in fifty-four stories and three novels from 1935 to 1943. As chief detective for U.S. Naval Intelligence, Lieutenant Commander Sheridan Doome’s job was a grim one. Whenever an extraordinary mystery or crime occurred in the fleet, on a naval base, or anywhere the navy worked to protect American interests, Doome was immediately dispatched to investigate it. Fear and dread would always precede Doome’s arrival in his special black airplane. For, in an explosion during WWI, he had been monstrously disfigured.

He was six feet two inches tall; had a chalk-white face and head. It appeared as though it had once been seared or burned. For eyes, he had only black blotches; glittering optics, that looked like small chunks of coal. His nose was long, the end of it squared off rudely. He had no lips, just a slit that was his mouth. His neck was long, as white and as bony as his face…. Sheridan Doome looked more like a robot than a human being. He was tall and ghastly; his uniform fitted him in a loose manner. Long arms hung at his sides; his face was a perfect blank. He had no control of his facial muscles; consequently, his countenance was always without expression, chalky and bony.

But behind the ugliness was a brilliant mind. Sheridan Doome always got his man. Before Sheridan Doome became a staple in the pages of The Shadow magazine, two Doome hardcover mysteries were written in the mid-1930’s by acclaimed hard-boiled author Steve Fisher (I Wake Up Screaming) and edited by his wife Edythe Seims (Dime Detective, G-8 and His Battle Aces). Age of Aces now brings you both books in one huge double novel, presented in a retro “flip book” style. This book is currently Out of Print.

I sadly don’t have any more information on the character other than this. The book is unavailable for me to acquire in any capacity, and the text above is taken from the Age of Aces website as well as Jess Nevins’s personal profile for the character. I’m not even sure if any of those 54 stories even exist anymore, since although he was published as a backup in Shadow Magazine, there doesn’t seem to be reprints of them anywhere, at least as far as I can find, and the original Shadow magazines have largely turned to dust by now.

A character who combines aspects of The Phantom of the Opera and The Shadow, whose adventures are set in a backdrop that can easily lead to ocean adventures? That’s like, what, three of my favorite things in the world combined. I really, really wish I could at least read the stories this character stars in, but as is, this description is all I can provide. Again, time really has been cruel to the pulp heroes.

Number 4: Harlan Dyce

This is another character I’ve only been able to learn about through Jess Nevins’s archives and have not been able to attain any further information on, which is sadly the case with a lot of pulp heroes that nowadays only seem to exist as footnotes in his Encyclopedia or records in libraries. I don’t post more about these characters because I really would just be copying the stuff he wrote without much to justify me quoting him verbatim, and I hate the idea of doing that.

I especially hate that in Harlan Dyce’s case though. Here’s his description

“Dyce had brains, taste, money, ambition, and a total lack of physical or spiritual fear. But—

“Dyce was thirty-three inches tall and weighed sixty pounds.

“That was all the world could ever hold against him. That was what had made the world, most of it, in all the countries of the world, stare at Harlan Dyce, billed in the big show as “General Midge.””

Harlan Dyce is a misanthropic and venomous private detective. He has an “amazingly handsome face,” and the aforementioned brains. But all anyone sees is his stature, and he hates that and turns his cold eyes and acid tongue on them.

The only person Dyce likes and gets along with (besides his dwarf wife, a former client) is his assistant, Nick Melchem, a six-foot tall former p.i.’s assistant with bleak eyes and a strong body. Melchem ignores Dyce’s stature and treats Dyce normally, which Dyce responds warmly to.

Dwarfs may be the single most maligned group of people depicted in pulp magazines, even more so than the Japanese in the war years or the Chinese during the peak of the Yellow Peril’s popularity. Evil dwarfs, murderous dwarfs, sexually depraved dwarfs, they are all loathsome, ugly cliches that are, sadly, the only instances you see of dwarf characters being represented at all, with the only ones who are awarded any measure of sympathy are doomed henchmen or tragic villains. Even outside of the pulps, the only other examples of heroic, protagonist dwarfs I can think off the top of my head are Puck from Marvel Comics and Tyrion Lannister from Game of Thrones.

