Latest / Mythmakers / Jennifer Hayashi Danns: Adventures with Gender

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Jennifer Hayashi Danns: Adventures with Gender · Mythmakers

• 0:00
  Are you really buying a car online on auto trader right now?
• 0:03
  Really?
• 0:04
  At a playground?
• 0:05
  Yeah, really.
• 0:05
  Look at these listings from dealers.
• 0:07
  Wow!
• 0:08
  Your search can really get that specific.
• 0:10
  Really?
• 0:10
  And you just put in your info and bone.
• 0:12
  Cars in your budget.
• 0:13
  Mom!
• 0:14
  Mom needs a second, honey.
• 0:15
  You can really have a deliver?
• 0:17
  Really?
• 0:17
  Or I can pick it up with the dealership.
• 0:19
  Mom!
• 0:20
  One sec, sweetie!
• 0:21
  Mommy's buying a car.
• 0:22
  Mommy's looking!
• 0:23
  I think Kate is walking up the slide.
• 0:25
  Kyle, again, really?
• 0:27
  Auto trader.
• 0:28
  Buy your car online.
• 0:29
  Really?
• 0:34
  Hello and welcome to MythMakers.
• 0:36
  MythMakers is the podcast for fantasy fans
• 0:40
  and fantasy creators brought to you by the Oxford Centre
• 0:44
  for fantasy.
• 0:45
  My name is Julia Golding.
• 0:46
  I'm an author, but also I direct the centre.
• 0:49
  And today I'm so excited because I am being joined
• 0:54
  by Jennifer Hayashi-Dans,
• 0:56
  who is about to bring to the world her new and very
• 1:02
  interesting book, which is called,
• 1:04
  let me get this right, Jennifer.
• 1:07
  Beneath the burning wave, that's it,
• 1:10
  which is the first of a trilogy.
• 1:12
  But I'll leave Jennifer to tell us more about that
• 1:14
  in a minute.
• 1:15
  And she's got quite an extraordinary mind
• 1:18
  and very different kind of fantasy,
• 1:19
  which is why I'm so excited to meet her.
• 1:22
  Right, so Jennifer, hello.
• 1:24
  First of all, would you like to tell us a little bit
• 1:27
  about your journey to being an author?
• 1:30
  And you might want to mention any particular things
• 1:33
  that you read along the way that inspired you into this
• 1:35
  mad world of trying to make a living by writing.
• 1:40
  So in 2011, I published a nonfiction book
• 1:45
  and that was actually based on my thesis at university.
• 1:48
  So it was, it was a feminist book,
• 1:51
  criticising the sex industry in the UK,
• 1:54
  specifically about lap dancing.
• 1:57
  So that was published, that was published
• 1:59
  with an independent publisher.
• 2:02
  And then after that came out, an agent approached me
• 2:07
  and she said, I feel like you have another story to tell.
• 2:11
  And that just, it opened up this,
• 2:15
  well, at the publishing world to me because I've always
• 2:18
  loved books, I've always loved literature.
• 2:21
  I would love to be an author and, of course, I now have.
• 2:24
  Of course you are, yes.
• 2:26
  But at that time, it was, yeah,
• 2:29
  it always just seemed very risky to do as a job.
• 2:32
  I had a lot of responsibilities, different commitments.
• 2:37
  It seemed like a profession that perhaps was also
• 2:40
  my reach for various reasons, mainly,
• 2:44
  socio-economic reasons.
• 2:47
  I mean, that's not a problem.
• 2:48
  No, that is so true.
• 2:50
  That is so true.
• 2:51
  I mean, let's just pause there.
• 2:52
  Because people in Bay, I've done various public events
• 2:55
  around the country on kids' prizes and things.
• 2:59
  I remember driving to one in Leeds.
• 3:01
  They got a driver to take us from the station to the hotel.
• 3:04
  And the driver said, oh, I thought you'd all come
• 3:06
  and show for different cars.
• 3:08
  And I think basically he thought all authors
• 3:10
  were like, I know, as rich as JK Rowling or something.
• 3:13
  I mean, he's had to think, no.
• 3:14
  So keep the day job.
• 3:17
  He's probably the best advice that most authors can be given.
• 3:20
  Anyway, back to you thinking,
• 3:23
  and maybe I could do some fiction.
• 3:25
  And I suppose I had a perception that you
• 3:28
  as an author, you're rich before you're an author,
• 3:30
  and then you're richer after.
• 3:32
  And as you said, there's a whole range
• 3:35
  of people publishing.
• 3:38
  So yet, so then that opened up the publishing industry.
• 3:43
  So what I tried to do was just write a novel as fast
• 3:45
  as humanly possible.
• 3:47
  And when you try and do that, you just end up with me.
• 3:50
  It was just a very thinly veiled account of my life.
• 3:55
  So it wasn't very good.
• 3:56
  And it was just a partial that I submitted.
• 3:59
  And the agent was lovely.
• 4:00
  And she said, and I really hung on to this for years.
• 4:03
  She said, you have a natural talent for writing.
• 4:06
  But yeah, this is not the story.
