“If you don’t like someone’s story, write your own” –Chinua Achebe (one of Nikesh Shukla’s memorable quotes which resonated with me during The Good Immigrant talk)

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All we ever hear on the news these days is the post- Brexit upheaval and where do we as a nation stand in Britain and of course the major issue of mass migration-how do we deal with the increasingly high number of immigrants flocking to the UK?

 

My first thought when “Immigrant” comes to my mind is the memories and experiences which my grandparents had of living in Britain as it was called back then; when they too immigrated to a new country leaving family behind and creating a new more scary and perhaps life-changing home for their own children. Back then it was different- that’s what my grandma keeps telling me and maybe it was but I shall never know. If only I could travel back in time and see Alum Rock from my grandma’s perspective of it being filled with a majority White community and the shopping experience being limited to the odd Woolworth’s store and a few local family run grocery/meat shops which my granddad also owned in Aston back in the early 70’s himself with a minority of Black and Asian families living in small pockets around the area. So the issue of immigration is still being debated on shows like Question Time and The Andrew Marr Show.

 

I understand and have grown up with talk of immigration and race but I have never let the colour of my skin or wearing the hijab dictate what other people think of me so with that being said, The Good Immigrant talk being headlined by the editor of the book itself Nikesh Shukla, playwright Vinay Patel, freelance journalist Sarah Sahim, Sales and Marketing Assistant at Oberon books Wei Ming Kam and chaired by Impact Hub founder Imandeep/Immy Kaur was the talk for me. The book itself reflected on the relevant, raw and real ideas and thoughts from fifteen writers from the BAME (Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities) who contributed to 21 essays about what obstacles the non-white community are facing in the world of publishing today and what it means to them growing and living in the UK and breaking the stereotypes that are associated with it and this felt relevant to me. Maybe other individuals around the UK are facing such trouble publishing their work if they represent the BAME community.

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Lights, drink red wine and read!

So the talk began with the chief executive of the Birmingham Literature Festival , Jonathan Davidson introducing the writers onto the stage which as a Literature Festival Virgin was something of a novelty for me as I always view a stage with professional actors performing for the audience but as Shukla, Patel, Sahim and Ming as well as the lead chair Kaur descended onto the stage which was both credible for being arty yet chic with Birmingham Literature Festival in bold capital letters illuminating the background screen and a quirky bookshelf with all the books from the talks across the BLF displayed and handmade speech cut outs with the words “Gambol”, “Fittle”, “Ta-ra-abit”, “Couple or three” and “Bostin”  (What do they mean, I still don’t know) hanging majestically from the ceiling made for a cosy and intimate backdrop. This setting allowed for a lively discussion on the book itself and the topics concerned such as diversity in publishing and what it means for the BAME community to stand out on their own amongst the literary crowd. Further adding to the cosy feel was an array of red sofas, the ones you find yourself sitting at home on a cold winter’s evening and the writers began with drinking a cheeky little red wine from their glasses. So the scene is set and the atmosphere alit.

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Kaur took straight to questioning Shukla on his success with the crowd-funded ( an unfamiliar term which I am familiar with now after watching an episode of The Apprentice in which candidates had to crowd-fund their product to the general public) book The Good Immigrant which was a slow and steady campaign he felt passionate about; especially the issue of immigration and wanted to explore these ideas from writers who have struggled to look for opportunities in the publishing world which as he sees many books that are being published today still “filtered  through a white gaze” and often stories being told by the BAME community are “romanticized” and not raw. This was a point that Shukla so deeply talked about as he made eye contact with the audience often looking less like a victim but more of a champion for other writers to voice their own fears, concerns and doubts about the potential of stories which don’t necessarily in my opinion have to always be centred on forced marriages, rape and honour killings.

 

Books written by the Black, Asian and minority ethnic should be written with strong fearless characters who make the readers feel a certain way like Harry Potter, The Fault in Our Stars and The Hunger Games which I enjoyed very much reading for myself and not have characters who are centred only on playing the victim or the villain but three dimensional and real characters which readers can connect with. Why do many writers from the BAME community feel typecast in their writing credentials and feel angry at publishers for providing books which only suit a particular class, gender and race to the reading nation.

What is going on in the literary world?