I’m not gonna say Harlan Dyce is great representation because I’m not a little person and can never make that kind of claim for a group I’m not a part of, but Harlan Dyce may be the first time I’ve ever seen a dwarf character in pulp fiction who was not a villain or a murderous goon or a victim, but an actual person and a heroic protagonist, and that definitely counts for something. I’m not sure how popular this character was or could be if someone picked up the concept and ran with it (and I’m pretty sure he’s public domain), but I definitely think this is a character that should exist and should be popular.

Hell, this character has Peter Dinklage written all over it, give it to him. Maybe then he will get to play a smart, fearless, cynical, misanthropic but good-natured and heroic character in something where he actually gets to keep these traits until the show ends.

Number 3: Audaz, O Demolidor

Audaz is a Brazilian character who was created and published by Gazetinha, the same publishers of Grey Claw as well as properties exported from elsewhere like Superman and Popeye, and much like The Grey Claw, he is also completely unknown even here. I’ll get to Audaz more in-depth sometime but here I’m going to provide a quick summary:

Audaz, The Demolisher is a gigantic crime-fighting robot controlled and piloted by the brilliant scientist Dr. Blum, his close friend Gregor and the child prodigy Jacques Ennes, who pilot the giant robot from a massive laboratory inside it's head rather than a cockpit. He takes on a variety of ordinary human criminals, mad scientists, supervillains and invading armies, towering over skyscrapers and grappling with jets.

Audaz was created in 1939 by illustrator Messias de Melo, a year before Quality Comics's Bozo the Iron Man and 5 years before Ryuichi Yokoyama's Kagaku Senshi, and decades before the debut of Mazinger Z. Although he is not the first giant robot of science fiction, he is the first heroic giant robot piloted by human pilots, and thus the first true example of "mecha" fiction.

Number 2: Emilia the Ragdoll

This is another Brazilian character, although nowhere near as obscure as Audaz as even a cursory Google search can show. Although Brazil did not have a “pulp era” in the same way the US had, we’ve long gotten past the point of sticking to it as a definitive rule, and I’m including Emilia as a pulp hero because she’s a 1920s fantasy literature character who was created under a publishing company that released pulp stories, because she doesn’t quite belong in the mold of fantasy literature characters she takes after, and because I like her and if I was putting a bunch of pulp heroes together in the same story, I would definitely include Emilia in it. It’s not like she really has anywhere else to go, now that she’s public domain and she’s outlasted her franchise.

As you can tell by the above image, Emilia’s had a lot of variations over the years and that’s because the work she was created for, Sítio do Picapau Amarelo (Yellow Woodpecker Ranch/Farm), has become a major bedrock of Brazilian fantasy literature, one of the only works created here that you can find substantial information about in English if you go looking for it. Here’s some descriptions of Emilia’s character:

Emília is a rag doll described as "clumsy" or "ugly", resembling a "witch" that was handmade by Aunt Nastácia, the ranch's cook, for the little girl Lúcia, out of an old skirt. After Lucia takes her on an adventure and the doll is given a dose of magic pills, Emília suddenly started talking, and would never stop henceforth.

Emilia has a rough, antagonistic personality, and an independent, free-spirited and anarchist behaviour. She is rogue, rebellious, stubborn, rough and intensely determined at anything she sets her mind on, eager to take off on just about any adventure. She is often immature and behaves like a curious and arrogant child, always wanting to be the center of attention.

She is extremely opinionated even when she constantly and confidently mispronounces words and expressions. Her attitude often gets her into trouble, and she very often has to fight against the villains who attack her home on the Yellow Woodpecker Farm and mistreat her friends.

In the stories, Emilia often takes the role of a heroine who travels through different realms and dimensions, as the books include not only figures from Brazilian and worldwide folklore, but also several characters both real and fictional, such as Hercules, King Arthur, Don Quixote, Thumbelina, Da Vinci, Shirley Temple, Captain Hook, Santos Dumont and Baron von Munchausen.

She's fought scorpions and martians and nymph hordes, her arch-enemy is an alligator witch, she rescued an angel from the Milky Way and tried to teach it how to become a human, and once shrunk the entire population of Earth to try and talk the president of the United States into ending war forever.

To little surprise, she has become the most popular character and the series’s mascot.

