Black Literature not rooted in black tropes (such as.. Slavery, Jim Crow, Modern Day Microagressions)

[Professor Emeritus]

Octavia Butler is one of our great writers. Her books are incredible. I've also heard great things about NK Jemisin and Marlon James. but who else do we have? Who else am I missing? Are there black authors not just telling black stories? put me on.

Octavia butler - any damn thing
Nnena okorofor - binti series
NK Jemmison - broken earth series
For the sci fi fans…
Colson Whitehead is superlative.

yea she's incredible. I'm reading Kindred right now but I've read Dawn as well which is apart of her Xenogenesis Trilogy. That's also a great book.

S/O to Octavia Butler

I came into the thread to shout out Octavia Butler, specifically "Parable of the Sower", but y'all beat me to it. The degree to which it (and the sequel) predicts the Trump phemomena is remarkable.

N.K. Jemisin's "The Fifth Season" is fire too though like "The Parable of the Sower" it's also dark as fukk.

"Heavy" by Kiese Laymon is a memoir but reads like a novel, might be the most poetic memoir I've read.

Like OP said, where's our Murakami or Dostoevsky? They're among us, somewhere. They just need the chance to shine.

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison deals with Black identity. I don't think it deals with tropes and to a degree has similarities to Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes From The Underground.

fukk I'll say it - Invisible Man is better than Dostoevsky's best work and I'm a Dostoevsky fan. But Invisible Man is a straight masterpiece. It deserves serious consideration as the greatest American novel - just layers upon layers upon layers.

 

[MegaManX]

Noticing a severe lack of varied writings from black authors. There is a lack of black male authors as well. You look at some of the top books by black authors

but who else do we have? Who else am I missing? Are there black authors not just telling black stories? put me on.

Already there family and changing the world in the process.



You missed the boat when we were taking investors 2 years ago but we got one more round in us with season 1 of Black Sands, executive produced by Kevin Hart. Stay tuned

 

[hatealot]

Wtf is post modernism? That's called fukking sci fi

 

[O³ (O cubed)]

You might be interested in Walter Mosley books

I was gonna mention him but remembered the Easy Rawlings starts in the Jim Crow era.

 

[The Fade]

some of modern japanese fiction is inspired on the trauma of the bombs.

thats why that shyt is so fire and sometimes unfathomable


Also The count is based off of the authors black father. and the systems that be that hurt him, represented in a couple of horrible individuals.

I dont mind allegories for our traumas as long as they are good ones, with development and it's not blatantly corny. Make certain aspects of our source of pain represent monsters or individuals or paradigms for example. Sensui represented Japanese youth and was a complex villain. shyt even racist as HP Lovecraft turned his racism into horror elements

If anything we need stories that are universally relatable, just put some black characters in and flesh them out instead of throwing tropes on them

shyt, cacs dont write about slaying dragons out of no where. That's a universal trope that comes from multiple religions about a supreme god slaying a serpent, which represents on a lower level man taming his reptilian urges

 

[Cadillac]

This is a unnecessary thread all because OP won't/can't do a proper searching of black authors he likes.

its literally as easy as this^^^

how hard is it to type in black authors reddit, or he could have typed and looked ta book threads here in the coli

Black literature severely lacks

what does black american literature lack that any other group has?

 

[Jean toomer]

I came into the thread to shout out Octavia Butler, specifically "Parable of the Sower", but y'all beat me to it. The degree to which it (and the sequel) predicts the Trump phemomena is remarkable.

N.K. Jemisin's "The Fifth Season" is fire too though like "The Parable of the Sower" it's also dark as fukk.

"Heavy" by Kiese Laymon is a memoir but reads like a novel, might be the most poetic memoir I've read.







fukk I'll say it - Invisible Man is better than Dostoevsky's best work and I'm a Dostoevsky fan. But Invisible Man is a straight masterpiece. It deserves serious consideration as the greatest American novel - just layers upon layers upon layers.

Couldn’t agree more. Heavy was a traumatic read but very necessary. Kiese just won a MacArthur fellowship so shout out to him, Jackson MS.

 

[NZA]

i just bought @ORDER_66's book...

i understand what the OP is getting at. i recently read some junji ito and wished somebody black was doing that.

 

[Fill Collins]

I've asked myself this quite a few times, closest authors I can give you are Donald Goines (very lowbrow, lowlife 70's crime pulp, there's no moralizing and it's disturbing stuff) and Richard Wright, his subject matter is damn near everything in the thread title but he was heavily influenced by existentialism, a militant atheist and his anger wasn't the usual "tropey" grandstanding shyt you'd expect, it was just relatable if that makes sense

How are actual things that happened to black people "tropes"?


My brother you are a by product of the self hate machine that America has put its black citizens through

Slavery and racism are boring ass topics, I LOVE history but I want entertainment to be seperate

 

[Cadillac]

Noticing a severe lack of varied writings from black authors. There is a lack of black male authors as well. You look at some of the top books by black authors, it's mostly female writers and the ones who are male are often times writing queer stories as well. So who do we have from past to present writing fiction (or nonfiction) that isn't strictly rooted in the typical tropes we see. Most of the books I've seen written today and even in the past have to do with "the Black Experience" but are there any black authors just writing about the human experience? This is not to say that we don't have great books being written today by black authors but I just think we've been pigeon held into telling only certain types of stories.

@thats your fault you cant find the books both past and present that are written by black american authors that are not "piegoned into telling only certain types of stories" not the fault of black american authors and the literary scene

once again, its not hard to google and due DD to lookup black authors.

Where are our black postmodernists?

