Zadie Smith disses black female writers.

Shame on you Zadie

‘Being the only black women in a bestseller list doesn’t mean that you’re the only black woman who can write well.’

Anyone who gets out and about, attends open mic or networking events knows that there are a lot of talented black people out there, working hard – even if they don’t end up famous. The few who make it into the ether – usually do because some mainstream person in power has chosen to believe in them. ie – luck. Leona Lewis was a world class, hard working singer prior to winning X-factor, but it was Simon Cowell who made her a star. Likewise, while there are many beautiful, tall black women walking the streets of London, it was being ‘discovered ‘ that transformed Naomi Campbell’s life. It doesn’t mean she was the only great looker in South London at the time. Zadie Smith wrote the excellent White Teeth – but would it have been pushed to the extent that it was if she had not been backed by Salmon Rushdie?

Zadie Smith is a great writer and has received wordwide attention for her efforts. Disturbingly, her latest literary effort has been to ‘diss’ black female writing wholesale in her forward to the re-release of ‘Their Eyes Were Watching God’. This epic story published in 1937 was written by the pre-eminent African American female writer of the time and Virago Press no doubt found it fitting to commission Zadie Smith – clearly the pre-eminant ‘black’ (she doesn’t like the word but will take the commission thank you very much) female writer of today.

She then spent half the foreword rubbishing her fellow female black writers in a global attack. It wasn’t specific. It didn’t distinguish between – say – How Stella Got Her Groove Back and Beloved, or African American and Black British. It didn’t emphasise the great things about black female writing. There was no balance. She took a stick and beat the past 30 years of our contributions indiscriminately.

‘Too often unerringly strong and soulful, sexually voracious and unafraid. They take the unreal forms of earth mothers, African queens, divas, sprits of history. They process grandly through novels thick with a breeding of greeting card lyricism. They have little of the complexity, the flaws, and uncertainties depth and beauty of Janie Crawford and the novel she springs from. They are pressed into service as role models to patch over our psychic wounds. They are perfect. They over compensate.’

So Miss Smith, a chance encounter has given you a platform from which to crow over the rest. Now what? Isn’t some humility expected - some tacit acknowledgement that being the only black women in a bestseller list doesn’t mean that you’re the only black woman who can write well?

And what of this greeting card lyricism? Unlike Miss Smith (who says she feels uncomfortable reading books by black women because its somehow expected of her) – many of us do actively seek out books by black women because we’re looking for some record of our unique experiences. You can call us people of the Diaspora or you can just call us black. We want to know what happened to our great-great-great grandparents – the life they lived. We want to know about today’s black women. We want to listen to someone who understands how hard it is sometimes to face the world with our ‘nappy’ hair and our dark skin and the weight of the world’s preconceived ideas on our shoulders.

Zadie Smith clearly doesn’t feel that way and was the wrong choice for this foreword. Zora Neale Thurston understood firsthand what it meant to be a black woman. She grew up in an all-black town. She only received her high school education after lying about her age. She then got a scholarship to Howard University. After being feted during the Harlem renaissance she was tossed aside by the mainstream and died in obscurity. If Zadie Smith doesn’t get black female writing, then maybe she’s just not black enough.

The Angry Sistas taking over Facebook

I’ve known a couple of ‘wastemen’ in my time. It’s difficult not to. They tend to launch themselves at you when you’re just minding your own business on the street with chat up lines like ‘You’re the buffest ting I’ve seen since I got out of jail.’

When Darwin developed his hunter gatherer theory on evolution. He clearly forgot about the Wasteman – the man who hunts women and gathers children but doesn’t provide – the man not in the history books because he has no official name, just several aliases – one for every manor. Like Samuel L Jackson in The Long Kiss Goodnight, he's Frank and Ernest – in New York he's Frank and in Chicago he's Ernest.


My ex was a classic ‘wasteman’. I used to carry a box of eggs in the glove compartment of my car and each time I passed his gleaming black BMW (we lived close by) Kapow! Splat! Boom! Just one of those days that a girl goes through, when I’m angry in side, and I’m gonna take it out on you. What on earth did he do to deserve that – oh, only lie , cheat, slap me in the face, try to bully me into taking out a £10,000 loan for him, you know – the usual.

At least this is the usual sort of man represented on the 'women against wastemen' page. Its two thousand members upload a gallery of ‘wastemen’ from convicted rapist Mike Tyson to cheating husband Harvey. There is a name and shame section where men are unceremoniously outed for their ‘waste’ behaviour amid lots of female cackling and heckling. But laughter aside, there’s obviously a lot of pain here. Some people are nominating their dads, which as one post comments is 'some deep shit'.


