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Asylum Road

In the middle of the night – the real night – Anne flung open the door. she was the kind of mother who refused to knock. A fan of borders but not boundaries.

They’ve dug up all the courgettes, she said.

The moles?

Much worse. Forget the moles.

Neither of us moved.

Come on – she flipped the lights – we’re being besieged. Get a shovel. Anya you can hold a torch.

Michael refused to be routed. I heard him insist Anne respect his sleep – she was more than intimidating enough to handle marauding boar.

Outside, we took in the destruction. Mounds of earth uprooted, shredded plants, craters, gougings and tracks disfiguring the lawn.

Monsters, she spat.

It’s not their fault, Luke said.

Whose is it then?

They were hunted to extinction then reintroduced. deliberately. By us.

I never introduced pigs to my garden.

They were here first, then we killed them off and got nostalgic for it.

Luke. I’m an animal person so spare me the sermon, please. But this – she gestured around. This is ridiculous. They go after dogs. They laid waste to Pem’s farm. Last time I heard one run along the decking I leant out the window and shot it. It was like a bomb going off. All the mud and dust. Took four of us to put it in Pem’s truck. Very good meat, so it was probably worth the carnage, in the end.

Luke stopped digging, closed his eyes and exhaled.

Your mum’s – she seems manic, I whispered. Do you think we – you – should make her lie down?

He mumbled something about going to get a glass of water but never came back. I finished our end of the trench alone.

 

After several hours digging, erecting fortifications using upturned chairs, I realised I was enjoying myself. I felt useful working alongside Anne, and it reminded me of my childhood, when anything could be reimagined into something new. shoes became firewood, sheets became windows, my brother’s skateboard became a water cart.

But the objects I gravitated toward aesthetically now, I realised as I positioned two dining chairs like coping stones, all had an underlying stability. The sculptural things I collected maybe did have emotional resonance then, in that I couldn’t imagine them transmuting into anything else.

Finally Anne surveyed the barricades. Seagulls called overhead and I followed her gaze to where the perimeter disappeared into the dawn mist and then the creek.

That should do it, she said. For now at least.

I crept back into bed beside Luke and admired the crescents of black dirt under my nails. I kissed the warm skin at the back of his neck. Then I remembered the poisoned trees.

 

Luke drank several cups of coffee at breakfast, rubbing his face and the back of his head. I was used to surviving on no sleep, but he needed at least eight hours to make any conversation. I loaded the dishwasher and pretended not to notice as Anne restacked everything.

I thought, she said slowly as she closed the machine, we’d take a walk to the church.

We put boots on and followed her and Michael along the road past the spar. Another new house had been built, its glass front loomed behind a row of white saplings, spectral as a mushroom. Like the others in their vicinity, it appeared to be empty.

Can’t understand why anyone would want to live under glass, she hissed. The few times I’ve actually seen someone in there, well, you can see everything. At night especially, I can see all its insides, like a jellyfish. There are more and more, they attract each other, these planning notices – she pointed to one pinned to the gate – like a swarm.

I imagined Anne standing outside the house in the dark. I agreed it was out of place.

 

We passed the disused garage, overgrown by weeds. Here Luke, an only child, had founded his own clubhouse after reading Lord of the Flies. Still his favourite book. And of course, as Anne was fond of pointing out, another Cornish author. There was still genitalia-themed graffiti in the basement and a shrivelled buoy hung from a steel joist to make a swing. On the upper level, where cars were repaired, there were stepped walls on three sides like a theatre, which must have lent gravity to meetings. Luke confessed they used to defecate in the long grass behind rather than return to the cottage where his mother remained in charge.

I followed Luke’s gaze toward it, it was clear he wanted to go inside.

Go on ahead, we’ll catch you up, he told his parents. I didn’t like going in there, but I liked it that Luke wanted to go in. It suggested a continued wish to escape his mother’s influence.

There was no glass in the window frames and it smelt of decay. Sometimes I seek that basement smell out precisely because I don’t like it. It’s still familiar. Cold concrete and earth.

 

In the graveyard, Anne took me through her thoughts on floral arrangements. I looked in Luke’s direction, wondering if he would mention the idea we’d come to the night his friends had interrogated us, of having a non-religious ceremony with Christopher as our celebrant. I knew the only gay men Anne had ever knowingly met were two Canadians. Rather than say the word she now referred to all gay people as being like the Canadian men.

Michael pointed out the usual headstone belonging to their family. I spotted a magpie dart away beyond it and looked for a second. On a similar walk, long ago, Anne had stopped abruptly before one and saluted him in the middle of the road. Not understanding, I’d reacted with nervous laughter. That Christmas she gave me A Pocket Guide to the Superstitions of the British Isles. They’re othering you, Christopher had said. Give her one for the Balkans next year.