It’s a little strange to consider Emilia underrated considering she is one of the most famous original characters of Brazilian literature, but hardly anyone outside of Brazil even knows who she is, and regardless of the quality of the original stories (and Monteiro Lobato’s views on race that tar much of his reputation), Emilia definitely feels to me like a character that should be a lot more popular globally.

She is the only character from Yellow Woodpecker Ranch that has transcended the original stories, since she was always the most popular character and there’s been a couple of stories written about her that usually separate her from the ranch and just set her out on the world by herself. The latest story about this character has been a series called The Return of Emilia, that’s about her stepping out of the books in 2050 and discovering a Brazil that’s been ruined by social and ecological devastation, and traveling back in time via a flying scooter in order to try and prevent this calamity.

Now that she’s public domain, I definitely think there’s some great stories that can be told with the character that just about anyone could get to, and I definitely think she’s a character that deserves more appreciation. Anything goes in stories starring her and it’s that kind of free-for-all freedom that I think can benefit future takes on pulp heroes. I would be very happy to place Emilia among them.

Oh yeah, and there was one time she kicked Popeye's ass by tricking him with a can of mouldy cabbage instead of spinach, making him sick and then beating him, which possibly puts her as one of the all-time badasses of fiction, except she would be pissed at not being number one and likely embark on a quest to beat everyone else just to prove she could, because that’s how Emilia rolls.

Number 1: Luna Bartendale, from The Undying Monster (1922)

Not necessarily my favorite of the bunch, but one who sort of epitomizes what you asked, a character who is both incredibly obscure and incredibly underrated in every sense. Despite the book being somewhat known, mainly thanks to the movie, the character is so obscure that I don’t even have an illustration of her to display here, not even fan art, just one of the book’s covers that I think best conveys it. Luckily, the book is also available freely online, so you can all go check it out here. The movie adaptation does not feature the character of Luna Bartendale which makes it pointless to talk about.

To not spoil it too much, The Undying Monster is a very fascinating book, ahead of it’s time in quite a few ways. You expect it to just be a detective story centered around a werewolf cursed, except the subtitle of the book is “The Fifth Dimension” and then it goes to talk about dimensions of thought and post-WWI trauma and love and hypnotic regression that travels through time and ancient runes and Norse mythology. It’s not exactly an easy book to get through in one setting, but I’d recommend it much the same if only because it’s got supersensitive psychic sleuth Luna Bartendale, literature’s first female occult detective, and she’s an incredible character who absolutely feels like she should have become a literary icon.

She lives in London but is world-renowned for her many good deeds. She is a small, pretty woman, with curly blonde hair, dark eyebrows and a high-bridged nose, and a slight build. She has a voice described as a light soprano that "does not make much noise but carries a long way".

Petite, bedimpled and golden curled, Luna is completely in charge of events, dominating every scene that she appears in with her welcoming disposition and cleverness.

Bartendale has various psychic powers, including mind reading. She is well-versed in psychic and occult lore, is a “supersensitive” psychic, and has a “Sixth Sense” which allows her to trace things and people through both the Fourth and the Fifth Dimension. (The Fifth Dimension is “the Dimension that surrounds and pervades the Fourth–known as the Supernatural”).

Her extensive knowledge of occult rites and practices puts John Silence, Carnacki and Miles Pennoyer to shame, and she beats them all with her "super-sensitive" gift of being able to psychically connect with troubled souls and hypnotize them.

She uses a divining rod for various tasks, including psychic detection and tracking, and distinguishing between benevolent and malevolent forces. She has various (undefined) powerful psychic defenses, can carry on seances, and can even cure a person of “wehrwolfism.” And she can always rely on her massive, intelligent dog Roska for help.

Luna sadly doesn’t show up in the book as often as I’d hoped, but everything about this character is so delightful. In a lot od ways she hardly feels like a pulp hero, at least the ones I usually talk about. She feels like a lost protagonist from an incredibly successful kid’s adventure series where a kind and eccentric detective witch and her giant dog go around solving occult mysteries and encountering all sorts of weird supernatural beings while counseling and helping people, like Ms Frizzle meets Hilda. Like this character is just waiting for Cartoon Saloon to make a film about her.

