I think βhumor renders ambiguous everything it touchesβ is one of the most profound quotes Iβve read about βcomedyβ. To me, itβs like the respite between sprints. A comedian and a politician can comment on the same topic and, effectively, make the same points - yet it be received completely differently. And I suppose this has to do, in part, with the arena in which said comments are made. Some arenas are designated, by society, for fighting; while others are designated for truces (i.e., sporting events, music halls, and (used to be) comedy shows). There are books and journals written about the societal implications of βraceβ and ethnicity so I wonβt minimize those topics but to Beattyβs point - I was always amused when rich and powerful black people would condemn young black men for saying a word; and completely ignore structural impediments, and avoid making an effort to instruct them how to get in the positions they held.. and then you drill down and you realize that the steps many of these individuals took are complex, and at points, contradict the public persona or story they tell their set demographic. Which brings me to the point that culture is in large part about the stories we tell ourselves. Thereβs an African proverb which says βuntil the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunterβ. Sometimes the hunter has a different color than you and sometime theyβre the same color... and sometimes we like telling ourselves fairy tales because they pacify us or others; and avoid the elephant in the room. So I think part of the genius of people like this is that they eject themselves from the hunter x hunted dynamic and act as an observer. The comic creates his own space, outside of the gladiators arena, and points out the absurdities taking place within it - giving the combatants a respite from battle and an opportunity, as Beatty says, to βrehumanize ourselvesβ and βassert your intellectual equalityβ.
"Thatβs the difference between most oppressed peoples of the world and American blacks. They vow never to forget, and we want everything expunged from our record, sealed and filed away for eternity."
I understand this desire to forget.
Pain, trauma, injusticeβincluding that which was justified and weaponized by the stateβwill never be easy to hold space for. As an individual, I don't want to live in the suffocating shadow of certain pains and humiliations that I've experienced. And those are just single episodes lobbed at me by hurting people, not centuries of sanctioned abuse, often justified by identity-driven lies.
There's also a grave danger in forgetting. In forgetting the historical acts and facts of injustice, we miss that wide angle view showing a steady march toward justice. In forgetting, we risk repeating the same sinsβthough perhaps with different actors in their next iteration. We also miss out on old stories of hope and grit. A forgetful people doesn't need to remember the perseverance of Tubman or courage of Douglass.
--
There's so much treasure in this essay it is hard to know where to comment.
I hadn't heard of The Sellout before this, thank you! Just put it on hold at my local library.
I like BEATTY. Ever since his Nuyorican Poetry Cafe days/poetry books from the 90s. Brilliant writer. No doubt bout that. Loves standup comedy like I do. The only thang I DONT like is that Beatty never shouts out CHARLES WRIGHT, the 60s author whose stile he, uh, BORROWED. Nevertheless, his voice in THIS genre is sorely needed. I still like WHITE BOY SHUFFLE and TUFF better than SELLOUT. In the meantime: how U broke alla this down is next level. Truly THORO.
Man, Kundera linking humour to the invention of the novel is classic Kundera. It describes the power of the novel so well, but I also think about the shape of Irish conversation, old as the hills, sly and effacing and also rendering ambiguous everything it touches. And, Iβm sure, most other ancient cultures with which I am less familiar.
I think I read _The Sellout_ in a new-parent fugue, and Iβm thinking itβs probably time for a reread. I remember enjoying it a lot but I didnβt retain enough.
In recent years Iβve become more guilty of trying to ascribe "authorial intent" to novels I read. Not sure if this is a sign of worse novels (frequently), or a worsening reader (almost certainly). βWhat is she saying, with this? Why did she do that to that character? Does she think this?β
In my youth I read almost exclusively blackly comic novels where the humour spread a kind of filament barrier between the author and the text. Martin Amis, etc. As you observe above, the impossibility of separating the authorβs opinion from what might simply be funny gives a protection to the author, but also to the text. So many of the novels Iβve read from the last fews years have very clear moral points to make, products of the concerns of online culture. Then you read something truly good (like Rachel Cusk), and those questions of intent just kind of melt away. And yet something enters you by osmosis.
As I grew older I read fewer of these kinds of novels. Maybe I thought I was outgrowing them, maybe there are fewer of them around. I think a lot of people saw/see these novels as products of comfortable, white, first-world perspective. So _The Sellout_ is an excellent example of the freedoms of humour outside of the dominant perspective.