 

The church was dismal. Michael disappeared and a few electric lights came on. I sensed Luke waiting for me to say something before he would. Then into the resonant silence, Michael’s voice:

Not much trade except funerals these days.

Luke appeared to be avoiding eye contact with me now and I panicked.

I love it here, I lied.

Wonderful, Anne said, that settles it then.

Going back, we took a longer route off-road. Gradually the path narrowed so that we walked in single file. I felt myself detaching, following Luke’s calves, letting them get further ahead until finally they were gone.

 

When I arrived back at the cottage, they were seated in a ring on the lawn which still bore the scars of the previous night. Luke was describing our holiday and the town of Sanary where many artists and writers had exiled themselves as Hitler rose to power.

Aldous Huxley, Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Stefan Zweig, he trailed off.

Sybille Bedford, I continued.

Don’t know her, Anne said.

I said I would give her one of Bedford’s books. maybe Quicksands. I realised I did not want to share with them her impressions of Yugoslavia from Pleasures and Landscapes. Though much of it was admiring – the mountains, Venetian architecture, translucent water – I’d experienced the familiar contraction around my chest as I read her descriptions of the terrifying roads and wild children on the ferry crossing:

What one wonders about is the future. Will it be a graceless, stark new world?

And finally of her time in Sarajevo,

Nothing ever, perhaps, quite safe, quite clean, quite straight . . .

 

Bedford, I told them, lived out the Holocaust in Sanary, later California. I heard my words echo what I’d read about her, sounding fluent. I understood her ambivalence at having spent so much time reading in comfortable places.

 

Anne and Michael wanted to see my photos. Luke had told them I’d taken several hundred. This was true. he rarely recorded anything on his phone except runs and photographs of plants.

They admired my pictures of the villa, the pink oleander, the view of the bay, Luke’s kitesurfing technique, the harmonious blue of the water, tasteful market stalls, a fish we ate at the Hôtel de la Tour that had baked inside a white salt crust and was then exhumed for us at the table.

Doesn’t look as flashy as you’d expect, Anne said, approving.

If their family went to restaurants, she would instruct everyone to order the same thing, since that way it was more like being at home. It was one of the things I felt I offered Luke, permission to indulge his yuppie side – to go out and order whatever he wanted.

Luke said there were no gin palaces in the harbour, a section of which was occupied by traditional fishing boats. He said there were few tourists, other than French from the north, and it was, compared to the surrounding destinations British holidaymakers had heard of, unspoiled.

Then he told the Bedford anecdote I’d relayed to him, concerning the Huxleys’ arrival. Looking forward to the anonymity of a foreign place, maria and Aldous had pulled up at their new Belle Époque home to find VILLA HUXLEY painted in bold lettering by the well-meaning decorator on the front gate. I knew why this resonated for Luke, who was horrified by the idea of public spectacle. It was something we’d discussed with regard to the wedding, He wanted the minimum possible number of guests. I was fine with that. Relieved, actually. It was easier to describe a wedding as intimate than find the words to explain why no one from my family would be there.

Anne held out my phone. I felt her gaze linger on the ring as I took it back and felt hot as if I’d stolen it.

She offered around segments from a clementine which I declined, though not before Luke could remind her of my hang-up.

The excuse I usually gave was not a lie, exactly. I had been eating plums gathered from the base of my grand- mother’s tree as a child. I had accidentally picked up part of a bird, ripped open, the greasy remains now heaving with life. I had been horrified by the sticky mess, its texture in my hand, the apprehension of anarchy.

The sight of some fruit can affect me like an animal whose fur is rubbed against its growth. Perhaps reasonably, given the nature of his work, Luke found this fact exasperating. Even seedless grapes? he would ask in perplexity as I declined to follow him down certain supermarket aisles.

As a child I dreamt about exotic fruit I knew only from cartoons. Sometimes we got parcels with exciting things and we’d make them last for weeks. Other times we got biscuits from WW2 and we’d feel resentful of the kids on other streets. I wanted Coca-Cola so badly that I hate it now. The same thing happened when I finally tried tinned pineapple and choked on the wet, syrupy chunks. In my mind, the longed-for fruit had the texture of human flesh.

The smell is fine. Maybe I’ve been desensitised by synthetic fruit-scented things. I can even enjoy fruit flavours, as long as there is no remnant of the original texture there. But the thought of biting directly into a tomato or unmediated slice of orange makes me gag. The various sensations that combine in the average piece of fruit! Seed, liquid, flesh, skin . . .