Its not so much “this character should/could be popular but it’s clear why that didn’t pan out”, it’s more me being confused as “why the hell isn’t she super popular? This character should have had a franchise ages ago, holy shit put her in everything””

#pulp heroes #pulp fiction #answer tag #sheridan doome #harlan dyce #audaz #boneca emilia #luna bartendale

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violet-bookmark · 4 years

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I know we (kind of)* have better media representation nowadays than in the past, but in the last years the big studios are giving us nothing while simultaneously expecting us to fall at their feet just because they said in an interview (that nobody watched) that x character is actually gay/bi, not that we will get to see them talk about it or be in a same-sex relationship on-screen.

Take for example what Marvel did with Valkyrie: they said in an interview that they were supposedly going to include a scene of her revealing her bisexuality, but decided against it at the last minute. That's not representation, that's just throwing a bone our way because they want us to watch the movie (and to consider the studio gayfriendly) but can't be bothered to write actual representation/include scenes of characters expressing same-sex attraction. And despite that, a lot of "lesbian" magazines from my native country were praising their "inclusion" (???) As if they had given them a bisexual lead, and talking about how great Marvel was for doing this empty gesture.

How can you claim you "represented" a group if you haven't even mentioned or showed anything about them on-screen? The majority of people won't care enough about the movie to search for this interview. The majority of people who have watched the movie don't know that Valkyrie is supposed to be bisexual. Which is awfully convenient because then nobody will be complaining about "Marvel pandering to the gays/bis again", but you will get just enough woke points to be considered inclusive because somehow gay magazines will be all over this news.

Same happened with How to train your dragon 2: everyone was SUPER HYPED about Stoic's friend being gay, because it is a children's movie and etcetera. People were writing articles about that bold move before the movie came out, just praising how progressive Dreamworks was being. And when the movie came out, all that the character said about it was that "he never married for certain reasons". That's it. That's all. I have seen movies from the 80's with better rep than this. Some children's books (like the Moomins) had better rep than this. Fucking High School Musical had better rep than this. And yet it was supposed to be a big deal, even when the majority of people who watched the movie won't get it. Hell, if it wasn't for all the hype I saw around it, I would have been none the wiser. Some would probably justify it with a "there wasn't enough screentime", but if you have enough time to show me dumb teenagers fighting over the only girl left in the village (??) Then you can show me a male character talking about some dude he likes. And if you really don't have time, just don't try to fit in minorities in such an awkward way. It smells like a money grab.

Please stop praising shitty "representation" from money-grabbing studios, I beg you.

* Taking into account that a lot of gay/lesbian characters still get killed/get an unhappy ending/suddenly fall for or have sex with someone from the opposite sex because why not (this happens to supposed "lesbian" characters so fucking much)/get put on a bus to never come back once they have fulfilled their mission of attracting the gays/get "over their homosexuality" and end up paired with a trans person of the opposite sex (yes, Shameless, I'm looking at you), one might argue that the majority of representation we have nowadays isn't worth much. Bisexual people also keep getting the occasional same-sex romance (that the majority of the time happens during one Very Special Episode™️) but 90% of the time they only have serious romances/endgames with partners of the opposite sex.

#lesbian #lesbian representation #lgb representation #bad lgb representation #homosexuality #homosexual representation #gay representation #Marvel #dreamworks #how to train your dragon #thor: ragnarok

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infernallewords · 7 years

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Stereotypes

I’m sick of them. I’m sick to death of them. If I see one more show, movie, or book with a stereotype of a minority in it, I will scream and pretend that piece of garbage doesn’t exist. If you have to add a commonly used adjective to your minority to describe it (one you’ve seen used previously), you are writing a stereotype. I have dropped show after show after show because of this. At this point I just watch silly videos online, because almost every show has this, with the exception of The Flash, because that show is apparently being written by people who actually interact with minorities. The story line may be a little hackneyed, but the minority characters are gold. And people need to take a page from its book, because fucking hell it’s beautiful.

If I can watch a movie/show or read a book with a minority, and predict exactly how they will behave, that thing will be dead to me.

