My senior year in college I found myself taking a class on African American women writers, hoping to gain more insight about other women like me. I needed to know whether my struggle was mine alone or did someone share my views. After reading Nella Larsen's novels Quicksand and Passing, I found kindred sisterhood and my zeal for writing invigorated. I further found Frances Ellen Harper, Jessie Fauset, Toni Morrison and Gayle Jones, women who spoke about the richness of being a black woman and the societal pressures that came along with it.
Unfortunately, Nella Larsen and the like felt the pangs of rejection for their work when it addressed issues of black female sexuality and the confines of gender roles. The NAACP, White editors, and some black women club leaders forced Larsen into quieting her voice and glossing over the topic that she wanted to address most. Larsen found herself divided between the artistic freedom of the Harlem Renaissance and societal pressure for racial uplift.
Twenty book reviews, four book clubs and three writing groups later, I have discovered that twenty first-century African American women writers still grapple with professional, literary and community acceptance. When I asked other authors about exploring sexuality in their work, their response was that although authors like Terri MacMillan have received best selling fame, most agents would rather African American women writers not discuss the psychological effects of black female sexuality, but only describe the sexual act or fantasy. Stereotypical characters like the crazed mistress, the ghetto girl, the sexual deprived Big Mama didn't take the place of Jezebel, Mammy, and Tichuba. It merely camouflaged them into contemporary form.
Edith Holmes, author of PRESSIONS: Memoirs of a Southern Cat, a hard hitting novel about the Deep South, Southern Traditions, and Ancestral Pride, told me about her struggle to get published. "I am from the Deep South and have been told that if I publish my novel I could be the next strange fruit hanging from southern trees."
On the other hand, Evelyn Palfrey, another member of my writing group had a different experience. "Neither my agent nor the editor at my publisher have suggested in any way that I water down my content... As much as many hate to admit it, race matters in America. Most folk who read my books know that I am Black and should expect that I would write from that perspective."
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