• 4:09
  And that was, yeah, it was absolutely true.
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  But something very interesting came out
• 4:14
  of our exchange and our encounter
• 4:17
  because the first book that I published,
• 4:20
  it really broke through into the media.
• 4:23
  So at that time, a lot of people were talking about this site.
• 4:26
  Like, it's like, I'm saying empowerment as a this.
• 4:29
  Is it that whole conversation was going on?
• 4:31
  2011, and then that kind of wave of feminism.
• 4:35
  And you had like the, what was that book called?
• 4:38
  Like, female chauvinist pigs.
• 4:40
  And you had all like the, it Natasha Bard and stuff.
• 4:42
  It was, it was a whole time of this type of nonfiction book.
• 4:48
  So, yeah, I was, I had a feature in the Guardian,
• 4:52
  the BBC did lots of things, even sent a poet to my house
• 4:55
  to write a poem about the experiences in the book.
• 4:58
  I was a women's hour.
• 4:59
  I was on MTV this morning, Phillips.
• 5:02
  The book or, but despite all of this media coverage,
• 5:09
  the book's still in print now.
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  It's been in print.
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  So what we had now 12 years.
• 5:13
  And I would say it sold less than 1000 copies.
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  So it is like, it's just such a wild industry, isn't it?
• 5:22
  Because you think that level of publicity
• 5:24
  that it would sell so many copies and it didn't.
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  And so I was talking to the agents about this.
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  And what we were speaking about was.
• 5:36
  So in the nonfiction book, obviously,
• 5:38
  it was a lot of experiences of women,
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  but it was also a lot of statistics, excuse me,
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  statistics and figures about, yeah,
• 5:48
  about like gender violence, violence against women.
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  It was really looking at it from, yeah,
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  from that feminist perspective about the objectification
• 5:56
  of women and looking at the lap,
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  that lap runs an industry from that perspective.
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  And we were just saying that literature is so powerful.
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  So you can present people with statistics about things.
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  But then if you can put that same content into a novel
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  or a story, it can really resonate with people
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  with the average person a lot more.
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  Because what seemed to happen with that first book
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  was it went into kind of echo chamber
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  if people were already thought that way were already.
• 6:29
  So they were just reading something that was reinforced
• 6:32
  and what they were thinking already.
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  Where my intent with that book is to really try
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  and will especially reach young women
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  who would enter the sex industry in various forms
• 6:42
  and just make them just think a little bit
• 6:43
  of more about it and think more critically about it.
• 6:46
  That was the intent, but I think it went into the feminist
• 6:50
  and academic group who would already feel in that way.
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  And so I think though, when we were talking about this
• 6:56
  with the agents that it really may think about
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  was like, you know, we have all of these statistics
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  like in America and about police brutality,
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  all things about violence against African Americans,
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  African American men.
• 7:13
  But you can have all of these statistics,
• 7:15
  but still we see these things again and again.
• 7:17
  But if you give people a book like to kill a mockingbird
• 7:21
  next minute, like crying and calling the first born aticus
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  because it just really resonates with them
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  in a different way than a list of facts and figures
• 7:31
  which are horrifying.
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  But there's something about when you bring it into fiction
• 7:40
  that really, I really believe opens up everything
• 7:43
  and really opens up.
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  And that to me is the only way to equality.
• 7:49
  I don't think that you would achieve equality
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  by having people like basically feeling sorry
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  for you with all of these statistics.
• 7:55
  Oh, those poor women, oh those poor black people,
• 7:58
  it just doesn't really, I think it doesn't resonate
• 8:01
  as deeply.
• 8:02
  So this was something that just really started
• 8:04
  thinking about instead of just trying to knock out
• 8:07
  this very fast novel that I suppose would have been
• 8:11
  more like, yeah, this is a fiction I suppose.
• 8:15
  It would have been like that and yet put you on themes
• 8:18
  of race and class and gender.
• 8:21
  But yeah, it just wasn't right.
• 8:23
  So then I spent two, a decade in Japan after this.
• 8:28
  And that's where this idea of moo really came alive.
• 8:33
  So beneath the bed and wave is set on a fictional
• 8:37
  ancient island called moo.
• 8:41
  And I would describe the story as it's forbidden twins
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  on an ancient island, they both have secret powers
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  but only one can ultimately rule the island
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  but it is certainly full of not it's not about race
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  and that's actually that's something intentional.
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  Maybe we can talk about that a little bit later,
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  but it is absolutely about gender and it's about how
• 9:02
  I'm and that was the story that was brewing inside me.
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  That's the story that came out and it's interesting
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  actually because or I wrote it.
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  I wrote a lot of it and then I was saying,
• 9:14
  what is this because it wasn't so similar.
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  At that time I thought it's not so it's not similar
• 9:21
  to anything I had really read but since then
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  I've really like educates myself on modern fantasy.
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  So say things like the children of blood and bone and books
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  like that, I'm just like, I mean, this is what it is.
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  It just fits in this is what it is.
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  But that's the way that I came about it.
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  It was how to yet explore these themes
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  that I'm very, very interested in.