Example: I was so excited to read a Christopher Moore book. Super excited. I’d heard so many good things about Lamb. Everybody I knew loved it. Well, I wanted to read a horror story, and he had written a horror comedy called A Dirty Job. This book was set in San Fran’s Chinatown district. The main character, a white male, was written with some depth (goofy, beta male stupidity, but some depth). His lesbian sister was written as just that. Her entire story line revolved around her being a lesbian. Not her as a person, but just her as a lesbian. Okay, I said, and continued on. His Chinese landlady spoke in broken English, stole his many pets to eat them, and screamed in Cantonese at him. His female Russian neighbor constantly talked about fighting bears. The one black guy in the book, who could also sense the dead, always dressed like a pimp, is called “Minty Fresh”, and pretends to be gay to lure in gay men to buy all his Cher albums. Also, the main character is constantly “talking black” to him. He’s also super physically strong. His creepy fellow shop keeper is constantly searching for “desperate Filipina girls” on dating websites and fetisizes them. There’s some ugly “trans humor” attached to it that makes me cringe. And the women are all fuckpuppets. One of the female souls gets attached to her breast implants.

Do you see the problem here? I will never read another fucking book by this author, because the method by which he wrote his minority characters was stunningly bad. Not all black men have to be big, burly pimps dressed in pimp suits. Not all Asian people “eat dog”. I guess he was trying to throw you off the scent with the Russian lady and “wrestling bears”, but fuck man, you don’t make something better by doubling down on it. And if you’re trying to comment on stereotypes, you have to subvert them in a well-written way. This author does not do that in the least. All he needed was the sexed up, saucy Latina character with her big hips and “feisty attitude”. Thank god there was no “sassy Black woman”, or the many, many stereotypes depicting Black women as either whores, mammies, or non-sexed magical characters for the main character’s benefit (though Minty did come off as a bit of a magical negro character to help guide the story line). Also, if the main character hadn’t been portrayed as a “beta male”, I’m sure there would have been some white savior complex a la every main white male character Hollywood throws in with a bunch of minority characters.

“Oh, stop talking down about white people! That’s just racist!”

Well, I am talking about minority stereotypes and the inherent racism therein, so it makes sense to talk about the opposite problem, y’know? You can’t improve upon a problem without talking about the problem. Also, stop getting cringey when somebody talks about white characters and their juxtaposition with minority characters in pieces of entertainment. The troupes are already proven and they are well-worn. Besides, I’m talking about representation, and it matters. White characters get amazing representation with depth, personality, romance, wants, goals, dreams, and hopes for their future. All I want is to see is that with minority characters, which rarely happens unless it’s written by a minority. And then if it’s a movie, expect a slave narrative, which I pretty much will not watch (#nomoreslavenarratives).

Example: While I did enjoy the movie Logan (went to the theatre and everything), its WSC was off the scales. I still enjoyed it, but why? And if anybody rolls their eyes at me mentioning this, just take a look at the way Hollywood furthers this standard. Avatar, The Help, The Blind Side, The Last Samurai, Dangerous Minds, etc. Hell, martial arts films made by Hollywood have a straight up complex when it comes to the Asian master who teaches the non-Asian to fight and be the best there ever was. I can direct you to Iron Fist, the Netflix show that does this, but everybody says, “Hey man, that was the original story!” Okay, but that’s actually not better. The fact that this has been going on forever doesn’t make it excusable. The movie Man of Tai Chi doesn’t exactly endear me to the concept, either. And I won’t even go into everything wrong with that horrific Dragonball movie.

And so you know I’m not pulling this out of my ass.

http://feministfilm.tumblr.com/post/6608112156/a-brief-list-and-analysis-of-white-savior-films

All I’m saying is this: I just want to see some realistic depictions of minorities in Hollywood and beyond. I’m sick of the stereotypes. I’m sick of being super excited to watch or read something, only to be hit over the head with stereotypes anytime a minority is introduced. And I’m also sick of people refusing to even write minorities in lead parts, because they don’t want to offend or have “tokens”. As Tim Burton put it, “Nowadays, people are talking about it [diversity] more ... things either call for things, or they don’t. I remember back when I was a child watching The Brady Bunch and they started to get all politically correct. Like, OK, let’s have an Asian child and a black. I used to get more offended by that than just… I grew up watching blaxploitation movies, right? And I said, that’s great. I didn’t go like, OK, there should be more white people in these movies.”

