Not every book I see in B&N is written by one kind of author but a good majority are. The Black authors seemed pidgeoned holed to writting urban lit, erotica, autobiographys, historical, relationship drama, something bent on racial justice or a cultural book on hair, Africa or southern cooking. I don't see anyone in Black author circles at the caliber of Robert Ludlum, Jackie Collins, any of the big romance writers, Grishom or a Dan Brown either.  Writing about your life and experiences is all well if it is your catharsis but I don't want to read about what I've already been through. Take my mind somewhere else, another world. I don't want to read about family problems and the ills of inner city society. What else can you write?

All other books of the hundreds of genres have a decent story or two but the authors and characters are mostly white. Many will say, oh but I write for everyone. Do you? What if other cultures can't relate dispite your attempt to draw everyone togather as humans, what are you writing that has a universal appeal? I see how a white writer may only write about what they are use to, what they know and what they are comfortable with but what happens when the world your writing for demands diversity? What have been your experiences with other cultures and races? Are your stereotypical predujuices hampering you from really getting to know other kinds of people or are you too sheltered to explore?  Do you write outside the inkwell or do you stay within the confines of what has worked for you all this time?  Both Black and White authors needs to really diversify their senarios with a real and outer worldly situations. Encompass all not just your family,friends and neighbors and the Rockwell painting on the wall.

I am an ethnically diverse writer, literally and figuratively. I am African/Puerto Rican American, both parents born in the US, my mother's parents born on the carribean island of Puerto Rico. I have no choice but to write for ethnically diverse people. The more blended the individual the more interesting their dynamic becomes. All of my characters for the most part are of some exotic mix and they deal with it through there interactions with other people like them. In my writing world there is no one color or another, we are all mixed and our strenghts are in what we can bring to the story.

I guess as long as there is racial tensions, apprehensions and stereotypical thinking about other cultures we in the world will enver get past our hang ups. We will never know the truth because we are cowards and fearful of the unknown. If you were any kind of writer,, you'd include an accurate depiction of individuals who are not all alike color wise but in heart. Yes, no matter the color of our skin its our character but I'm not feeling that from anyone these days because people are still ahting one another for differences.

---

Tauria Kane

Interesting post.  I don't like stereotypical characters either.  However there is variety even within the African American category. You said it yourself when you listed them "The Black authors seemed pidgeoned holed to writting urban lit, erotica, autobiographys, historical, relationship drama, something bent on racial justice or a cultural book on hair, Africa or southern cooking" and there are more beyond that, like African American Christian Fiction, Poetry, photographic art etc.  

I personally do not write for a certain racial audience.  I just write the story that comes to mind.  I have wondered what do my white readers think though.  My book, Her Confession is a drama and I guess could be considered urban literature... But I wouldn't want to be categorized as African American Urban Lit.  I have recently noticed I like white male writers... Mario Puzo (actually Italian), Stephen King, John Grisham... but some of my all time favorites are African American Females Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston and J. California Cooper.  

 

I am of mixed heritage as well with Irish, Haitian, Cherokee and African descent.  

To answer your original question, yes writers do write through the filter of their own experiences.  People who are 'mixed up' will have their own version I suppose; but still writing through their own filters ;) 

 

---

As you think within yourself, so you are.

I just write because I want to and not worry about what everyone else is expecting of me.

Sky

---

You can do anything you want--so long as you put your mind to it.

In writing--there are no limits. Just endless possibilities.

The answer is...authors usually are writing from experience, period--even if it's well disguised.  I don't think it has anything to do with racial issues.  If you can't "feel" it, you can't write about it.  Not well, anyway.  It so happens that while most African Americans are absolutely unable to live totally segregated from white people...there ARE white people who can spend most of their lives never coming into contact in any meaningful way with African Americans.  And who, therefore, would probably be better off not trying to write about them.  I think, however, if you take a really good look at the Norton Anthology of African American literature your list of African American authors who can take on the big dogs you mentioned would grow.  And we have writers who reach far beyond the urban genre.  Some of our best selling authors write detective novels and science fiction--check it out.  That may, in fact, be the reason why you don't know them.  They're not seen as "African American" writers.  They're just incredibly good writers who write in genres with which you may not be familiar.

That said, for many writers--perhaps most--the best writing only comes from writing about cultures you actually understand either through immersion in it as an outsider or as a member of that culture.  I'm African American, with English and Creek Indian roots.  I married into the Hopi Tribe and lived there for 8 years, and still visit our family regularly.  Can I write about all of those cultures confidently?  No.  I can write about the life I've lived and the people I've lived with, directly or indirectly, but my perspective is indeed filtered through my experiences as an African American female who grew up in Chicago and then fled to the Southwest.  I spent summers in England for several years, but...could I write a novel about a British or even a West Indian or African citizen of that country confidently?  No.  Has it been done?  Yes.  As close as I am to my Hopi relations, as a non-Indian, I cannot write a first person fictional account of a Hopi character experiencing life--many try, and most Native Americans find those efforts pretty laughable.  But has it ever been done?  Well...my relations would say "No," but Tony Hillerman lovers would say he came pretty close.

It's just not possible to generalize about these things.  Some writers can make that leap, others can't. I prefer to write about the people I've known, not autobiographically but in stories about people of all colors whose experiences may resemble or be informed by real folks I've known.  My latest novel is a first person account of an May/December affair told by the white teenaged boy who lived it.  But...I KNEW a kid like him, and he rings true to all who meet him--I've optioned a screenplay based on the novel already.  That's where it begins for me.  Where it begins for others...there's just no way to generalize that way.

 

the answer to that question is yes, yes, and yes again.  most stick to writing what they know so that does make it easier.  however, we get stuck in genres that we wish not to be stuck in.  That leads to most not having the right avenues for others to hear us.  Depending on your characters, you will be streotyped. period!

.....Often it is difficult to tell that a writer is of a particular race just by name or content. One of my favorite Science Fiction authors is Octavia Butler. Most of her engaging characters are black, so I suspect that she is black. These characters don't seem 'written for white people', they are just well-written.

.....And I think that's the best answer. Not to purposely try to write for another race or for anyone else's expectations, but to just write well, and encourage everyone to write well.

You've got to realize that human nature includes divisiveness. In America our divisiveness is focused racially, but there is a kind of divisiveness in Scotland and Wales that has nothing to do with skin-color and everything to do with human nature. I've been told by people close to me that some African Americans hate others because the skin of the others is lighter. I've never experienced that myself, but I believe it because it is a part of human nature. So are we going to wail about it, or find a way to write about people getting over it?