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  But put it into a story that is, well,
• 9:53
  what I hope is it's exciting.
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  It's an adventure.
• 9:56
  It's apocalyptic.
• 9:57
  It's all of those things.
• 9:59
  But those themes are within the narrative.
• 10:05
  Yeah.
• 10:06
  And I think one of the things that struck me about it is
• 10:11
  well, it's some very interesting sources
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  that you name at the end.
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  But there is this feeling of a,
• 10:21
  it's kind of almost like
• 10:24
  Garden of Eden except it's not.
• 10:27
  It's the sort of state of nature place.
• 10:29
  The sort of stripped away of any kind of technology.
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  It's a group of people trying to find a way of living
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  on an island or limited resources.
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  And of course that becomes a microcosm
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  for society, doesn't it?
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  And I often think about fantasy
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  as a bit like a laboratory where you can run an experiment
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  of things that you see in real life.
• 10:52
  But you can shift it into a fantasy setting
• 10:54
  and say, well, how does this work?
• 10:56
  And that's a way of exploring
• 11:00
  things which are perhaps too encrusted
• 11:02
  with other things in our society.
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  So the obvious thing to ask you about
• 11:07
  and the thing that strikes a reader immediately
• 11:09
  is that you are in the first half
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  using neutral pronouns.
• 11:19
  And I wanted to ask you about,
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  that's the first half until there's like a fallen moment.
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  I'm putting that because I don't know if you call it
• 11:27
  a fallen moment.
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  Anyway, it changes, there's a change in that society.
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  How difficult was that?
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  And how did you go about writing a language
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  to communicate without using familiar pronouns?
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  Well, I didn't find it so difficult
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  because I knew I wanted to explore the origin of gender.
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  So then for me, the logical thought was before
• 11:53
  there was she and he, her and his,
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  what would have been before that?
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  So if it's something that's evolved
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  or something that had changed,
• 12:03
  what would have come before
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  and that led me to an island that was Agenda.
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  So they use the pronouns, moo, moo, men.
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  So everyone, however,
• 12:17
  because I am exploring the origin of gender,
• 12:21
  I would want to misrepresent this
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  because I think that is at the moment
• 12:25
  there's a real passion, a real hunger for non-binary characters
• 12:30
  for fluid characters.
• 12:31
  But I would say my book is not that.
• 12:34
  It's very much an exploration of gender.
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  So yet by the second half,
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  we're onto the binary.
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  And also a question that's being posed in there
• 12:45
  is within this Agenda society,
• 12:48
  there's still the requirement to procreate.
• 12:52
  So if something's happened on the island
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  where there's been a dip in the population
• 12:56
  and the ruling of the island,
• 12:59
  they're called the experience
• 13:00
  and the head experienced is Takenori.
• 13:03
  And he is obsessed with repopulating the island.
• 13:08
  And what I'm going to do here is so said,
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  it's moo, moo, men.
• 13:10
  But by the second half,
• 13:12
  everybody is gendered.
• 13:13
  So I'm going to use the gendered pronouns for it.
• 13:16
  Yeah, yeah.
• 13:17
  But the weather is kind of pushing you
• 13:19
  to then stop speaking in moo, moo, men.
• 13:21
  So if you want to explore that part,
• 13:22
  please pick up the book.
• 13:23
  And that's not the first half is,
• 13:25
  but by the second half, you do know
• 13:27
  by our, by current standard,
• 13:29
  who's a man, who's a woman,
• 13:30
  you do know that they become gendered
• 13:33
  in the second half of the book,
• 13:34
  you do know that Takenori is he,
• 13:36
  where does in the beginning?
• 13:38
  Well, how did you find that when you read it,
• 13:40
  what did you,
• 13:41
  without the gendered pronouns?
• 13:44
  It was a very interesting reading experience
• 13:46
  because I found myself looking for other signals
• 13:49
  in order to categorize people,
• 13:50
  which was the kind of working against what you know.
• 13:54
  It's that.
• 13:55
  So for example,
• 13:56
  something like I was looking at names,
• 13:57
  thinking,
• 13:58
  is there a clue in the names as to whether or not
• 14:00
  somebody is a carrier, you know, like female or not.
• 14:05
  So the twins are Kairi and Kayora.
• 14:09
  Is that right?
• 14:10
  I'm Kairi and Kairi.
• 14:12
  Kairi and Kairi, okay.
• 14:14
  So I think he always says something,
• 14:15
  you know,
• 14:16
  so I was felt probably not,
• 14:19
  but just so I'm so ingrained that I found myself looking for it.
• 14:22
  So I could relax and think,
• 14:24
  oh, I understand who they are.
• 14:25
  But actually,
• 14:26
  what's interesting is trying to hold yourself
• 14:29
  in that suspense where you don't answer that question.
• 14:32
  And I think what was most interesting for me about that
• 14:35
  and I think where it was really a great way
• 14:38
  of introducing characters is because, as you say,
• 14:40
  you've got.
• 14:43
  You're trying to write to place where there is no set idea
• 14:47
  of gender to start with,
• 14:49
  which means that people are welcome to fall
• 14:52
  enough with whoever they want to fall enough with
• 14:54
  and have relationships.