 

In the afternoon Luke caught up on sleep, forgetting to take the meat for dinner out of the freezer as he’d promised Anne to do. I remembered too late, and had to massage it beside the fire while he slept and his mother was busy somewhere in the garden. I was still attempting to defrost it when she came in and saw me there, crouching. When he came down I was silently angry that he’d left me open to his mother’s suspicion of being a barbarian, and as we finally sat down to eat, much later than planned, we seemed to be engaged in another psychic war. I did not know why he was angry at me. I had saved the day. I remember hoping those vicissitudes in personality were chemical. A lighthouse whose beam disappeared only to come back.

Normal people argue, I said once, and then we had a very quiet argument in the garden centre, beside an LED Buddha fountain and a sign that read TRANQUIL OASIS. I felt such relief despite the humidity, the claustrophobia, the smell of rabbit hutch. His moods would shift abruptly, and at times I would find myself having crossed an obscure boundary into a strange place, a territory which only minutes ago had not been there.

The change could be even subtler. A shadow over the sun, a cold spot in water. swimming as a child, I remembered turning onto my back, putting trust in the sky, imagining I swam in that element instead.

Luke could be two people as distinct as these elements, just as he had two names in my phone. Real name to indicate company mobile and pet name for personal. Depending on which he called from, our conversation would be altered.

At first I hadn’t noticed the second person. I began to, soon after I moved in. Around the time things started to go wrong in the flat. The bath plug lost its suction. I couldn’t fill the bath with water unless I kept it running, and even then, it would only reach my hips. A shelf came off the wall. A chair back marked another with a groove. The tap – which Luke had never had a problem with before – now leaked, heavy and staccato through the night. A gas ring refused to ignite. Clicking over and over without producing a flame. These went on a list of things to be fixed, and everything else on a list to break.

 

After dinner we watched the news and the mood lifted. They liked working out the BBC’s more obscure visual puns. A story about pressure on primary school places was accompanied by seemingly unrelated footage of rowers, then canoes, and then the Queen’s barge moving down the Thames. The connection between these images and the news story remained a mystery until the reporter ended with the words: The race is on.

Ho ho, Michael said.

Luke held my foot under a cushion then took one of my hands. They were covered in soot after poking the fire to thaw the meat, my fingers stained purple from chopping red cabbage. I’d removed the ring to prepare the food – an absence he mutely noted as he examined them. I tipped my head back to indicate where I’d put it. Then the news came to Brexit and I felt the room contract.

His parents knew which way I’d voted, but we hadn’t directly talked about it since. They didn’t know I’d exchanged insults with strangers on the internet late into the night. The ‘real’ people, with whom I’d argue until confronted with my own unreality, my own irrelevance. it was not the specifics of opposing arguments that upset me, but that the things I held on to, which kept me from being sucked back into the past, were coming loose.

Because my aunt was not my mother, when I’d had disputes with her children, they felt she was biased toward me and I felt she was biased toward them. Her son Nikolaj was a compulsive liar who had a problem with authority, except where it gave him power. He hated me not only for being clever, despite the language disadvantage, but because I’d experienced things he had not. I didn’t understand then that he felt threatened. Not just by having to share his family with strangers, though that didn’t help, but because in comparison to mine his life story was a domestic drama. He’d take great pleasure in warping events with unnecessary lies so that our referee, his mother, would eventually wave us away: carry on for all I care, just stay out of my kitchen. My sister Daria left for university a few months after we arrived, and then I had no one to confirm what I’d seen or heard versus what he then said had happened.

Why did I want things to stay the same? Christopher, who’d spoiled his ballot, asked me. He has an anarchist streak but somehow ended up a lawyer. A human rights barrister, more accurately. Law was what his parents had wanted him to do, and perhaps because of his ability to stand outside or above any such man-made edifice, he was very good.

I didn’t have an answer for him. It was an emotion I couldn’t put into adequate words. I remember right before the referendum, another wedding, this time Luke’s non-Cornish cousin’s, on Michael’s side, I’d been seated next to a man I didn’t know. One of the groom’s parents’ friends. He didn’t know anyone, he claimed, which initially seemed the reason for our pairing. Then he said he was a poet, as well as a writer of thrillers for which he used a pseudonym. He pointed knowingly at my surname on the place card. He asked me about my parents, their ethnicity, and I said I was the child of a mixed marriage. in his capacity as a poet, he had travelled to the Balkans, and so for most of the reception, wanted to talk about the war.

I detected that tone I so often encountered then. As though such chaos could never occur within his island, whereas in the Balkans it was inevitable. Luke had later sympathised when I complained about my table, saying he understood how maddening it was – in the context of anthropogenic climate change. He called it the blind spot of any culture – the inability to conceive of its own destruction.

