The Counterpublic Papers vol. 5 no. 5

So Sunday was one of the first days that actually feels like fall. I’m typing this at about 5:00pm and it’s dark enough that I need to write with the light on. I’m feeling like a glass of red rather than white is in order. And a lot of my friends who drove into Ann Arbor for homecoming—I have to say that I never imagined when I was at Michigan as an undergrad (and grad student) that I’d be trying to get back to homecoming every year—are probably back home right now. Under normal circumstances I’d probably be cramming furiously to get ready for class tomorrow. But fortunately this isn’t normal circumstances.

Today, I’m writing about a book I’ve read (Black Leopard Red Wolf), a book I plan to read (and from what I’ve seen I disagree with—The Enigma of Clarence Thomas) and then a movie I’m going to see (Joker).    

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I’ve talked about Marlon James’ latest book Black Leopard Red Wolf in a previous issue. I bought it on my kindle when it was released in February. When he would talk about the project before it came out he called it an African Game of Thrones. In as much as George R. R. Martin still hasn’t finished the series—not to put bad juju out there but I don’t think he will—I was really hoping that James didn’t mean “the black version of a series that won’t get past book 2” because that would hurt my heart. I forgave Robert Jordan for dying while writing The Wheel of Time (which was eventually finished). Will kind of forgive Martin when he doesn’t finish The Song of Ice and Fire (the real name of the book series—I remember when my response to HBO’s “Game of Thrones” was what the hell? That sounds so wack. Why didn’t they just use the original title? And now I’m all like The Song of Ice and Fire? What the hell was Martin thinking???).

Anyway.

What James did with Black Leopard Red Wolf is not as simple as an “African Game of Thrones.” That’s just the elevator pitch James used in interviews about A Brief History of Seven Killings, the thing that reels people in. Now in as much as what George R. R. Martin did with The Song of Ice and Fire was introduce grey to a genre that was mostly black and white, in part by telling almost the entire story through a a variety of first person point of views (nine in the first volume alone, 31 in the series up to date), James does this. But more. Because while Martin was aiming to bring a hefty dose of realism into the fantasy genre he was still using the European landscape, and also working with a set of standard fantasy motifs.

I can think of elements that bind James to Martin. James uses a similar point of view—the story is mostly told from the perspective of one character, Tracker (aka the Red Wolf). We meet Tracker in prison, and he’s telling his story to an inquisitor. Many of the other characters we meet have stories as well, but these first person stories are themselves told through Tracker. But unlike in Martin, Tracker is, untrustworthy to put it mildly. The other two books in what is expected to be a trilogy will tell the same exact story but from the standpoint of two other characters, who may or may not be more trustworthy, depending. This plays with the entire concept of truth as usually deployed in fantasy fiction and plays with the idea of the linear progressive tale as well.

James also alters some of the other concepts in fantasy. There is a fellowship—but the fellowship in this case reads to me more like the X-Men than, say, the Fellowship of the Ring. There are objects of power that must be found, and a great evil that must be defeated—but in this case that object is…well…that would be telling. And although there are wizards and witches, monsters, and goblins, tree-cities, and magic portals, James’ use of North, East, West, South, and even African American (there’s a white mad scientist in the novel that I swear reads a little like the Nation of Islam’s Jacub) and Caribbean mythologies reimagines them radically.

And his language. Talk about rhythm on the page…

There’s more. But for me…I liked the book so much that I bought the kindle edition and the hardcover (when was on sale, granted). Would be interested in knowing your thoughts.

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Corey Robin authored a new book about Clarence Thomas, The Enigma of Clarence Thomas, arguing that we can best understand Thomas’ rulings by understanding Thomas as a conservative black nationalist. I haven’t read the book—I took a look at his section on black nationalism to see who he drew from in making his claim. But I’m a skeptic. Maybe his approach to Thomas is the same as the approach some took in the seventies to what became known as “neoconservatives”. Some neocons were on the left in the sixties but changed positions drastically in response to a combination of New Left politics, Great Society policies, and the Soviet Union. I think it’d be correct to suggest that these neocons were always anti-liberal. I’m unaware—and here please correct me if I’m wrong—of anyone who’d suggest that their neocon positions come from Marxism, that neocons are basically Marxists. I’d buy Thomas as a black anti-liberal. I don’t buy Thomas as a black nationalist. Will pick up the book (from the library) and let you know.

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Joker.

I’ve been looking forward to this since I heard about it. Intended to see it this morning but the morning got away from me. (I still remember Joaquin Phoenix from Ron Howard’s Parenthood so it’s still kind of odd seeing him as an adult.) What strikes me about it, and I won’t say more until I see it, is the response.

When Do The Right Thing came out 30 years ago, conservatives like Stanley Crouch (now him I’d buy as a conservative black nationalist even now when he’d run from the term like it was a disease) argued that Spike Lee was intentionally provoking violence. It seems what’s going on with the response to Joker is the same thing, a type of anti-populist sentiment (if we expose mass populations to certain types of stimuli they aren’t prepared for they’ll behave violently and irrationally). (As an aside, while we’re comparing DTR to Joker it’s worth noting that DTR was primarily a critique of police violence while Joker is primarily a critique of economic inequality. Shades of BLM and OWS….)

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On that note, you know the routine. We aren’t independent. We’re interdependent. Reach out to the ones who need it. And because you need it too….be gentle with yourself. Until next week.