• 14:55
  So it's a good way of introducing a romantic,
• 14:59
  queer relationship because you don't know.
• 15:02
  Oh, it doesn't matter.
• 15:05
  I should say rather than you don't know who they are affectionate
• 15:09
  towards because you set up that relationship
• 15:14
  and then after the fall or the break
• 15:17
  where you get the he and the she and you think,
• 15:19
  okay,
• 15:20
  so that's the same sex relationship
• 15:21
  and that ones are not.
• 15:25
  But you've already got used to them being a couple.
• 15:27
  So it was quite a good way of stripping out
• 15:30
  any kind of residual pre-judging that you might do
• 15:33
  of social roles or whatever it might have been
• 15:37
  that go along with that.
• 15:39
  So the two things for me worked in parallel,
• 15:42
  the relationships plus the gender neutral pronouns.
• 15:47
  That's what the effect they had on me.
• 15:49
  Yeah, that's good.
• 15:50
  That's that's crazy.
• 15:52
  So tick, tick result.
• 15:54
  You know,
• 15:56
  I'm glad that that came across and I do,
• 15:59
  and I do understand that that it does involve
• 16:02
  a little bit of work if you're not familiar with that.
• 16:06
  But again, I suppose that's where the
• 16:09
  in terms of,
• 16:10
  I suppose like where fiction is that this is would be
• 16:14
  to find then as experimental because of that element.
• 16:18
  But at the same time that is
• 16:21
  almost like a very clear story going through.
• 16:23
  I do feel that if you hook those pronouns out,
• 16:29
  it would be like a fairly straightforward story.
• 16:32
  Actually, it's about family.
• 16:36
  It's about because something that I was thinking about
• 16:39
  because I mean,
• 16:41
  I have children and I had children fairly recently.
• 16:44
  This idea of,
• 16:46
  you know, it takes a village and that being a positive thing.
• 16:50
  But I do think,
• 16:50
  well, it depends on the village.
• 16:52
  I don't think it's going to take him for granted.
• 16:56
  It just, it depends on the village.
• 16:58
  And as I said,
• 16:59
  the main antagonist in this,
• 17:04
  Hakenori,
• 17:05
  absolutely does have a gender and is extremely zealous,
• 17:10
  is extremely dominating is extremely manipulative.
• 17:15
  So they are to a certain extent because of the hierarchy
• 17:19
  that exists in this society.
• 17:22
  At the mercy of him.
• 17:24
  And it's about that as well.
• 17:27
  There's all of that going on as well as yet.
• 17:30
  There's romantic relationships.
• 17:32
  Yes, the relationship between the twins,
• 17:34
  the relationship between authority.
• 17:36
  It doesn't,
• 17:37
  it's I think it's like an exploration of various relationships.
• 17:42
  And it's not just clearly,
• 17:45
  it's about affection rather than romance in some relationships.
• 17:49
  And you mentioned in your sort of epilogue material
• 17:55
  that you wanted to talk about,
• 17:58
  cuddling affection between people,
• 18:00
  because they don't know who their parents are or.
• 18:05
  That relationship is removed by the structure of society
• 18:08
  in the first half.
• 18:10
  They have close relationships with other people,
• 18:13
  which kind of feel a bit parental,
• 18:14
  but it's not specified in that way.
• 18:17
  And so you can feel really close to somebody
• 18:20
  without it being a romance or a sexual relationship.
• 18:23
  And I thought that was a really interesting way of looking at
• 18:27
  a society when there are lots of forms of love.
• 18:33
  Between the people in it.
• 18:36
  So moving on to sort of looking at it as a craft
• 18:40
  and the structure of your book.
• 18:43
  You've got twins.
• 18:44
  So it's you can see how you're led to doing two points of view
• 18:49
  as a result,
• 18:51
  but also your book breaks in half as well
• 18:55
  with a sort of moment and then it.
• 18:58
  So how much did you,
• 19:00
  did you sit down and plan your structure
• 19:02
  or did it just flow naturally in that way?
• 19:04
  Is it something that you had a grid of your story
• 19:07
  or did you just sort of explore your way through it?
• 19:12
  Yes, so the ancient island is called Mew.
• 19:15
  And then the mythology of Mew is that it's like,
• 19:20
  it's an atlanta.
• 19:21
  So it's the atlanta of the Pacific.
• 19:24
  So the idea is that there was a continent called Mew that.
• 19:31
  Well, yeah, the myth is that pretty much overnight collapsed
• 19:36
  under a twin catastrophe
• 19:38
  of fire and war sort of volcano and of tsunami.
• 19:43
  So I mean, and this is all you can find as a Wikipedia.
• 19:46
  You know, this is like the mythology of Mew.
• 19:48
  So I suppose that.
• 19:51
  That was a starting point for the story.
• 19:54
  So immediately this and these polarized elements,
• 19:58
  this idea of twins to.
• 20:02
  And although we've we've now decided on a trilogy,
• 20:07
  it was I was thinking it could to be like a duology to really.