 

I have noticed no current books being published by BAME writers that focus on the science fiction, thriller, and fantasy genre as books I have read tell the same story over and over and over again. Something needs to change for writers of the BAME community to feel comfortable to write about Aliens inhabiting unknown planets or a dark fantasy set in a magical world with realistic characters that people enjoy. I felt myself nodding along to the points Shukla made in his book which any writer would find therapeutic as he went on to say with a twinkle in his eye and with a remnant of a bygone cold that many Black and Asian writers always have to “justify our seat on the table” and “every opportunity is questioned” and the case is often a stark reality to the minority of writers from BAME community being marginalised in society and the wider world too.

 

So the crisis in the publishing industry is not only limited to the UK but to the wider world as Award winning Young Adult writer Bali Rai who has written books about marriage, honour killing and stories that represent his cultural heritage such as (un)arranged marriage, killing honour, Web of Darkness and Rani and Sukh which all contain controversial themes of forced marriage and honour killing. Rai in an interview with Global Times mentioned that as a child he grew up “thinking that books are about middle and upper class white people”, I feel similarly to Rai as growing in a multicultural city in Birmingham I read many books as a teenager which many of the lead protagonist were often young white heroine or hero’s of the novel with no mention of a black, Asian or ethnically diverse characters.

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As the talk continued with this passionate topic, Marketing Assistant at Oberon books Wei Ming Kam (Ming for short) declared to the rapturous audience that “publishing is dominated by women at a certain point and then men again” which is true as many jobs concerning leadership or even managerial posts are often held and given to men who are paid more than if a woman in the same position were to do the exact same job, she would however get paid considerably lower. With her half finished glass of red wine in one hand and the other pushing her glasses up, she voiced into the microphone that there needs to be “more people into publishing who are not middle class”; this was the debate that was carried forward throughout the talk.

 

Sarah Shaffi reporting in her article Publishing seeks to address industry’s lack of diversity found out that Jenny Todd, a publisher working at Canongate said, “I think staffing is lagging behind output, but both are still falling woefully short” so this shows big publishing houses such as Penguin, Random House, Harper Collins, Hachette Livre and Simon & Schuster are all generating books which do not represent the BAME community fairly or not allowing writers from ethnically diverse backgrounds to communicate complex stories which are appealing as these publishing houses don’t want to take the risk of publishing books which may or may not pan out successfully in the literary world. Ming in her essay Beyond ‘Good’ Immigrants in The Good Immigrant expressed “being a model minority is code for being on perpetual probation” with society and the media pitying minorities against each other instead of giving minorities the opportunity to grow and learn. Individuals often from the BAME community lack confidence to voice their opinions so there isn’t much breakthrough artists to inspire the younger generation.

 

But breakthrough writers from the BAME community such as one from the talk I attended, Vinay Patel has broken barriers as he has written his first piece for television, Murdered by My Father which was released on BBC3’s online channel. The one hit wonder focuses on widowed father Shahzad’s control over his children, especially his daughter Salma. It unveils the hushed topic which the Asian community do not want to talk about; honour killing and the consequences of a young Muslim girl of having a boyfriend. Patel has gone onto write a full-length play, True Brits in 2014 which was critically acclaimed and received positive reviews. This shows emerging new young talent from the BAME community is rich in literary talent and is contributing to the diverse voice in television, theatre and films. There is still a long way to go yet before the BAME community really feel that they are on a level playing field within the publishing world.  Is Patel a literary exception?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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As the talk was drawing to a close, Shukla got up with style and made his way to the podium to read a short extract, from his essay titled Namaste  in which he opened up to his page gracefully and spoke into the microphone and looked across at the beaming audience, and read “ One of the many online arguments I’ve had about the importance of language, how language can hurt, has been about tea. Chai means tea. Chai tea means tea tea. The number of times you see this on a menu makes you wonder why people can’t be bothered to do their research”, when he finished reading, everyone around me fell into one mighty applause and laughter. I was laughing at the experience he’s had at restaurants where the owners fail to do their research, and I just shook my head woefully as this is only a snapshot of what it means to be living in a multicultural country in which sadly people don’t know what chai translates to in English.

 

This talk has revealed the true cost to which modern day publishing has had on the BAME community and is a talking point for other young inspiring writers to continue to fight the common stereotypes in the literary world. In response to someone’s question about why are we still talking about race in publishing and why this book was published when we all live in a multicultural country, Shukla replied “In a perfect world, this book wouldn’t need to exist”.

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