Tayari's Blog: Candy Licker

Comment #1, by james3neal

I don't know if you read the Nick Chiles piece from the January 4 New York Times that was entitled "Their Eyes Were Watching Smut". It's no longer available for free on line but can be purchased as a part of New York Times Select. In any case here's Calvin Reid from Publishers Weekly writing about the Chiles article: http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6336603.html

I am definitely pretty highbrow in my taste and I have not quite decided how I view the popularity of "urban" literature. (or what I've come to call thug and booty literature) It's a very complex issue indeed.

Comment #2, by dwayne

it's depressing when something as sadistic as any book by noire is what we say makes it okay for a ghetto girl to read. worse is when a book like candy licker with a character called mc thugalicious is advertised on the trains. and even though i didnt too much agree with their eyes are watching smut, g spot, candy licker and a host of other books like this are cousins to smut. the ironic thing is the women are the major buyers, in my experience.

women go out and, i mean sophisticated college graduates as well as your tri toned weave ghetto girl. (that was sarcasm, i really dont think the whole term "ghetto girl" implies anything relevant about a woman's personality any more than the generic use of the word bitch does) so like i was saying, these sophisticated and not so sophisticated women love this stuff.

problem is that alot of writers who dont write like this aren't nearly as accessible, and as the race to dumb down americans continues, the proliferation of this "ghetto girl" friendly literature will continue.

i never saw an author show up at my school, and had an eleventh grader who lives in a black middle class area tell me he hasnt had to read a book in school. if he's not reading you not the low income schools aint having folks read. so why wouldnt our eyes be on smut and murder and death, when its so easy to digest and guarantees that no dictionary or moment of thought will be needed to consume it. sorry for preaching

Comment #3, by Jackie

Wow, Dwayne. That was good. As I read your post, I started thinking about what you said about women being the ones buying street lit/hood books/urban fiction/ crap. These women, influencers of culture, are mothers or potential mothers. Will they pass on this mess to their children as a love of literature? Will children, underexposed to good writing, literature, equate books like CandyLicker/Ridin'Dirty on I-95/etc. as what it means to be a writer? A reader? I am starting to get anxious again. Even in the days of Iceberg Slim and Donald Goines, there was still literature and we were exposed to all of it, not just parts. What about today's children? If all they see adults around them reading are stories about pimping, hooking, drugging, thugging and stripping, will they turn off to reading or use these stories as their cultural dictionaries? Oooo, I don't like this, not at all.

That said, I will still defend to the death the right of choice, the right to choose what one wants to read, write, share. At the same time, I want to run some of these publishers out of of town because I see them as killing off our children's future with wrong headedness and only for the quick buck it makes.

Comment #4, by Michael Fischer

In general, it seems like there is always a tug-and-pull between "high" and "low" literature. I guess I'm more on the "high" side, but I can understand people who feel alienated by "high" literature. Yet, at the same time, one of the biggest misconceptions amongst the general reading public is that all "high literature" is inaccessible, which is not true at all. Sometimes I wish more accessible, "high" CONTEMPORARY literature was taught in the public schools to debunk the myth that all "high" literature is gimmicky, academic, and self-conscious.

Comment #5, by Ladylee

Now, what worries me is that the new Urban lit will become the new measuring bar for what African Amreican literature is, whether it be good or bad. And from the description of the Noire book, she seems to be taking things to some other sadistic and violent level. (Oh, and I think I will pass on reading Candy Licker... Tayari, YOU read it, and let me know what's up!)

Makes me wonder where will things go from here...

What IS the next level?

@Jackie...

Jackie, you offered some nice suggestions for some good summer reading... I am definitely going to go check out some of this SUBSTANTIAL lit!

Comment #6, by Ladylee

@Jackie- I was speaking of the lit suggestions (Castro, etc.) you left in the comments section of Tayari's previous post.

Comment #7, by edi

As an urban high school librarian, I fight this battle a lot. I don't make it available in my media center although I know it's what the students read. I prefer not to go to the mat for these books. I find it interesting, though that the books that are challenged in our libraries are _Whale Talk_ and _Kite Runner_ and _Chocolate War_ but not the urban lit that I know some schools choose to carry. The real problem is that we want our children to read, but no one else is really writing for them. We really enjoy reading that which relates to us and students are saying they relate so much to these books, but they're relating to the more negative aspects, rather than questioning the morality of situations they are validated for them. Our struggle is lost as is books that expose them to the world, uplift or motivate. Its as if our children's minds are (again) being messed with. So, the challenge, then is on me as a librarian to seek and find more African American young adult fiction, its on our authors to remember our youth and its even more so on publishers.