• 20:10
  Yeah, to get to there.
• 20:12
  To to to to to to and then the book is split into two.
• 20:16
  So yeah, I have taken that to think of really.
• 20:19
  Yeah, I run with that very, very far down the road.
• 20:23
  But it did.
• 20:25
  Yeah, it did give quite a firm structure then to the novel.
• 20:29
  So I did feel the third person wouldn't really work.
• 20:33
  Obviously I could have done it very, very, very close.
• 20:36
  But because this mythology and I said this mythology is publicly available.
• 20:41
  It is I think it's kind of known as you begin the book that it's leading to catastrophe.
• 20:46
  So I think that has a much greater dramatic effect in first person.
• 20:51
  And then I think it's interesting because.
• 20:54
  The twins eventually split on the split in terms of gender.
• 20:57
  I think it's quite interesting to be writing their minds about how they'd experience in this.
• 21:03
  So how they'd experience in the catastrophe, how they'd experience and the pressure from.
• 21:09
  Takenori from society, how they'd experience and especially for carry the pressure of being a carrier.
• 21:16
  And she doesn't want to be it's not something a role that she wants.
• 21:21
  And carries attitude towards.
• 21:25
  How he is the kind of illegitimate power.
• 21:28
  He has, but not having the responsibility to repopulate the island.
• 21:35
  So I thought that yes, with that immediately give yet first person.
• 21:41
  And I feel that.
• 21:45
  Yeah, I think because.
• 21:48
  Within what within one novel to start with neo pronouns.
• 21:52
  I thought that if we had to really make a decision about how the language then was going to evolve.
• 21:59
  In shini and.
• 22:01
  I'm going to get into she and hate.
• 22:06
  I tried it.
• 22:08
  I tried it so like where the language is changing and then they fumble and over it a little bit because it is it's evolving for them as well.
• 22:16
  And it was just it was too confusing.
• 22:18
  I just think it was just it was too confusing.
• 22:21
  So it was I've made the decision to do that split.
• 22:26
  Just something.
• 22:27
  Yeah, very dramatic happens to reality.
• 22:30
  We're not going to get the plot away.
• 22:33
  But she.
• 22:35
  So it disappears from the narrative and it's within.
• 22:41
  And then it's in in carries narrative that we see that language is changed and a period of time as paths.
• 22:48
  And I think this is always that I'm sure other people have this right fantasy.
• 22:52
  I do get a bit stressed out and I always forget that I'm right in fiction because I'm just a bit like is that enough time for language to have changed.
• 23:00
  And I mean of course not it's fiction and it's it's driving and propelling the story forward.
• 23:07
  And it's I mean it's not I'm not writing her a historical documents of course language would it would be a bit more subtle how it would change.
• 23:17
  It is a it's a key points of the narrative about this split.
• 23:21
  And then I suppose I did really go for ban split.
• 23:25
  Yeah, because it's another 20,000 words.
• 23:28
  I suppose it really.
• 23:30
  No, no, no, you don't actually have that question when I was reading it.
• 23:35
  I just accepted it on the terms that you gave it.
• 23:38
  Because carry is enforcing it in a way because he's quite a.
• 23:45
  He's a violent character who quite a sort of dictatorial character as well.
• 23:50
  So you could imagine somebody in that atmosphere enforcing it and you're too scared to get it wrong.
• 23:57
  So another thing Jennifer because of as well as the book there's a really interesting things that you write at the end, which is.
• 24:06
  You were writing about yourself as a black British author.
• 24:11
  And you mentioned a dialogue in December 2020 between a ready Edo lodge and Bernadine Everisto, which really kind of inspired you.
• 24:21
  Do you want to tell us a little bit about that and the effect it's had on you as a writer.
• 24:25
  Yeah, so at that time, I think it was that Bernadine Everisto was like the first black woman or black British author to.
• 24:37
  Was it take the number one slot?
• 24:40
  Both of them achieved something that black British female authors hadn't achieved.
• 24:49
  Yes, they were the first black British women to top the nonfiction and fiction paperback charts.
• 24:55
  Yeah, I mean, it's extra. So I'm what you.
• 24:59
  December 2020.
• 25:01
  Yeah, I mean, well, that's like outrageous, really, isn't it?
• 25:04
  I mean, as a star.
• 25:06
  It was yeah, unbelievable that that is a.
• 25:11
  That that was an achievement that has come so late.
• 25:16
  And yeah, so that's who yet the Guardian was just asking them about them.
• 25:21
  There I suppose the hopes for future black female authors and at one point that Bernadine Everisto says her hope is there.
• 25:35
  But yeah, the authors are able to write what what specifically black authors are able to write whatever they want to write.
• 25:44
  And I think this is I think it's quite clear if you go into any UK bookshop that all now there is a significant number of.
• 25:57
  Books being published by black British authors, but that they heavily scoot towards being about race and being about anti-racism or if the.
• 26:10
  It's we're all with in fiction that the elements about race and racism and I don't believe.
• 26:21
  That that's what every single black author wants to write about it's about what's being commissioned about what you can get published.