Occasionally I’d made attempts to engage the neighbour on my other side, an elderly relative of the bride’s. She’d blinked at me kindly and said it must be sad when your country no longer exists, then returned to pulverising her asparagus. The need for discretion removed, the poet began to list his top ten most harrowing sights. His lips were wet. He topped up my glass and said that history must not repeat itself. That though the EU was imperfect, like Yugoslavia, like any marriage in fact, British people valued what it represented. Membership, he mused as a server took our plates away, was probably my homeland’s only hope. We had better get a move on with integration.

A year on, if someone raised the subject in my presence I felt myself shut down. I couldn’t bear to meet people’s outrage or smirking faces, even their shock and grief. If it was mentioned at a party, whether or not I’d had anything to drink, I would simply walk away. Now I felt myself sliding into apathy.

 

On Sunday morning Luke kissed my shoulder tenderly then got up, pulled on his shorts and went running. I stayed in bed, the windows open, listening to the gentle call of a wood pigeon. The room flooded with light and a breeze came in off the creek. I’d had my first unbroken sleep in weeks and the combination of breeze, sunlight and memory foam gave me the sensation of gliding. Suddenly I heard the strains of what I took to be a recording of a piece of classical music. it began with tuning, but then, from its occasional repetitions, stops and starts, I understood that it was live.

I guessed a group of students were rehearsing, but I’d never seen any young people when I’d stayed before. My only explanation was that one of the elderly neighbours, or maybe the very rich one who poisoned trees, had convened a small orchestra, not for any reason other than enjoyment. something about this idea seemed incredible. Though I did very little in the way of making money – did very little generally – I found it hard to think in any other terms than productivity.

As the communal effort of several brass instruments sailed into the room, a feeling of contentment and security verging on euphoria coursed through me. I stretched my limbs toward the four corners of the bed and felt a desire that I’d forgotten. I wanted to have sex with Luke.

I remained in that position for several more minutes with my eyes closed, listening to what I guessed was a cello, letting it merge with the wind, the heat of my skin. I sensed this was a moment I could have only once. When it stopped I’d never know what the piece I’d been listening to was. I thought of its transience, of using it up, like precious water running.

The solo ended and the silence which followed sounded entirely different from the silence that had preceded it, as if it was now part of something else.

I didn’t know much about classical music and wondered if I should admit to this in order to ask Michael if he’d heard and could identify the piece for me. To risk being told it was something obvious.

He had extensive knowledge of all genres. The search function on iTunes had proved endlessly absorbing. He spent hours on these voyages of discovery, back and forth in time, through world music, thrash and electronica. he’d made Luke four CDs composed of songs with American cities in the title for no reason other than the search function made it possible. They had been good for long car journeys before we discovered true crime. Some were classics, others by obscure heavy metal groups we knew to skip past.

He had unofficially taken charge of wedding music and given us a list that included a Cornish folksong arranged by Holst. The lyrics describe a woman released from bedlam by her lover who has returned from being at sea. I wondered if Michael had recalled the part about it being the man’s parents who’d tried to keep her institutionalised.

I rolled over on the bed to the window, pulled myself onto my knees and crouched forward with my elbows on the sill to wait for him, watching the optimists sail past the mouth of the creek, remembering the time Luke had insisted on taking me sailing. They could not believe I’d never been before, until I got into the boat.

Now I heard Michael’s voice. He and Anne were standing below the window. I shot back, covering my chest. Thinking they must’ve heard me, I prepared to call out a greeting, but a prickling heat rose across my skin and I closed my mouth again.

I’ve looked. Nothing comes up. Nothing I can make sense of anyway. I really think it’s odd Luke’s never met them. I know he says they’re just not close but I’m beginning to think it’s more really.

Snip.

more than she’s let on you mean?

For a few moments I was paralysed.

. . . contribution . . .

. . . never . . .

. . . marquee . . .

Snip.

If that’s what he wants.

Snip snip.

. . . clever seating plan . . .

Sometimes I could hear whole sentences very clearly, other times only random words as they moved with secateurs along the trellis against the wall. They must’ve assumed we’d gone together – but would see when Luke came back he was alone. Given the open window, it would look like I’d been listening, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to pretend I hadn’t heard.

I put my hands over my ears, then pulled the covers over my head but could still detect certain words. I longed to close the window but forced myself to be still.

Savages,

If they come,

Children,

Communists,

Christmas,

I told you,

Stuck with it darling.

I pressed harder into the pillow. Trapped there, with my eyes closed, I could almost see the words as illuminated streaks firing through the window.

When Luke got back I said I had a headache and needed to stay in bed. I gave the kind of vague explanation – fine, tired – he always gave that drove me mad when I knew something else was wrong. I didn’t come down for lunch and saw Anne and Michael only to murmur bye and thanks as we put our bags into the car.

On the motorway I was silent, listening to the murder Luke put on – a woman who’d stabbed her fiancé in the heart with a steak knife – until we stopped for fuel. Luke bought food from Marks and Spencer which we ate across the dashboard. When we’d finished, I slotted the oily containers one inside the other, and asked if he still wanted to meet my family.

