Tonight I watched the National Book Awards at my local independent bookstore, Ravenna Third Place Books, and it filled my soul in so many ways that I wanted to share some highlights with you while still on this high.
We can and must lift each other up
Roxane Gay received a lifetime achievement award. She spoke of the work she did in 2012 to assess how many writers of color and women were reviewed by the New York Times in one year, nearly 90% of the writers were white.
She spoke also of doing all the work she can to uplift other writers, and avoiding a scarcity mindset. She called out the publishers in the room, reminding them of their power to change the way the industry operates and who it represents.
Her speech was filled with her characteristically incisive wit and she ended by saying, “You have the power to create the change that the publishing industry so desperately needs. And you will be remembered for how you use that power. Or how you don’t.”
Writing is a sacrament that makes us smarter
George Saunders spoke about early days when he was stealing writing time from work and about writing on the bus. I’ve done both. And he talked about how this close work made him smarter. And realizing that, he found writing to be a sacrament, because “The person we happen to be in this moment through habit is not the limit of who we might become.”
“[Revising] is the process of not being sure, it’s staying open to the truths that the prose is anxious to show us…bullies, autocrats, zealots…they know, they always know. They are completely sure. But we artists…have an advantage over autocrats because when we’re in that not knowing state we’re open to finding out how things actually are.”
There is power in being who we are
When Gabriela Cabezón Cámara got up to give her speech to accept the award for literature in translation, she did it in Spanish, “Because I know the fascists don’t like it.” And my heart swelled. Something I’ve been trying to recapture lately is the multilingual self that used to feel like all of me. I was the only one in the room who laughed at her joke before it was translated, but I felt so full knowing that I could follow what she was saying and that that made me part of a larger world.
We must use the voice we have
Omar El Akkad said over and over “it’s difficult to think in celebratory terms” about spending two years watching children be torn apart from shrapnel, knowing our tax dollars are doing it, and watching people be snatched off the streets by masked agents of the state for insisting that Palestinians are human beings.
But he stressed, “We have an obligation to stand in opposition to any force, including those enacted by our own governments that, if left unchecked, would happily decimate every principle of free expression and connection that we come here to celebrate.”
Being in community
Rabih Alameddine spoke, in what was easily the funniest speech of the night, of the myth of the writer as a solitary being. “Writers as arts libertarians. Well, as you probably know, libertarians are like house cats. They consider themselves fiercely independent while relying on a system they don’t understand or appreciate…” and then he went on to describe all the connections that make writers not libertarians at all. I felt seen.
Last time I watched the National Book Awards was a few years ago. I was by myself on a writing residency at Centrum and it felt so professional to tune in. Tonight, though, I was surrounded by people cheering for their favorite authors. Even better, our laughter echoed together. And when a person I knew, Stesha Brandon, got up on the awards stage to present the award for literature in translation, the people at the bookstore ran to the screen and took selfies. I hadn’t remembered that Stesha was going to be there, but it was a wonderful moment that made the world feel small in the best of ways.
Sometimes things seem dark right now. They are. But we are not alone, even with our books. And we have work to do (together).
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