First of all, lol. This is why I haven’t watched a Tim Burton film since he fucked up Sweeney Todd. Second, “a black”? Blaxploitation films? Oh man. Third, minorities aren’t just people you sprinkle in stories for the sake of diversity. If you have a diverse group of friends, they aren’t there just because you “sprinkled them in”. You have them because you like them and what they bring to the table as human beings. You have friends from different backgrounds, because you have things in common. It’s those commonalities that cause you to come together and experience life. Why people who write these scripts and screenplays and books seem to completely forget the real people they know in real life when they put pen to paper is beyond me. If you have black friends, are they are sexless mammies who are magical negroes that merely exist in your life to further your story? Are they all thieves or pimps or gangstas who have at some point involved themselves in criminal activity? Do the young black women you know all resort to drugs or having a bunch of kids for child support or welfare? Are they turning tricks? Are the guys all players who fuck women and leave them with kids? Are the black women in your life all neck-swiveling Shaniquas who wag their fingers and eat fried chicken and talk about “oh no you didn’t!”

I certainly hope none of the people I know who write would try to shove me in any of those boxes, because I don’t fit in any of them. I’m childless, in a long term relationshipand have hopes and dreams and a love of creativity, writing, and books. I also have mental illnesses that affect my ability to be social and end up staying at home all day trying to parse my own reality while struggling with existential dread and nihilism. I have the type of personality that would never be attributed to a black woman in many scenarios. I’m not strong and independent--I’m a sad, depressed girl with anxiety issues who spends her time fumbling through life while trying to be successful and artistic. That black girl never gets written, and it’s a shame. That Korean/Chinese/Filipino/Indonesian girl never gets written. That Latina girl never gets written. That Indian girl never gets written. Same with minority guys. That guy, as a minority, never gets written, and I know so many going through the same ups and downs as me.

Minority characters are fucking human. When I see us get written as humans in a movie or show or book, I inhale it and support it with all my might. I will stan for these things. I get excited about them. I tell everybody about any piece of entertainment that does this and does it right. And if you don’t know how to do it (I’m looking at you, again, Hollywood), then just write a character and make them a minority second. Again, take a page from The Flash, who does this marvelously. They wrote people first, and minorities second. Did they have some slip ups (the absent mother who becomes a drug addict arc for Iris West), yes. And it was stupid. Did they make up with it with Iris’s brother in a way when they introduced Kid Flash? Absolutely, and his character is awesome. He was a little hotheaded at the beginning, but when they found his voice and disposed of certain stereotypical aspect (illegal drag racing), it was much better. And really? Even the drag racing played into him becoming Kid Flash due to his motivation for speed. Even the mild stereotypes made some sense. He’s a college student now with a job and a loving family, and that makes me so happy. Why can’t more shows and movies do this? Why is this so hard? Joe West is a hard-working detective in the show and a black father who supports his kids. He doesn’t have some edgy past with drugs and other crap. He’s just ... amazing. Why is that so hard?

Why is this so hard to comprehend? I’m not complaining to be controversial or aggressive or mean or hateful (though many will obviously see that, regardless of how politely I structure my argument simply because I am mentioning race). I’m complaining about it because I am none of these stereotypes, nobody I know or love are these stereotypes, and nobody I’m around are purely and only these stereotypes. Whether or not you choose to believe that “stereotypes come from somewhere”, those same stereotypes can be found in any group of people. So why are they only attributed to some and not others? Or, if they are attributed to others, why do those others get to redeem themselves while the minorities who have these stereotypes don’t? That’s where my frustration lies.

#stereotypes #Hollywood just doesn't get it #why I hate most entertainment #writing #mini rant about stereotypes and minorities

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joannechocolat · 7 years

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On Ghostwriting, Celebrity and That Guardian Review.

Yesterday, some of you may have noticed this review in the Guardian. It’s a review by Jenny Colgan of The Secret Lives of the Amir Sisters, by (according to the title page) Nadiya Hussain and Ayisha Malik.

Now, being one of those freaks who doesn’t watch GBBO, I have only limited knowledge of Nadiya Hussain is. I do know of Ayisha Malik, though. She’s a writer, a good one: and from that it’s pretty easy to guess that she’s Nadiya Hussain’s ghostwriter.

So what? Becoming famous in one area (be it sport, politics or baking) does not magically transform someone into a writer. Of course celebrity authors need ghostwriters to help them: that’s why their novels and autobiographies are generally clear, interesting and competently-written. And Nadiya even credits her ghostwriter; not all celebrity authors do. (Some even make them sign non-disclosure agreements, in the hope that the general public will really believe they wrote the book.)