• 26:30
  And I suppose in an industry where the gatekeepers are predominantly white women and the people who at the top of the publishing house as a white men.
• 26:41
  You still that's who you interacting with that's the gatekeeper that you have to get past and even people who are very well intentioned.
• 26:51
  It can be of course perceived as a positive thing to publish books about anti-racism it's important I've read these books some of these books they are spectacular.
• 27:01
  But I am concerned about the lack of black authors within genre fiction because I do think there's an enormous amount of freedom for black authors for queer authors in genre fiction and particularly in fantasy.
• 27:16
  You can write whatever you want you can dream or whatever you like and I'm very interested in Afro futurism and an enormous part of Afro futurism is this doesn't there's like a place.
• 27:34
  Called Drexion and the idea of this is that slaves who have cast off the slave ships the pregnant slaves at the bottom of the sea like their children survived and that there's this whole alternate universe which is free from any kind of empire slavery any kind of any kind of that oppression.
• 28:00
  And that's why I do find it extraordinary that there are not that there's that there's just not a that there's not an enormous canon of writing by black authors be in in the fantasy space I just think that's extraordinary because it can be a space that's devoid of all of these things.
• 28:21
  So I said I I'm passionate about women and I mean I just despise violence against women it's something that's very important to me and in terms of that's my feminism I'm absolutely not on any level of gender critical feminists I believe the trans women women and we're all included in this so I wrote a non fiction book about those things and kind of so you can.
• 28:51
  I can't do that but then now I was a fantasy book and I think that you should be able to do that I think you can as a black author you can write the anti racism book of course and if you're passionate about that of course but then I also think then what do you write next and whatever your call or ethnicity.
• 29:13
  In the industry it does kind of like like that's your lane now so you've started on the nonfiction that's your audience that you keep going on that's a problem anyway and that's that is why it's a problem with the over commissioning of these anti racism books because it's very hard to change it is very hard to then rebrand yourself in another way.
• 29:36
  Oh it's exhausting having to be a banner carrier for a particular cause be it racism or feminism or whatever it is that you're interested in.
• 29:46
  To actually have to always carry that banner and not be able to say right I just want to write a story about I know exploring Mars or whatever it might be just do something completely different and be because a form of.
• 29:59
  It ends up as being a form of prejudice doesn't it even though it's coming from the good intention of trying to readjust the balance of representation.
• 30:09
  That's what I was talking about earlier that there is an unfortunately human nature there is a limit to how many statistics people can read about this I mean we know about this like the under representation of black authors in publishing across various industries in the UK.
• 30:28
  We know about the discrimination from the police I mean where speak and now what is it February 2023 I just saw a horrible video with a girl being attacked outside of school and the theory behind this is that she would be racially abused and then she's being attacked by what seems to be like a white family including adults and there's videos of these things we can see in America that all of these injustices they're being documented.
• 30:57
  You can literally watch them and maybe there's something even in that in our way you just watching black people be attacked and be abused and be humiliated and again it's like you end up with well okay it's kind of important to see but it is dehumanizing it ends up like it's like a trap sometimes it feels like a trap because it is like no I don't think you should share these videos.
• 31:26
  But I know from my experience that if I speak to people about racism and experiences I've had especially when I was younger that is all my people are always a little bit incredulous like a little bit like well it's not like that now all like almost a bit like it kind of being like that bad but then you watch these videos and that's how bad it is.
• 31:46
  So during this time what I mean is it's very important that I believe it's really powerful so I do think that if you had black characters or people of color characters in a ball who were just so I would love to see a character who's a black character who's the scientist they destroy the world change the mind and decide to save it.
• 32:12
  And it does not have anything to do with racism they just did it as a human being as a flawed human being that's what they did that's the type of the term.
• 32:25
  I would like to read especially in genre fiction I think it's just it's so so important I'm the same in fantasy and in science fiction that it's just it's just the black person in the rocket and that's just it and then the story just continues on.
• 32:44
  And you start to think this like I spoke to an author recently I think Grace Curtis she's publishing a book called Frontier and it's like it's like space opera.
• 32:56
  And I don't think she'll man be saying this because of this we did we're doing this talk like Waterstones we talk about this publicly anyway but she would identify as a queer writer and as another queer writer so I'm bisexual as I was reading a novel.
• 33:12
  I just knew I just knew because it was like the protagonist was queer and the face of all different kinds of obstacles but at no point was at all to her because she was gay it just was not there.
• 33:24
  So every other type of problem you can imagine it's a great story really interesting but that discrimination just not there.
• 33:31
  And I think that is the difference it does just get really drained sometimes where you have the representation but the reason is about that you still even in this fantasy universe you still worthless and still people who are going to put you down I just don't think it's healthy at all.
• 33:50
  Yeah.
• 33:53
  There is a role in fiction to model what we could be you know so it could be passed or another site can be passed these things and it's something to aspire to as opposed to always be fighting the same battle again and again.
• 34:11
  But you can do it more as an allegory I mean you could do it so you know that's really what it's an allegory of but it doesn't have to be so literal.