 

The above is an extract from Olivia Sudjic’s Asylum Road.

The post Asylum Road appeared first on Granta.

Writer’s Relief Named One Of The 100 Best Websites For Writers In 2021 | Writer’s Relief

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Writer’s Relief Named One Of The 100 Best Websites For Writers In 2021 | Writer’s Relief

We’re repeating ourselves—and we’re thrilled! The Write Life has once again named Writer’s Relief as one of the top resources for writers: 100 Best Websites For Writers In 2021. You’ll find us listed alphabetically in the Publishing category.

Here’s some of what the nice folks at The Write Life had to say:

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See the criteria Writer’s Relief had to meet in order to qualify as one of the best websites for writers, which article of ours was a favorite, and more here!

 

A New Graphic Novel Shows the History of the Black Panther Party

David F. Walker and Marcus Kwame Anderson’s graphic novel The Black Panther Party may be the first introduction to the revolutionary party for some. For others, it will provide additional context to the history. The graphic novel spans from the founding of the party by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale in the mid-’60s to its unfortunate demise when members were murdered, ostracized, or imprisoned. It covers the constant government attacks to the Party—cue J. Edgar Hoover, who stated the Black Panthers were the “greatest threat to the internal security of the country”—and its internal strife, against a background of increased racial tensions throughout the nation. Walker and Anderson’s collaboration reveals that the Black Panthers weren’t without faults, yet the organization’s focus from the beginning was always giving Black communities the strength and power to be informed of and fight for the rights they deserved. From food pantries to educational programs to a newspaper circulating relevant and under-reported news affecting Black people, the Black Panthers served their community first, which seemed radical to those who never thought Black people deserved basic rights in the first place. 

I spoke with the author and illustrator about the challenges of bringing forth more rounded information about the Black Panther Party, and the cyclical ways social justice movements have fought not only for our voices to be heard but for survival. 


Jennifer Baker: David, in the afterword you spoke pretty poignantly about having conflicted feelings about writing a book about the Black Panthers. What was your approach in regards to this graphic novel? Did you and Marcus think about what existed already or did you primarily think about what you wanted to do?

The Black Panther Party

David F. Walker: I went arrogantly into it thinking “I know a lot.” Thinking this would be easy. And that was my first mistake because I didn’t know as much as I thought I did. When I went into it [it was] with the attitude that this book would be for people who knew nothing about the Panthers. I didn’t dumb it down in any capacity, [but] I felt like if you never heard of the Panthers or if all you know is the name or had seen an image or know about Bobby and Huey, that this would be sort of the Panthers 101 History as a great jumping off point. And even then it was still a challenge—despite what seems like a lot of material out there, there’s not really as much as you would think, and some of it is sort of one-sided and at times even unreliable in its information. It was definitely a big challenge, and I think that also for myself there were definitely people in the Party who I didn’t have as much of an understanding of, [and] I began to understand them more. And at times [this] was conflicting because these were actual people. We learn about them as iconic figures, but they were people who made some really great decisions and some not so good decisions.

Marcus Kwame Anderson: Not dissimilar to what David was talking about, I was going in with a good amount of knowledge. I came up in the ’80s and the ’90s and I remember “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back” [by] Public Enemy, there was just all kinds of Panther references. And I remember them talking about being a supporter of [JoAnn] Chesimard (Assata Shakur). So it was at that time when I was in high school in the ’90s where it sprouted the interest to learn more. But like what David was saying, no matter what you know there is so much more, so I was coming in with information but David is very humble about what he does. When I was reading the script I was impressed with how much he did get in there and how much of a big picture it gives. I was excited, and for me it was a very huge task but also felt like a task that I was kind of meant to do, just in the sense that my interest in work that deals with the African diaspora and social commentary and all that and my love of comics, they really merged on this project in a way even before I knew about this project.

JB: Marcus, can you talk a little bit about your artistic approach? There’s a softer element to your work. There’s not as many hard edges and there’s a great attention to hues and how they balance out on the page.

MKA: I always try to draw what I want to read. When I read comics I’m a fan of people that are inventive when it comes to page layout and panels. One of the things you’ll see if you read the book is oftentimes I’ll break the panels with borders, not necessarily just to do it, there’s always a reason for that. I grew up reading comics back in the ’80s, ’70s, and before, and there was one brown for Black people, period. I’ve never gone to a default brown, so I would look at it like Huey’s complexion is darker than Bobby’s. And then you have Angela has her complexion so I tried to really be true to that. One of the challenges is I was working from a lot of black and white reference images. But for a lot people who are still around I was able to find some color images for color references. And David and I had also talked about coming up with simpler color palette and some colors that could be found in the Panthers’ newspaper because the newspaper was a huge part of the Party and the design was very dynamic. A big part of the color theme was orange and blue, that’s my favorite complementary color combination, so I kind of built a lot of the color around that. But then you’ll see there are pages where the murder of Fred Hampton, scenes that depict racist violence, are in more red hues and that was a very deliberate choice. But for a lot of the scenes that were less violent I went with some softer colors like you were talking about.