However, having noticed all that, Jenny Colgan (whom I’ve met several times; she seemed like a nice person, though even nice people can be wrong, and in this case, I think she is) still proceeds to make her review all about her dislike of celebrity novels, and how this somehow cheats “proper writers” out of the shelf space they’re entitled to.

She begins with a description of two little girls, one in a library, dreaming of being a writer, and one in a kitchen, dreaming of cakes. You don’t have to be a great brain to understand that the little girl in the library is Jenny Colgan, and that the girl in the kitchen is Nadiya Hussein, who somehow in real life gets to be a baker and a writer too, thereby (it implies) cheating the first little girl out of her dream; as if baking and writing were two kinds of cookies, with limited numbers to go round.

Does she really need to put her name to a novel, too, (writes this successful writer of the first-time author) when there’s only so much shelf space to go around?

It feels greedy.

Well, maybe it would, if writing and baking were cookies. It might be, if we lived in a world in which someone who was good at baking wasn’t allowed to write books. It might be, if publishing were a charity, fairly and evenly distributing its attention to everyone who needed it.

But as it is, no. It doesn’t feel greedy. It feels as if someone is feeling insecure and resentful, and that comes out as sounding plain mean.

Don’t think I don’t understand: I do. Being a writer is a risky business. It’s getting harder and harder to make a living as a professional writer. And now we seem to be overwhelmed by politicians, and TV chefs, and comedians, and musicians, and actors, and pop stars and people from reality shows all wanting to be authors, hogging the limelight and making it look as if anyone can write a book...

Yes, it sometimes feels unfair. It can sometimes seems as if being a celebrity comes with a special, free “bestselling author” card: a card that most authors never get to play. And yes, authors often feel jealous, resentful and scared that their livelihood is being eroded by people whose status as celebrities earn them special privileges. I’m as guilty of this thinking as anyone. You’ve heard me rant about Morrissey, who used his special status to get his ridiculous novel published by Penguin Classics – Penguin Classics, for pity’s sake, next to Shakespeare and Homer. I’m still dismayed that Penguin could do that – to themselves, and to us – for the sake of a piece of piss-a-bed prose that even his fans couldn’t read. And for what? Sales. So I get it. Yeah.

I’d also like to take a moment to mention the editor who commissioned the Guardian piece. My strong suspicion is that he or she knew perfectly well that Jenny Colgan’s review would raise hackles (and, of course, sales). Clickbait is synonymous with journalism nowadays: but if they’d had any kind of integrity, they would have given Jenny Colgan a kind and quiet warning, telling her just how badly she was exposing her prejudices, instead of throwing her under the bus. Because that’s just what the Guardian did, in encouraging her to voice her ignorance and insecurity in a way that would provoke debate. She got the flak: they got the sales. That word again. Sales. Hm.

However – let’s get to the review, and why Jenny Colgan and the Guardian ought to think long and hard about the toxic and damaging messages they are putting out.

First, let’s start with the fact that the book is “perfectly competently-written.” As well it might be; it’s by a perfectly competent writer. It will sell “like hot cakes”. As well it might: it looks like it might be fun, and lots of people have heard of Nadiya Hussian, whose TV presence (by all accounts) is delightful, warm and appealing. But, for some reason, we still shouldn’t buy it. Why? Because it’s ghost-written? The reason for this becomes increasingly unclear and illogical.

If you want to read warm-hearted sagas about second-generation immigration, Meera Syal is a wonderful novelist. If you want to read a brilliant book about four sisters, Little Women is still in print. If you like sisters and cooking, try the marvellous Like Water for Chocolate. Or read Ayisha Malik’s book: it’s huge fun.

Hang on – isn’t The Secret Lives of the Amir Sisters Ayisha Malik’s book? Or does she mean a different book, with Ayisha Malik’s name on the cover? In either case, we know that the book would be perfectly competently-written. So why does it really matter to Jenny Colgan which one of Ayisha Malik’s books we read?

Surely it can’t be just because the book is ghost-written. Ghost-writers are excellent writers, and they work hard for their shelf space. Their work is the reason “celebrity books” meet the high standards readers expect. No, it’s because the book will “sell like hot cakes”. Sell better than books by other, less visible authors, who also write about relationships, and families, and baking.