• 34:19
  Yeah again especially just in fantasy I mean there's just the whole say to do that it's extraordinary to not take that the opportunity to do that.
• 34:30
  Right so thank you that was really interesting I'm very pleased we talked about that and I was saying to you just before we started recording that one thing I wanted to ask you because it's been a little bit of a Twitter media flurry or whatever wherever we're getting our news from these days.
• 34:47
  Is there's a question around at the moment about whether young adult fiction is has gone too dark recently and I would say that.
• 35:00
  Beneath the burning wave could be read as a young adult novel I mean it also has adult themes but it might be read by young adults.
• 35:08
  And you are dealing with darker themes in it is quite violent in places and you mentioned up front about morning people it's very responsibly portrayed so you know do read the whole thing.
• 35:22
  Do you think that's true that we've gone dark recently or is this just one of those media you know they've got themselves in a tizzy about something that's not really happening.
• 35:34
  Well I mean if you look at something like the lion the witch and the wardrobe all of the.
• 35:43
  Through the jeopardy the conflict it's not as graphic as certainly something that's in my novel so yes there has been a change in what we depicting novels and I think of course TV and movies has had an enormous effect on that so you.
• 36:03
  Given descriptions the.
• 36:08
  Yeah yeah I think I think well of course it has like I was born in 1983 so I can definitely see in terms of literature that things have become more graphic more graphic violence I would say and certainly more graphic.
• 36:25
  Violence in TV and film and there are things that I just choose not to watch like I'm not a big fan of horror films like I just could not watch something like so I know that's directed adults but films like so and things like that I just can't it's just not for me I just choose not to consume that type of media.
• 36:45
  So I do think that I think that I think there is a valid argument for the young adult fiction has become darker but it is also a reflection of the young adults are exposed to darker material outside of literature as well so again what I was mentioned before we now on the news you still you will see the video of somebody before the.
• 37:14
  Before they died and you can check and not be shared on social media it will be on the CNN it will be on BBC these really violent disturb and videos it exists and I feel that.
• 37:32
  That you can't really you would we don't live in a vacuum so maybe if I was if I was living in yet like a quiet cottage somewhere then yeah I wouldn't feel so compelled to write about violence but that's not necessarily my experience I live in a city that's my.
• 37:53
  Life that's my life experience is about conflict about violence and I feel the.
• 38:01
  So like beneath the ban and wave is extremely violent and I would describe it as extremely violent I wouldn't recommend it for 13 14 year olds and let's say it's 16 17 into adults and at the beginning there's a content notice which lists the types of violence there there's a link to do some other things and to.
• 38:23
  High old line but something that was important to me and something I think perhaps the reason I don't like violence some violent movies is because I do feel what's missing is the consequence of violence I think it can be.
• 38:43
  It it either ends so everyone's just like dead there's not there's not really any kind of.
• 38:50
  Yeah I don't see that there's a lot of like consequences and one of the first books actually that it does have an enormous influence on me was was the hunger games and I feel like I have quite unusual.
• 39:05
  View of this because I just felt now how anyone can watch that like film like as entertainment I find it really really disturbing and the books I thought they were really disturbing and I think that they are.
• 39:19
  Overly political but what I do like about them as the the trilogy goes on as the stories go on you see the consequence of participating in violence yeah I think that's very very important I think it gives a fully.
• 39:37
  Rounded story and to me that is the difference between gratuitous violence or otherwise I feel it's very important that.
• 39:49
  At least somebody acknowledges.
• 39:52
  The consequence of this fact that the impact that it's had on them that it's not just.
• 39:59
  I wouldn't so like on moon like I wouldn't this ancient you know.
• 40:04
  Civilization so we can just be violent like of course not you're still a human being you still.
• 40:09
  Feel pain you feel all of those.
• 40:13
  Responsibilities that we have as human beings I don't know you can just have I like all it's like ancient so they can just be really violence and obviously it's really drawn on.
• 40:23
  Ancient Egypt it's.
• 40:26
  Because the mythology of mu is then after the catastrophe on the continent that the refugees essentially of move became the ancient Egyptians and then the early.
• 40:37
  I was in early millions but I'm calling them millions.
• 40:41
  So it's something different but and again we know there's lots of out the was violence in those.
• 40:47
  Societies of sacrifices and things and you could really just zoom in on that really gratuitous gratuitously.
• 40:54
  Right about that and then just leave it and then everything just continues and that's I don't I personally don't think that's right I think that it so.
• 41:03
  I think within believe the better way that there are absolutely moments were either completely overwhelmed the shell shock they're looking back on it and with regret and.
• 41:14
  They're upset about it they're upset about things that have happened and at the moment I'm just finishing the edits for the second one and yeah all the repercussions are the first very much being felt.
• 41:29
  I think perhaps there was violence in earlier why a fiction but maybe it's just couched a bit differently so one book which I was thinking of as a.
• 41:40
  As I was reading this was the court lord of the flies which a lot of children are given to read the way of golding piece which has no women in it which is one of the discussion points and I thought this is really fascinating to put this alongside your book.