A few weeks ago I read _O Caledonia_ by Elspeth Barker, published in the early β90s. A Scottish Highlands account of a girlβs sad and lonely childhood. Her family hates her. She suffers an endless series of small and large misfortunes. In the end she is pointlessly murdered (foretold on the first page), then buried and forgotten by her awful parents. It was an exhilarating and deeply moving and very funny read. So beautifully written, and very nostalgic, a true late-20th C novel. Why did the author do these things to this kid? Why make so much of it funny? Novels of often bad people doing often bad things informed my moral development to a ridiculous degree. Itβs difficult to explain this clearly. You find your humanity in the reason that you laugh, in awareness of absurdity, in feeling for imperfect people.
Respect to Paul Beatty for resisting the label of "satirist." In accepting that label, he would have made it far easier for many folks to categorize, shelve, and dismiss his work.
It's wonderful to read about (I haven't read the book yet) the amount of humor in The Sellout. Humor is honest. You either laughed or you didn't.
Just the other day our dog ran headfirst into the door. I laughed. My daughter said, "Dad, that's not funny." To which I replied, "It's hard to make the case that it wasn't funny when someone is laughing."
Some of the best jokes or comedic situations push the boundary of truth in one direction or the other. Maybe they are laced with a thread of reality that is generally hard to talk about, and that joke provides a unifying release valveβwe're glad someone finally said it. (Dave Chappelle) Orβpressing hard in the other directionβthey are so patently devoid of truth that we are tickled by the absurdity. (Seinfeld) But my favorite jokes do both at the same time: a thread of truth, but then laced with absurdity or awkwardness. (Tig Nataro's famous cancer stand up set.)
"But I am desperate to know how most readers βand again, especially white readersβ took this passage..."
I thought the passage was funny. Why? Because I've misused plethora. And heard other people do the same. El Guapo in The Three Amigos said it wrong too. Skillfully highlighting the misuse of words can be funny thing. The fact that the black protagonist narrator approached it through a hyper-racialized lens doesn't change that universally funny truth.
recommending you a book and then getting a whole poast of thoughts is the most satisfying thing I can imagine
I think βhumor renders ambiguous everything it touchesβ is one of the most profound quotes Iβve read about βcomedyβ. To me, itβs like the respite between sprints. A comedian and a politician can comment on the same topic and, effectively, make the same points - yet it be received completely differently. And I suppose this has to do, in part, with the arena in which said comments are made. Some arenas are designated, by society, for fighting; while others are designated for truces (i.e., sporting events, music halls, and (used to be) comedy shows). There are books and journals written about the societal implications of βraceβ and ethnicity so I wonβt minimize those topics but to Beattyβs point - I was always amused when rich and powerful black people would condemn young black men for saying a word; and completely ignore structural impediments, and avoid making an effort to instruct them how to get in the positions they held.. and then you drill down and you realize that the steps many of these individuals took are complex, and at points, contradict the public persona or story they tell their set demographic. Which brings me to the point that culture is in large part about the stories we tell ourselves. Thereβs an African proverb which says βuntil the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunterβ. Sometimes the hunter has a different color than you and sometime theyβre the same color... and sometimes we like telling ourselves fairy tales because they pacify us or others; and avoid the elephant in the room. So I think part of the genius of people like this is that they eject themselves from the hunter x hunted dynamic and act as an observer. The comic creates his own space, outside of the gladiators arena, and points out the absurdities taking place within it - giving the combatants a respite from battle and an opportunity, as Beatty says, to βrehumanize ourselvesβ and βassert your intellectual equalityβ.
Does nominative determinism work on books? If so "The Sellout" might be the greatest title
"Thatβs the difference between most oppressed peoples of the world and American blacks. They vow never to forget, and we want everything expunged from our record, sealed and filed away for eternity."
I understand this desire to forget.
Pain, trauma, injusticeβincluding that which was justified and weaponized by the stateβwill never be easy to hold space for. As an individual, I don't want to live in the suffocating shadow of certain pains and humiliations that I've experienced. And those are just single episodes lobbed at me by hurting people, not centuries of sanctioned abuse, often justified by identity-driven lies.