This surefire seller, promoted at every literary festival you’ll attend this year, just feels like yet another chance snatched away from that kid whose library is closing down.

Except we know who that kid really is. It’s little Jenny Colgan, working hard to write her books, while TV celebrities are ushered past her on a red carpet that’s cordoned off from ordinary people.

But here’s the thing. Jenny isn’t a little kid. No-one’s snatching anything. She’s a high-profile, well-established white author, begrudging a Muslim woman “shelf space.” And that sounds pretty greedy, coming from someone with 27 books already in print. In fact, it sounds not entirely unlike “foreigners stealing our jobs.” or “get back in the kitchen.” Not a great moment for Jenny (or indeed, for the Guardian).

Moving on to the actual book review part of the piece, we encounter my next problem. Having pointed out the cosmetic similarities to Little Women, Jenny says:

I was hoping for insights into a culture I don’t understand as well as I’d like, but the main thrust... is that big noisy religious families are all more or less the same, which, while undoubtedly true, didn’t add much....

Now whether she meant it or not, that reads as if she is complaining that the Muslim family in this book isn’t different enough to be interesting. Muslims in fiction should be exotic. They shouldn’t try to be like the rest of us. They shouldn’t take inspiration from Little Women. (Remember how Monica Ali was lambasted for daring to write about Princess Diana, instead of staying in Brick Lane?) Reading about people of other cultures should add something (to the experience of white people). It’s a perspective that fails to take into account the fact that a book authored by a Muslim woman, ghosted by a Muslim woman, about Muslim women may not be aimed at white people at all.

So hang on, I hear you asking. If Jenny Colgan didn’t like the book, is she not allowed to say so?

Well, yes. Of course she is. But in her review, she didn’t suggest that she disliked the book. Instead, she used her review platform to make a statement about “greedy” celebrities. Again, she had every right to do this. But was it really appropriate for her to do it as part of a review (and therefore target one writer only), rather than write a general piece, in which she could have mentioned any number of (white, privileged) celebrities?(Morrissey, I’m looking at you.)

And at best, it sounds as if this white author doesn’t understand how little representation Muslim girls have – in the media or in publishing. It sounds as if she has allowed her personal insecurities to cloud her objective judgement. A book reviewer reviews the book, not the author photograph. And in a world dominated by white celebrities, white authors, white reviewers, is it really too much to allow Muslim girls this one successful role model?

Muslim women have little enough of a platform – be it on TV or in publishing - as it is. They do not need to hear that one of the few Muslim women recognized as a success outside of the Muslim community is taking up too much space. And in the past, Jenny Colgan has given glowing reviews to books by (white) celebrities (who didn’t happen to be writing about women, and love, and baking).

Now I'm not a great fan of celebrity novels either, although I do think ghost writers do an excellent, and very underrated job. But in some cases, the value of giving a high-profile role model to (for instance) Muslim girls is more important than literary snobbery, or even the hurt feelings of an author who feels threatened.

Books are a zero sum game, she says. If you’re reading one, you can’t be reading another.

Not so. Books are stepping-stones. One book leads to another. People reading Twilight sometimes go on to Wuthering Heights. People reading The Secret Lives of the Amir Sisters might well go on to read Little Women. And people being told not to read it may just end up not reading at all. Whether we like it or not, there are people who never read books unless they have a TV or a celebrity connection. Those people feel so disconnected from the world of literature that, unless given permission to read by someone they know from TV, they may never reach for a book at all, let alone Little Women. Are we to ignore them, just because we, as writers, happen not to understand?

Books are for readers, not writers. And if even one non-reader reads a book because of a TV show about baking, then that book will have served its purpose. And if one Muslim girl sees Nadiya Hussain on the cover of a book and tells herself “I could do that,” then once more, it will have served its purpose.

As writers, we are all subject to fears and insecurities. But we’re not in this business to score off readers, or sneer at their choices, or deny role models to those who need them. That kid in the library needs to learn that no-one owes her shelf space, or column inches, or sales, or cookies. As writers, we ought to care about literacy, and empathy, and the good that books – that all books – do. And that means looking at what readers need. Because we’re not children any more, even though sometimes, we feel that way.

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