• 41:55
  Because it's about how we treat each other in extreme situations and in fact in a way it was definitely been an influence I would say laws and cries and also you know the short story by Shirley Jackson the lottery and lost that short story.
• 42:12
  Oh I don't know that one oh yeah it's extraordinary.
• 42:16
  We must look that one up and right so thank you that that was a very fascinating take on why there is so much violence around in books and we have on a lighter note.
• 42:32
  We have two two regular sections that we look at at the end of our podcast one is where in all the fantasy worlds that we've sort of read or watched or what come across is the best place for something and this time to celebrate the positive side of the fact that
• 42:53
  literature is finally becoming a bit more diverse we will say where is the best place in all fantasy worlds for diversity where is it actually best represented.
• 43:05
  Do you have a view have you got one which models it really well.
• 43:10
  What I enjoyed recently is it's by Sara El Arehi is called final the final strike and yeah there's representations of a wide range of people.
• 43:26
  So there's so yeah there's people who use they then pronouns and actually also outside of kind of race sexuality.
• 43:36
  It's very interesting like the protagonist it becomes quite a pirate very quickly very flawed and they're actually a drug addict.
• 43:44
  I thought that was an interesting take on diversity because I think it's really moving away from the other perfect character of colour as well because then that's another.
• 43:56
  You do want to be criticising people yeah.
• 43:59
  Yeah it's like yeah I thought that was yeah that was it was very well done that's just a fantastic story it's populated by diverse characters and it's a phenomenal story.
• 44:13
  I was going to choose not not as a perfect example but one that's having a big impact sort of culturally globally is Star Trek which is always tried to push the boundaries on this.
• 44:25
  Particularly from the second second next generation onwards and I was thinking of the I don't know if it's so many of these I don't know if it's the latest iteration but the one that has it's Star Trek discovery where the main character is Michael who is.
• 44:43
  First her name is kind of obviously I'm fairly androgynous and it's not about her gender and it's not about her race at all it's about the fact that she makes a mistake.
• 44:55
  It's a mistake at the beginning or something which is perceived as a mistake and that sort of kicks off the rest of it and I just like the way and there's same sex marriages and you know it basically it's all normalized.
• 45:09
  It's not about problematising something it's just these characters are showing a range of human behaviours and of course you've got your aliens to push it even further to the days when we're going to have to work about about diversity with aliens among us who knows they're already here I don't know.
• 45:29
  Anyway so I think Star Trek has been trying to do its best to explore these issues in a way which will change people's minds and make it so you're freed up to not have to be a certain kind of writer just because of your sexuality or your race or whatever it is.
• 45:51
  Also we have a second thing which is we ask our guests for a fantasy tip they might want to share feel free to.
• 45:59
  Think about this anyway you like maybe it's something that helps you as you write or.
• 46:04
  Life hack that you want to recommend people.
• 46:08
  Well I mean first there's a couple of books I would recommend so I would get strongly recommend the final strike by Sara El Arefie it's amazing I also love Natasha Bowen Bowen so I'm sorry if I'm mispronouncing that and that's skin of the sea.
• 46:27
  I think that's a duology this and the second one's called Soul of the Deep they're really beautiful books if you want to try.
• 46:35
  Perhaps a different type of fantasy then that's really based on African mythology and I would say what my fantasy tip is especially if you were born after 2000 is you must watch Dave about his labyrinth.
• 46:52
  I'm obsessed with that film I just think everybody should watch it I am horrified if there's a people don't know what I'm talking about and if you haven't seen it so that's my instruction you need to google this I find a way to watch this and I am.
• 47:07
  Yeah that's the Japanese version that DVDs.
• 47:12
  Absolutely now I'm a bit a fair bit older than you so I remember that when it was originally the original flavor of it in the in the cinemas but yes absolutely.
• 47:23
  Oh so that's an interesting thing about a must watch film for me carrying on my Star Trek little thought my must watch film for fantasy writers is galaxy quest.
• 47:35
  Which is the best ever affectionate parody of something which is actually almost better than the thing it's parodying.
• 47:45
  It's just such a classy film that one some great performances and many laugh out loud moments definitely so that's my tip if you want after you've watched labyrinth line up.
• 47:59
  Thank you so much Jennifer and when is the book actually coming out and so beneath the ban and waivers out now it came out in September 20.
• 48:10
  And it came out in America in November and yeah I'm just working on the second one now which is called across the scorch sea and that will be available by the end of the year which is getting that all sorted out now.
• 48:24
  Brilliant so we're put a link to where you can get these books in our show notes so thank you very much Jennifer and all the best with the next two parts of your.
• 48:35
  Your geology that's really a trouble trilogy but we'll think a bit to do on to keep it to thank you very much but there is a third one and that's called Beyond the Blood Tide and that'll be in 2024.
• 48:48
  Thank you.
• 48:49
  Thanks for listening to myth makers podcast brought to you by the Oxford Center for Fantasy visit Oxford Center for Fantasy dot org to join in the fun.
• 49:04
  Find out about our online courses in person stays in Oxford plus visit our shop for great gifts tell a friend and subscribe wherever you find your favorite podcasts worldwide.
• 49:34
  Thank you.