Where are our Haurki Murakami's, our Fyodor Dostoevsky's, Thomas Pynchon's, Don DeLillo's, David Foster Wallace, Cormac McCarthy, Gaddis, etc

Latin American writers have a rich history of post modernism. Roberto Bolaño, Jose Saramago, Julio Cortazar. shyt Miguel Cervantes, the founder

Japanese writers like Sayaka Murata, Natsuo Kirino and Ryu Murakami

James Mcbride, John Edgar wideman, Samuel R delany, walter mosley, Coltson whitehead

how have you not come across atleast one of any of these guys?

Such varied literature that has its roots in their prospective cultures but is solely unique in its story telling, backdrops, and messaging.

and you think black americans dont have this? are you crazy

nikka we have that as much if not more than those other groups and even more varied. from Magic realism like Beloved by Toni Morrison to adventure fiction and heoric like Standing In the Scratch line by Guy Johnson(Maya Angelou's son) we have it all.

and for just plain ole fantasies, stories or pieces of work about everyday life you have everything from Babel 17(sciene fiction) to August Wilson plays.

if your issue is that the "black tropes" are there in certain works then thats your own insecurity. because like those groups your bigging up. Those tropes are whats part of our "prospective culture" and will be touched on if not mentioned

same reason why japanese people stay writing about the bombs

or koreans and the korean war, and occupation under Japan.

Latin americans(of all types and nationalities) are even more redundant and repitive as they all whether White latinos or Afro latinos stay writing about the theme of duality and bilingualism and being latin in america. or just about their culture and history in general and their country

Gabriel Garcia Marquez has almost all of his novels and works being based on columbia and the columbian experience and he prolly one of if not is the most known latin author. no different than black american authors who do.

 

[earthwalka]

Octavia butler - any damn thing
Nnena okorofor - binti series
NK Jemmison - broken earth series
For the sci fi fans…
Colson Whitehead is superlative.

@thats your fault you cant find the books both past and present that are written by black american authors that are not "piegoned into telling only certain types of stories" not the fault of black american authors and the literary scene

once again, its not hard to google and due DD to lookup black authors.



James Mcbride, John Edgar wideman, Samuel R delany, walter mosley, Coltson whitehead

how have you not come across atleast one of any of these guys?



and you think black americans dont have this? are you crazy

nikka we have that as much if not more than those other groups and even more varied. from Magic realism like Beloved by Toni Morrison to adventure fiction and heoric like Standing In the Scratch line by Guy Johnson(Maya Angelou's son) we have it all.

and for just plain ole fantasies, stories or pieces of work about everyday life you have everything from Babel 17(sciene fiction) to August Wilson plays.

if your issue is that the "black tropes" are there in certain works then thats your own insecurity. because like those groups your bigging up. Those tropes are whats part of our "prospective culture" and will be touched on if not mentioned

same reason why japanese people stay writing about the bombs

or koreans and the korean war, and occupation under Japan.

Latin americans(of all types and nationalities) are even more redundant and repitive as they all whether White latinos or Afro latinos stay writing about the theme of duality and bilingualism and being latin in america. or just about their culture and history in general and their country

Gabriel Garcia Marquez has almost all of his novels and works being based on columbia and the columbian experience and he prolly one of if not is the most known latin author. no different than black american authors who do.

preciate the recommendations bro, imma check those guys out you mentioned. I only know about Colson and Toni Morrison. Just read about Babel 17, looks interesting too.

I'm ignorant bruh, I'll be the first to admit, I'm tryna learn more, that's all. I know we have great works, I think the issue is a lot of what is usually pushed to the forefront is shyt that doesn't necessarily interest me. It wasn't hard for me to find writers like Bolaño or Murakami. I wanted to find black authors like them, that's all

 

[Cadillac]

this thread reads no different than a "Black americans have no culture" topic

black american lit is very diverse some of yall just have laziness to research or just dont like the concepts at hand of slavery, jim crow, etc

nikkas been doing that shyt of turning slavery on its head, blacks fighting back

one of the stories i mentioned Standing By The Scratch Line by Guy Johnson features a Black man going across America and in Europe kicking Racist CAC ass.

Colson whitehead has a John Henry novel


some of you just want black american writers to be on some escapist african mythology fantasy/sci fi shyt.

Lets just get to the meat of yalls issue thats what yall want. its not about how black americans twist and turn slavery, jim crow, etc





which is why this topic reads no diff than a "black americans have no culture" because this comes down to black americans needing africaness to solidify themselves in yall eyes.
In this case its black literature

 

[Mr. McDowell]

I've posted about this before but if you're interested in black authors who write other things feel free to take a look (all twelve books and their subject matter are listed and can be purchased via Amazon and other retailers. They're also in libraries):

Darn Pretty Books

Indie Press specializing in Science Fiction, Action, Adventure, Comedy, Suspense and Thrillers. We publish what we enjoy reading. Be sure to contact your local library and put in a request/recommendation for one of our fine authors. Happy Reading!

www.smashwords.com

 

[Cadillac]

Like OP said, where's our Murakami or Dostoevsky? They're among us, somewhere. They just need the chance to shine.

and they have shined, Coates, Mcbridge, etc

murakami is no different than the black american authors yall are trying to belittle, all his work centers around japanese culture and japanese life.

no different then how black american authors do it with black american life and black american society.

Taking different genres, elements, story tropes and centering it on their culture.

if your whole thing is about not having stories that are romance, or them being strggle stories. you can avoid them because there are stories from alot of black authors that dont touch on that stuff

 

[The Phoenix]

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