I grew up reading comics back in the ’80s, ’70s, and before, and there was one brown for Black people, period. I’ve never gone to a default brown.

JB: I also want to get into the women that are featured. I haven’t amassed as much Black Panther history myself, but there’s a lot that was revealed to me. Because of how information was unraveled I had a deep appreciation for seeing women like Erika, Kathleen Cleaver, and Tarika Lewis actually discussed. 

DFW: Thank you for bringing that up, because I honestly feel like if there’s one part of the book where I fell short it’s this particular part. I actually wanted there to be more about the role of women and specific women in the Party. When I went into this [I was] thinking “I know all about the Panthers, this is gonna be easy,” but then the more research I did it seemed like it was impossible. It really felt like women were written out of the history. And I really had to dig deep to find stuff. In some cases I had to talk to people who were in the Party to get a feel for it. Elaine Brown’s memoir, her autobiography, is probably one of the key publications that deals with women in the Party, but that’s only one person’s story. Kathleen Cleaver has yet to produce anything along those lines and Angela Davis, she doesn’t talk as much about the Panthers. And I was getting really really frustrated and I was committed to having something in the book. 

It was one of the last sections of the book that I finished writing because I was still conducting the research. And I think more than anything else, where I talk about the stuff that I learned and how incomplete the history of the Party, the women and the role that they played is the thing that stands out in my mind the most. And I feel like that definitive book has yet to be written. That story has to be told, because when you look at the numbers more than half of the party was made of women, rank and file women. The leadership roles were primarily men, but the Party lasted as long as it did, it survived and did all that it was able to do because of women. I don’t know that it would be me [to write it] but it really needs to be about the complexity of gender, gender identity, and what women have to do just to survive. And not just survive but get acknowledged for the work that they’re doing. 

The leadership roles were primarily men, but the Party lasted as long as it did because of women.

JB: You’re right that there’s such a dearth of Black women in our history books and in their connection to the Party. Even your intro of Civil Rights and reading more books, I’ve learned how PR driven some movements were. 

DFW: When I look at … history or Black history, the role of women—I didn’t realize this ‘til I got older and began taking my work more seriously—I didn’t realize how much the role of women was diminished. And now that I see it I’m more aware of it all the time. To the extent that I feel like okay, as I move forward in my career and my life, one of my life battles has to be to help level that playing field and to help find opportunities for creators who might not get the break that they need and for stories to be told that might not have been told.

I remember reading just a paragraph of how Tarika was the first woman to join the Party, and Marcus can talk about this too, figuring out what she looked like was so hard. ‘Cause there were pictures of her, but there’s only three or four and none of them were labeled correctly. And so it took forever. There are several women who I have pictures of. There’s one woman whose name escapes me at the moment. But I had 30 or 40 pictures of her with her name and there were enough pictures that I thought “Okay, she had to be somebody if someone took this many pictures of her.” But I couldn’t find her name in a single book. In the back of my mind, I’m thinking, “There’s the story here.” I want to know her story. She has this dynamic look about her. There’s pictures of her in the newspaper and a couple other photo essays but nobody took time to write about her. And that to me, when we talk about the Panthers and when we talk about people in general, the rank and file, that’s where the true story of the Panthers is. Some of those rank and file members are still with us, they’re our parents or grandparents, our aunts and uncles. I would love for people to start talking to their families and recording their stories. That’s how we’re going to understand the Party, what they went through and how to learn from what they went through.

I would love for people to start talking to their families and recording their stories. That’s how we’re going to understand the Party.

MKA: What David mentioned with Tarika Lewis is really important. Because … there were more recent pictures of her when I was researching her, so I found myself really trying to cross reference her pictures with older pictures to try and de-age her. But it really was a challenge. Speaking to David’s earlier point of the importance of someone following this work, I’m just thinking about the fact that a lot of the people in the Party and the people we’re speaking about aren’t here, and the people who are right now I do think it’s important for as much of their story to be told both in our book and otherwise, because they’re not going to be around forever. And I don’t want some of the lesser known aspects of the history, especially about the rank and file people, to be lost.

JB: With this contribution to literature about the Black Panther Party, is there a conversation you want us to engage in or dissect a bit more when it comes to social justice parties and grassroots work for us and by us?