When I saw this group, my heart soared. Here finally was a much needed real-time forum for sistas old and young to share their pain about men. Started by a intelligent sista studying at Manchester University. She describes her aim as empowering women to deal with ‘wasteman syndrome’. Its silly but also as deep as you want to take it with some message posts from truly traumatised women and legions of offended men (and women) who find the group very negative.

After all, as one brave brother posted (he was immediately surrounded and manhandled to the ground), 2000 sistas devoted to a positive cause could change the world, but 2000 sistas devoted to negativity will just further negativity.

Okay yeah – but no- but I think that misses the point. This isn’t a ‘cause’ –if you want a cause you can join the Mother Daughter Project Uganda or Remember Lindsay Hawker. 'Women against the Wasteman' is mass scab itching in all its bloody glory, nothing more, nothing less.
There’s got to be a place for women and especially Sistahs to do that. Its okay. Some of our experiences are so bad you have to laugh or cry and this group is utterly hilarious – no bad thing.

Besides which, the men haven’t maintained the higher moral ground for long either. Hot on the heels of Women against the Wasteman is 'Men Against Wastegash' – The Big Brother contestant renowned for her shallow ideals Charley Uchea coming in for some stick there, unsurprisingly.

Of course the more we complain, the more stories we have to tell, the more the joke is on us. Wastemen wouldn’t exist if the demand wasn’t there. There are plenty of Nicemen, but guess what – no group dedicated to them. We get so caught up with being victims – we forget our own role in ‘waste’ relationships – chasing down the bad men – raising our sons to be ‘waste’ – having kids for men who aren’t worth it. You know what they say, behind every ‘waste’ man…..

Back History Month – am I bovvered?

Are we taking our heritage for granted?


Is there anybody out there - who gives a shit about Ira Aldridge or Mary Seacole? who loses sleep over Olaudah Equiano or Sam Selvon? Who gives meaningful thought (not just hot air) to the issue of reparations and slavery? What about the history of your country of origin? Could you make a list of 100 Great Jamaican’s or Bajans or Ghanaian’s?
The ‘evidence’ suggests that not many black people are interested in history unless it comes ready packaged to their front door like a pizza. The armchair protest for more black programming is deafening but people are not voting for their feet. When you go to 'heritage' events is it not echoingly empty? And are you not more likely to find slightly bemused white people in attendance than black people? All in all its very quiet out there as if 'community' has moved on leaving only a few nutters behind to apply for black history month grants. Many people like to get het up about schools being too imperialist in their education but show little interest in education of any sort until Tyrone is expelled. Then suddenly it’s the absence of all those Marcus Garvey lessons that are responsible for his aggressive behaviour. Is anyone else tired of the empty rhetoric that black history or lack of is behind so many social problems - when so few black people seem sufficiently interested in their own history to support history events?
For some people this is no bad thing, just life, the world, the like-it-or-lump-it status quo. My parents were and still are largely indifferent about their history. They don’t know anymore about their Jamaican history than I do. They can just about remember the names of their grandparents and the parish of their birth. Beyond that it’s all ancient Greek mythology to them and just as irrelevant.
But the legacy of their indifference has often been, unsurprisingly, indifference. I once went on a date with a man whose parents were both from St Kitts. Over dinner I asked him to tell me about St Kitts. All he knew was that the island is shaped like a drumstick (it is). It was clear he would be more able (and willing) to tell me about Kentucky Fried Chicken rather than his country of origin.
We’re not all apathetic when it comes to history. There are plenty of individuals who have thrown their lives into the idea of ‘reach one teach one’ bringing heritage to others via organisations or books. Wake up and smell the Fufu is a wonderful book by the late Njoya Diawara Small - a young man who goes to Ghana to experience the motherland and explore his ancestry. Alex Wheatle’s Island Songs is a rich tale of our parents’ generation and their lives ‘back home’. Sukdev Sandhu’s exhaustive London Calling looks at the presence and contributions of black and Asians in Britain since Elizabethan times.
But it’s an uphill struggle when the average (black) man on the street ain’t bovvered. As a community we are taking our funded heritage events for granted. If/when the Conservatives get back into power it will be the long kiss good night for diversity - more prison and less heritage for our young people. Maybe we will be ‘bovvered’ then – when it’s too late.
Vanessa Walters is currently ‘writer in residence’ for the royal borough of Kensington & Chelsea. She hosts a reading group which focuses on the writings of black british authors and a fortnightly discussion group looking at social issues. For more information on participating in any of these activities, email vanessawalters@hotmail.com