There's also a grave danger in forgetting. In forgetting the historical acts and facts of injustice, we miss that wide angle view showing a steady march toward justice. In forgetting, we risk repeating the same sinsβthough perhaps with different actors in their next iteration. We also miss out on old stories of hope and grit. A forgetful people doesn't need to remember the perseverance of Tubman or courage of Douglass.
--
There's so much treasure in this essay it is hard to know where to comment.
I hadn't heard of The Sellout before this, thank you! Just put it on hold at my local library.
I like BEATTY. Ever since his Nuyorican Poetry Cafe days/poetry books from the 90s. Brilliant writer. No doubt bout that. Loves standup comedy like I do. The only thang I DONT like is that Beatty never shouts out CHARLES WRIGHT, the 60s author whose stile he, uh, BORROWED. Nevertheless, his voice in THIS genre is sorely needed. I still like WHITE BOY SHUFFLE and TUFF better than SELLOUT. In the meantime: how U broke alla this down is next level. Truly THORO.
Man, Kundera linking humour to the invention of the novel is classic Kundera. It describes the power of the novel so well, but I also think about the shape of Irish conversation, old as the hills, sly and effacing and also rendering ambiguous everything it touches. And, Iβm sure, most other ancient cultures with which I am less familiar.
I think I read _The Sellout_ in a new-parent fugue, and Iβm thinking itβs probably time for a reread. I remember enjoying it a lot but I didnβt retain enough.
In recent years Iβve become more guilty of trying to ascribe "authorial intent" to novels I read. Not sure if this is a sign of worse novels (frequently), or a worsening reader (almost certainly). βWhat is she saying, with this? Why did she do that to that character? Does she think this?β
In my youth I read almost exclusively blackly comic novels where the humour spread a kind of filament barrier between the author and the text. Martin Amis, etc. As you observe above, the impossibility of separating the authorβs opinion from what might simply be funny gives a protection to the author, but also to the text. So many of the novels Iβve read from the last fews years have very clear moral points to make, products of the concerns of online culture. Then you read something truly good (like Rachel Cusk), and those questions of intent just kind of melt away. And yet something enters you by osmosis.
As I grew older I read fewer of these kinds of novels. Maybe I thought I was outgrowing them, maybe there are fewer of them around. I think a lot of people saw/see these novels as products of comfortable, white, first-world perspective. So _The Sellout_ is an excellent example of the freedoms of humour outside of the dominant perspective.
A few weeks ago I read _O Caledonia_ by Elspeth Barker, published in the early β90s. A Scottish Highlands account of a girlβs sad and lonely childhood. Her family hates her. She suffers an endless series of small and large misfortunes. In the end she is pointlessly murdered (foretold on the first page), then buried and forgotten by her awful parents. It was an exhilarating and deeply moving and very funny read. So beautifully written, and very nostalgic, a true late-20th C novel. Why did the author do these things to this kid? Why make so much of it funny? Novels of often bad people doing often bad things informed my moral development to a ridiculous degree. Itβs difficult to explain this clearly. You find your humanity in the reason that you laugh, in awareness of absurdity, in feeling for imperfect people.
Respect to Paul Beatty for resisting the label of "satirist." In accepting that label, he would have made it far easier for many folks to categorize, shelve, and dismiss his work.
It's wonderful to read about (I haven't read the book yet) the amount of humor in The Sellout. Humor is honest. You either laughed or you didn't.
Just the other day our dog ran headfirst into the door. I laughed. My daughter said, "Dad, that's not funny." To which I replied, "It's hard to make the case that it wasn't funny when someone is laughing."
Some of the best jokes or comedic situations push the boundary of truth in one direction or the other. Maybe they are laced with a thread of reality that is generally hard to talk about, and that joke provides a unifying release valveβwe're glad someone finally said it. (Dave Chappelle) Orβpressing hard in the other directionβthey are so patently devoid of truth that we are tickled by the absurdity. (Seinfeld) But my favorite jokes do both at the same time: a thread of truth, but then laced with absurdity or awkwardness. (Tig Nataro's famous cancer stand up set.)
"But I am desperate to know how most readers βand again, especially white readersβ took this passage..."
I thought the passage was funny. Why? Because I've misused plethora. And heard other people do the same. El Guapo in The Three Amigos said it wrong too. Skillfully highlighting the misuse of words can be funny thing. The fact that the black protagonist narrator approached it through a hyper-racialized lens doesn't change that universally funny truth.