Comment #8, by Jackie

Interesting stuff in this thread.

When I was in junior high school, we got a new library and it was a big deal for my community. We no longer had to go to the rundown, one room castoff building designated for black people. Suddenly we had our own new branch with lots of windows and it was easy walking distance from my house. If you wanted to punish me, tell me I couldn't go to the library. This may be a stretch for some of you, but this was in the 1960s, Florida. My mother's good friend was the librarian and she kept an eagle eye on which shelves she saw me browsing. Naturally I was looking for the sex stuff, but she kept re-directing me to the classics. Without her guidance, I would never have read the Bronte sisters, or Vanity Fair or Gone With the Wind or been open all that represented writing. I discored there was more to the Dewey decimal system than the 300s.

Now that I think of it though, I did read a series called Trixie Belden (think poor cousin to Nancy Drew). Maybe that was my equivalent to "low" fiction. Obviously the librarian didn't know about that. The point I am trying to make is that there was someone who directed me to quality books. It was unlikley I was going to find anything written about a middle class black girl living in a segregated world, but what I did discover were ideas and writing that transported me to another place and gave me possibilities.

One of my best memories was getting through a book called Rebecca. Talk about mystery and bodice ripper! Then it became a movie and I wanted to stay up and see it on TV. My parents had a discussion about whether or not it was appropriate and especially since it came on at 11 at night. After much discussion I was allowed to see it, but I fell asleep because I wasn't used to being up that late.

For me, "low" fiction wasn't all there was. There was balance. Quite frankly, Gone With The Wind was far more intriguing than anything Trixie could have uncovered; I liked Trixie because she was a girl detective. I still have one of the books in that series. Maybe I will re-read it to see what the pull was.

I am just concerned that some young people will think urban fiction is the sum total of the reading experience.

Comment #9, by dwayne

this topic has gotten some really interesting comments. i want to say my last piece on it, or maybe my last. jackie you are right about someone needed to push people towards quality literature. i worked in a bookstore and can't name how many times i put breath, eyes, memory by danticat in some young girls hands. truth is i got maybe ten folks to buy it, and most of these young women came back and told me they enjoyed it. the problem i noticed is that too often we accept the at least they are reading line.

it's amazing how many parents accept this. my point is if you expose people to quality literature, what is passing as urban literature just won't be appealing after a certain amount of time. the quality of writing isn't there, the narrative pull isn't there, and if we are willing to admit it, the quality of thought is a little off.

i went to a book signing with the author of I-95, my feelings about the book aside. as i watched her defending her genre from the podium, i realized that we've allowed the conversation to be reduced to name calling. she wasn't defending her book based on it's merits. she was defending her book because some young women said it talked directly to them. she compared what she writes to nas. she compared her book to illmatic. the audience let it go, they agreed. her book is the literary version of illmatic. i almost started laughing. i almost just said forget it i need to listen to jazz. i'm afraid with all our choices, a generation of readers are missing the point. quality is no more defined by number of readers than it is record sales. and the author was cool, cause all i could think of when she left is that if she can sell that, it's no way i cant sell breath, eyes, memory.

i wasn't born in the sixties. i was born in the eighties. during the start of the crack era. i guess we are the first generation where it seems outrageous to demand something from a child. choices are beatiful. but if streetlife is your first exposure to literature, you haven't had a choice.

and i've read bout all donald goines books. i'd finish them and think, damn i really aint trying to be a dopefiend. in these streetlife books, the main character often goes from high school dropout to a life where she fulfills her dreams. with her only struggle being escaping the "game"

i share jackie's concerns.

erasure by percivall everett is a good read on the subject.

Comment #10, by Jennifer

I agree with Dwayne. You're right about Erasure, by Percival Everette. Also, it seems to me that a lot of people who have been readers for years before the "urban lit" came out continue to stay with their dedication to good literature. Me personally, it just seems like a lot of the new stuff is the same story. I look forward to hearing about a new book from authors such as Tayari, Pearl Cleage, Alice Walker, Edwidge Danticat, Ernest Gaines, Bernice McFadden, etc. I have stumbled across some new authors also who I think are serious about writing a good story, such as Andrea Smith (Friday Nights at Honeybees). I like Tracy Price-Thompson's book, A Woman's Worth. She is a good writer, however, Candy Licker and G-Spot just don't get it for me.

Comment #11, by james3neal

After reading some of the comments here and thinking about it a bit more ... I guess it's just good that literacy is being exercised at all ... so many people don't read these days if it's thug and booty literature then so be it ...