“Speaking specifically about the memoir, I know that's a criticism that people can have about my work. When I look at the young men's lives, if they're reduced to the worst thing they've done, then it's easy for them to become a stereotype. I keep running into that with newspaper articles that are very short.” PeopleIfsKnowsMenLooksDoneRunningYoungEasyWorstCriticismNewspapersMemoirYoung ManArticlesWorst ThingsStereotypeKeep Running Author:Jesmyn Ward
“When I was writing the memoir, every page was a battle with myself because I knew I had to tell the truth. That's what the memoir form demands. I also had to figure out how much of the truth do I tell, how do I make the truth as balanced as I possibly can? How do I make these people as complicated and as human and as unique and as multifaceted as I possibly can? For me, that was the way I attempted to counteract some of that criticism.” PeopleWayWritingHumansFormFiguresBattleDemandPagesUniqueCriticismComplicatedMemoirTelling The TruthBalanced Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I came to the realization that I had failed in some respects because I had been more of a benevolent narrator than the world I saw reflected around me, and in the lives of the people in my community, and in my family. There was no benevolent God sparing us pain and loss and grief and struggle. If I was going to continue to write about the place where I am from, and the kind of people who live in my community and who are in my family, I owed it to them to be honest with what our lives are like.” PeopleWorldWritingKindPainCommunityLossGriefStruggleHonestMy FamilyRealizationBeing HonestBenevolent Author:Jesmyn Ward
“My understanding of voodoo is that it was important to the people who practiced it because it helped them survive. There are practical ways it enabled survival. It used herbal medicine to heal, to aid in childbirth. It was a spiritual system. It made room for hope and for magic and for possibility. For people who struggle and fight to survive and who fight to live, those are really important things.” PeopleImportantSpiritualFightingUnderstandingStruggleMagicPossibilitySurvivalAidsHealChildbirthVoodoo Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I wanted to write about voodoo tradition that I feel has been very important to survival of black people here: people of the African diaspora, people of this region, and throughout the south.” PeopleWritingImportantBlackSurvivalTraditionBlack PeopleVoodoo Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I consider myself a progressive, so my answer would be that we need to be progressive. For some reason the people in power in Mississippi still seem to be invested in these very American myths."The individual is alone." "We pull ourselves up by our bootstraps." "We create success for ourselves, and if we work hard enough then we will succeed and have success beyond our wildest dreams." I think that we need to do away with that kind of thinking and be more aware of history and how the history of this place bears in the present and how it affects people.” PeopleThinkingKindReasonEnoughDreamIndividualHard WorkSucceedMythProgressive Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I think that we need to be more aware of how we are all interconnected, and how we actually need to invest in safety nets and in education, and that we need to come to the realization that health care is a human right and try to provide that for people.” PeopleThinkingTryingCareSafetyRealizationHealth CareSafety Net Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I hope that if the people who read my work encounter people in the real world who are like the characters that I write about, that maybe that might make them feel empathy for those people. I know it sounds idealistic in a way, but I do hope that my work maybe changes some minds, and that my work makes readers see people as human that maybe before they read my work they might not have seen as humans, and those people include me and my family and my kids, people in my community.” PeopleWorldWritingMindRealCharacterKidsCommunityEmpathyMy FamilyReal World Author:Jesmyn Ward
“Black people in the US are told all the time, from all aspects, that they're nothing, that they're less than. And of course that bears fruit, but no one wants to shoulder part of the blame. A lot of people here can't see around their own family's history. They don't want to see that where they come from and the people they surround themselves with might have played a role in all this. This is all part of our national myth about the individual. We think that a lack of success comes from the individual not working hard enough. A lot of people in this country really believe that.” PeopleThinkingBelieveCountryEnoughIndividualBlackBlameMythSurroundBlack People Author:Jesmyn Ward
“There are things about the South - the politics, the classism, the racism - that I hate, and I want to be here to fight those things. I don't want to be in California or Michigan just complaining about them. I'm here trying to make a difference in the way I can, writing about it. And I want younger people, especially kids from my community, to see that being successful doesn't have to mean leaving a place like this. You don't have to trade in your family or your sense of belonging for that.” PeopleWritingTryingMeanKidsHateFightingCommunitySuccessfulRacismI HateTradeLeavingComplainingOur FamilyMaking A DifferenceBeing SuccessfulBelongingI Want YouClassism Author:Jesmyn Ward
“Most people just aren't clear-eyed about the rural South. We think that the urban centers are the problem, and the rural areas across the country are idyllic, suffused with good old American values, social values, religious values, moral values. It's what we tell ourselves to keep this political power structure in place, and it's what we see in pop culture, too.” PeopleThinkingCountryProblemPoliticalValuesCultureReligiousMoralUrbanPop CulturePolitical PowerMoral ValuesAmerican Values Author:Jesmyn Ward
“Living in the rural South, you sometimes feel trapped, like you don't have any options. It grinds people down, and of course it leads to substance abuse. I see it all around me. So many people in my family, probably more than 50 percent, have had substance abuse problems, either currently or in the past. It's so personal and immediate to me.” PeopleSometimesProblemPastLike YouMy FamilyAbuseGrindSubstance Abuse Author:Jesmyn Ward
“Some people think that Southern hip-hop doesn't have any depth. They think it's just noise, all about people having a good time in the club. And some of it doesn't have a lot of depth, it's true, but some does. I wanted to work against that stereotype. These are verses by Southern artists who are really wrestling with what it means to be here, young black men who are trying to figure out how to live in the South. So I wanted the epigraphs in my novels to reflect that.” PeopleThinkingMenTryingMeanArtistBlackNovelGood TimesWrestlingSouthernVersesStereotypeHaving A Good Time Author:Jesmyn Ward
“I feel like the kind of people I write about are the kind of people I grew up with, the families that I know in my community. Most everyone is working-class, and there are some intact families, but a lot of families aren't.” PeopleKnowsFeelsWritingKindCommunityClassGrewGrew UpWorking Class Author:Jesmyn Ward
“That's why I write fiction, because I want to write these stories that people will read and find universal.” PeopleWantWritingStoriesFictionUniversal Author:Jesmyn Ward