DFW: There was a moment when I was working on the book where I realized that the age that I am right now, right this very minute I am old enough to be the father of any founding member of the Panthers. Bobby was the oldest when he formed the party, I think he was 25, 26. Bobby Hutton was only 16. Huey was in his early 20s, and there were moments when I was reading about what they did and things that happened to them and I realized I was reading it from a middle age man’s point of view, where I don’t have the same fire in my belly that I had in my early 20s and my late teens. And what I was thinking about was, how do we keep that fire in our bellies, the thing that drives us the way it drove the Panthers? How do we keep that going as we get to middle age and how do we survive long enough to do something with it? One of the worst tragedies of the Panthers is that all the people who were killed, most of them were killed before they hit 30 years old. And when Huey died he was in his 40s, but he might as well have been in his 80s in terms of all the things he’d been through. And so it was just really interesting to me because I thought about what would it take for me now as a man in his 50s to take arms? And more importantly, what would I say right now today to young people? I look at what’s going on with the BLM movement and I see people out in the streets and there’s part of me that’s like, “Maybe I should go out there with them, but I got a bad back. And I don’t want to fall and break a hip.” I really would like to see more people my age think about how we can help educate and mentor young people. But I would like young people to look too, as they wonder why nothing has changed in their mind, look at why it hasn’t changed. Look at what’s happening. Look at what happened to the Panthers, understand how they were infiltrated, how they were turned against each other. And know that those same tactics are being used against you right now. 

Look at what happened to the Panthers, and know that those same tactics are being used against you right now.

MKA: When I started working on the illustrations it was last spring or summer of 2019, so this is pre-George Floyd but post many other travesties of justice. And as I’m reading about these things all these uprisings that happened in history into the 20th century, some of them you could’ve just changed the names and it would’ve been any headline that we could speak of in the last ten years. Then the tail end of my work directly overlapped with the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, so those uprisings were fresh in my mind. There was a surreal moment this past May where you would see a lot of people who had previously been very uncomfortable with the phrase or idea of BLM becoming more comfortable, and all these companies getting their graphic designers to put statements about. And I don’t want to make light of it too much because I think even incremental progress for people, the idea of BLM being less vilified is positive. But I felt reinvigorated living with the Panthers for a year. I had read about them and learned about them, but to create this book I felt like I was living with them this past year and it really did help reignite a fire within me. I also think it’s important for this story to be out there so it can inspire people, but they can also learn from the ways it didn’t work. I really think that’s what progress is. We stand on the shoulders of others and you take inspiration from the things that worked and then you try to rebuild from the things that didn’t. 

The post A New Graphic Novel Shows the History of the Black Panther Party appeared first on Electric Literature.

The Best Poems For The Start Of This New Year | Writer’s Relief

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The Best Poems For The Start Of This New Year | Writer’s Relief

During the first weeks of a new calendar year, it’s good to look back and also move forward. Poetry written for a new year can be filled with hope, regret, grief, and moving on. At bookriot.com, Writer’s Relief found this wonderful list of twenty poems to help you begin the year 2021—Maya Angelou’s “A Brave and Startling Truth” is a must-listen for its impactful delivery!

See the whole list of poems for the new year here.

 

20 Most Popular Writing Posts of 2020

We share a lot of writing-related posts throughout the year on the Writer’s Digest website. In this post, we’ve collected the 20 most popular writing posts of 2020.

After 20 production cycles with the Writer’s Market books, 2020 became my first full year focused on figuring out what writing content to share on WritersDigest.com. If we remove all the “2020” of 2020, last year was one of my favorite as an editor ever. I mean, I love writing in all its forms, so getting to focus on EVERYTHING was exciting and a little overwhelming at times (but mostly super exciting).

(Writing Mistakes Writers Make.)

With a full year under my belt, I’m even more excited about what we’re going to do in 2021. And I’d love it if you could share a comment or two below about what you’d like to see on this site in the future. But first, let’s look back over 2020 and celebrate the most popular writing posts of 2020.

Each post below was originally published in 2020, and yes, I’ve included more than 20, because a few of these can be categorized together. And I just like sharing all our coolest posts from last year. So without further ado…

