What American Fiction Doesn’t Get Right

Because of my work, I actually saw “American Fiction” three times. What I liked was how determined the story was to portray a very specific, individual family with no trace of any stereotype, in direct contrast to the extremely stereotypical tropes in the bestselling book Monk (Jeffrey Wright) pens. But the portrayal of the publishing industry as demanding such content from Black authors in order to sell struck me as a dated reaction to “Precious” — which represents a pretty narrow slice of what black authors actually produce.

Google “100 bestselling Black authors” and you will see what I mean. I didn’t see one who wrote anything that was remotely like the fake bestseller written by Monk, or the over-the-top, dialect-on-steroids portrayal of “ghetto” life written by Sintara Golden, the character portrayed by Issa Rae. Implying that’s the only thing that sells is a bit of an insult to those writers, whose portrayal of Black life (but not exclusive to it) is rich and varied, featuring characters as different and complex as any you’d find googling “100 best-selling authors” (not necessary to put in “white,” as the vast majority are.)

The complete (though funny) cluelessness of the white editors in the movie also struck me as very 2001. Which is not to say there still isn’t plenty of racism in the publishing industry, but it is far more submerged and…