S7 Ep. 19: American Fiction: Jacinda Townsend and James Bernard Short on the Joy, Pathos, and Complexity of Black Experience in the Oscar-Nominated Film

Novelist Jacinda Townsend and writer James Bernard Short join co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the movie American Fiction, which is based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett. Townsend and Short discuss how the film addresses race in the publishing industry via its central character, Black author Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, who tries to make an ironic point by writing a book exploiting Black stereotypes and finds, to his dismay, that it’s received in earnest and a bestseller. Townsend and Short analyze director Cord Jefferson’s approach and the film’s themes of family dysfunction, freedom in storytelling, and the importance of portraying the complexity of Black lives. 

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This episode of the podcast was produced by Anne Kniggendorf.

Jacinda Townsend

Mother Country

Saint Monkey

James Bernard Short

“Aqua Boogie” | Blood Orange Review

“Rootwork” | Blood Orange Review

“Flash, Back: Langston Hughes’ The Simple Shorts” | SmokeLong Quarterly

Others:

American Fiction (movie) | Official Trailer

Erasure by Percival Everett

An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead

Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead

Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

Thelonious Monk

Ralph Ellison

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

“The Little Man at Chehaw Station” by Ralph Ellison | The American Scholar, 1978

The Tuskegee Institute

White Negroes by Lauren Michele Jackson

“The White Negro” by Norman Mailer | Dissent, 1957

“Dragon Slayers” by Jerald Walker | The Iowa Review, 2006

“The Hidden Lesson of ‘American Fiction’” by John McWhorter | The New York Times

Origin (movie) | Official Trailer

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 1, Episode 11, “Annihilation, Adaptation: What's It Really Like to Have Your Book Made Into a Movie”

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 2, Episode 11, “Brit Bennett and Emily Halpern on Screenwriting’s Tips for Fiction”

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 33, “The Stakes of the Writers’ Strike: Benjamin Percy on the WGA Walkout, Streaming, and the Survival of Screenwriting”

Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 38, “Jacinda Townsend on Why Democrats Are Skeptical of President Biden—and How He Can Win Them Back”

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