20 Most Popular Writing Posts of 2020

  1. 75 Grammar Rules for Writers, by Robert Lee Brewer. This is actually the 2nd most popular post of 2020; but the most popular (Heroes vs. Heros) is in this comprehensive list of grammar rules, along with others like Semantics vs. Syntax vs. Pragmatics; Fable vs. Parable vs. Allegory; and Metaphor vs. Personification. Meanwhile, Larger vs. Bigger vs. Greater vs. Higher may be included in a future update of the list.
  2. 12 Thought-Provoking Quotes From 1984, by George Orwell. When this was originally posted in January 2020, the world was a very different place, but Orwell helps show how very timeless his work is through his words. 10 Equal Quotes from Animal Farm also made the Top 20 list.
  3. 21 Authors Share One Piece of Advice for Writers, by Robert Lee Brewer. This post collects one piece of advice for writers from writers who’ve found success. You can always find new interviews in our Author Spotlight series on the site.
  4. 25 Plot Twist Ideas and Prompts for Writers, by Robert Lee Brewer. One of my favorite things of the past year has been creating weekly Plot Twist Story Prompts on Thursdays. This post collects the first 25. 
  5. 25 Ways to Start a Story, by Robert Lee Brewer. Before you can twist a story, you need to start it, right? Here are 25 ideas for getting stories started.
  6. New Agent Alerts. Okay, there were actually a few agent alerts that made our Top 20-ish list, and they are: Pam Gruber of Irene Goodman Literary Agency; Erin Clyburn of The Jennifer De Chiara Literary Agency; Jennifer Herrington of Harvey Klinger Literary Agency; Emily Forney of BookEnds Literary Agency; Kristina Perez of Zeno Literary Agency; Matt Belford of Tobias Literary Agency; Megan Manzano of D4EO Literary; Analieze Cervantes of Harvey Klinger Literary Agency; and Maria Rogers of Tobias Literary Agency.
  7. Vintage WD: 36 Plot Nots: Plot Clichés to Avoid, by Donald Westlake. One fun thing we did in 2020 was celebrate our 100th anniversary of the magazine, which meant a lot of fun editorial dives into our archives. “Plot Nots” is from a 1959 issue of Writer’s Digest, and “How to Get Started as a Writer,” by Thomas Clark, is from a 1990 issue.
  8. 15 Things a Writer Should Never Do, by Zachary Petit. Speaking of blasts from the past, we were able to re-share this fun post by former WD managing editor Zachary Petit on things a writer should never (ever) do, though we’ve all probably done some of these things.
  9. How to Write a Five-Paragraph Essay That Works, by Robert Lee Brewer. Raise your hand if you’ve ever written one of these; keep your hand up if you want to write some more. Anybody? <crickets>
  10. 3 Tips for Writing Cosmic Horror That Goes “Beyond,” by Scott Kenemore. I wasn’t aware of the difference between cosmic horror and other sub-genres until I read this piece, and I’m pretty sure if there’s a specific type of horror for 2020, it’s probably cosmic horror.
  11. Writing Submissions for Magazines: How to Submit Writing to a Magazine, by Robert Lee Brewer. Posted in 2020, still relevant today.
  12. 9 Tips on Writing Query Letters to Publishers and Literary Agents, by Robert Lee Brewer. Also, still relevant. 
  13. What They Don’t Teach You in MFA Programs: 5 Rules for Writing Stories That Work, by Chris Mooney. Bestselling author and creative writing instructor Mooney shares five rules for making beautiful writing engaging.
  14. 25 Publishing FAQs for Writers, by Robert Lee Brewer. This post also includes a few Top 20-ish posts within it, including 7th ranked How Much Should Writers Charge Per Word or Per Project; How and When Should Writers Use a Pen Name or Pseudonym; Do Literary Agents Cost Money; Can Writers Query Multiple Agents at Once; How Long Does It Take to Get a Book Published; What Should Writers Post on Instagram; and Do Writers Need Literary Agents
  15. 5 Ways to Surprise Your Reader (Without It Feeling Like a Trick), by John McNally. It’s one of the goals of a writer: Surprising their readers in a delightful way, or at least in a way that doesn’t feel like a gimmick or trick. McNally shares some solid advice on making it happen.
  16. 20 Ways to Write Characters Better: Protagonists, Antagonists, Minor Characters, and More, by Robert Lee Brewer. This post collects a lot of great posts on characters, including moral dilemmas, character names, and more.
  17. Creative writing exercises. Cassandra Lipp shares a new creative writing prompt every Tuesday, and a few made our Top 20-ish list: “A Different Match,” “Story Title Generator,” and “Write Like Studio Ghibli.”
  18. Your Story. Cassandra Lipp also manages our Your Story offerings, and “Your Story 108” and “Your Story 107” made our list. Click the Your Story link to see what the current prompt is.
  19. How to Write a Mystery Novel, by Robert Lee Brewer. Like the characters post above, I had fun collecting some of our best posts on how to write novels, especially mystery novels.
  20. Gary Reilly’s 25 Unpublished Novels: How a Great, Late Writer Lacked This One Necessary Thing to Find Writing Success in His Lifetime, by Mark Stevens. In this post, Stevens shares how a brilliant writer and friend missed publishing success during his lifetime and how to avoid his fate. 

So there you have it. Now don’t forget to share what you’d like to see in 2021 and beyond in the comments below. And check our home page regularly, because we’re constantly sharing great writing posts.

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