When writing stops, we wither

You cannot legislate or regulate or discriminate against imagination.

I hereby declare that anyone has the right to write about anyone and anything they want to.

You cannot legislate or regulate or discriminate against imagination.

Sticks and stones will indeed break your bones. But names will never hurt you … unless you let them.

If someone comes at me and aims a rifle at my belly, and if they shoot me in my belly, there is nothing I can do about it. That bullet is going to go inside of me, and I am going to die.

But if they come at me and call me this or label me that, absolutely nothing whatsoever will happen inside of me. Unless I let it.

And if that’s my privilege, then that is everyone’s privilege. And if you are denying someone’s privilege, then you are on the wrong side of history.

And I am not so stupid as to think that it’s fair that white people get paid more to write about brown people than brown people get paid to write about brown people.

But what I do think is that if a yellow person wants to write a song or a poem or a book or a play or a script about a red person, then it doesn’t matter what the white, the yellow, or the brown think about it.

Because you cannot deny someone else their imagination.

And did you know that I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou was banned because it promoted “bitterness and hatred toward white people?” And did you know that To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee was banned because it portrayed Atticus Finch as a “white savior?”

And if I say something and I don’t get put in handcuffs and someone else says the same thing and they do, that is not fair, and that may be my privilege, but it might not, and either way, we can both imagine what we want to imagine, and we can both write down what we imagine, and nothing in the world can stop either of us, except the death of our bodies.

Which is why we write.

Because we want to leave evidence that we were only ever our bodies for a while, but the energy within us is forever.

And did you know that The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir was banned in Spain for promoting feminism?

And if you say I can’t write something because of who I am, and if I say you can’t write something because of who you are, then we are both wrong.

Because empathy is Person A putting themselves in Person B’s situation as far as their imagination will let them go, and how the hell are they supposed to do that if you won’t allow them their imagination? And who are you to try and deny anyone’s imagination?

Now, you don’t have to like what I write. And I don’t have to like what you write. And neither of us has to like that the other wrote what the other wrote. And I don’t have to read what you wrote. And you don’t have to read what I wrote. But we certainly shouldn’t go complaining about what the other wrote if we didn’t read what the other wrote. See how that works?

You can turn off a television.

You can turn off a radio.

You can close a book.

You can leave a movie theater.

It’s amazing.

If someone has ideas you don’t like, guess what? You don’t have to listen, or pay attention.

And did you know that the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling was banned for using magic, witchcraft, and the occult? And that it was also later challenged because people believe the author is anti-trans?

Now, I am not so stupid as to think money has nothing to do with any of this. Money has nearly everything to do with this. But only when it comes to what does and doesn’t get given money, and what does and doesn’t make money for someone.

And did you know that Brave New World by Aldous Huxley was banned not for excoriating techno-capitalism but because it was against the “traditional” family and religion (Ireland), and also pornographic (India)?

Spend your money on what you like. Go ahead. That’s fine. You don’t want to buy a book written by a brown person about a white person? Don’t. You don’t want to buy a book written by a straight person about a gay person? Don’t. You don’t want to buy a book by an old person writing about a young person?

Caught you there, didn’t I?

Because you don’t think about ALL the prejudices. You only like to think about the ones that you like to think about.

Do you know whether the authors you love and hate have disabilities or not, and whether or not they do or don’t write about people with disabilities?

I bet 98 goddamn percent of you have no idea.

And can a rich person write about a poor person?

You better hope so, otherwise there ain’t gon’ be no books in the library for you to read.

And did you know that Animal Farm by George Orwell was banned in the UAE for featuring a talking pig, in Kenya for its focus on corruption, and in Cuba for negatively representing communism?

Let’s remind you and us and me and we about something: anyone can write anything they want about anyone and anything they want.

That’s not where the battle will be fought.

You cannot legislate or regulate or discriminate against imagination.

And did you know that The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown was banned in Lebanon for being offensive to Christians?

The answer to the question, “Who gets to tell this story?” is, anyone who wants to.

And the answer to, “Who gets to read this story?” is, anyone who wants to.

Now, the question of who gets to teach this story is, I admit, a different question.

We live in a society, and compromise is the fuel that societies run on, so we’re going to have to decide that third question together.

I subscribe to the “tie goes to the runner” and “the call on the field stands” school of thinking on this one. In other words, unless we as a society conclusively decide together that a story shouldn’t be taught within our walls, the default is that it can — provided the reasoning is defensible and repeatable. In other words, no ad hoc subjectivities. Codify the standards, codify the exceptions, and keep the line moving.

And did you know that Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night was banned for promoting homesexuality and featuring cross-dressing? And did you know that Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe was the most challenged book of 2022?

If equality is everyone having an equal chance to write their story, and equity is everyone getting the specific chance they need to write their specific story, then I agree with both.

If you have pencil and paper and I do not, we can both write our stories, and I do not need pencil and paper the likes of yours. I will be Han-Shan and write mine on cave walls with pointed rocks.

And when I say “write” I do not even mean the physical act of writing, because not every body (space intentional) has the eyes and arms and hands and fingers to do that particular kind of work, and not every mind has the capabilities of driving that particular kind of work, and that’s something the identity politics police often forget about, but what I’m talking about when I talk about “writing” is “a style or form of composition” and “the art, style, etc. of literary composition” and “the activity of creating stories, poems, or articles,” which can happen any way the writer can make it happen.

And we are a world of states.

But where are the boundaries of the state? Of each state, and every state?

In the state of my family’s house, we do not ban reading, and we do not read all writing. And it is true that we do not buy what we do not believe in, but it is also true that we check out from the library what we’re not sure about, so that we may read without risk of inadvertent and misguided subsidization.

In the US, where I am a citizen, Texas has banned the most books, and California the least. I live in California. My wife lives with me in California. We moved back to California to raise our daughter in California. Our daughter lives in California.

And did you know that All the Rivers by Dorit Rabinyan was banned in Israel for depicting a romantic Arab-Jewish relationship?

Ignorance is often humanity’s default setting, and anger, our energy. And we get angry at what we don’t understand, and we are scared by what we don’t understand, and we get angry at what scares us.

And when we are angry, we are dangerous.

In February of 1989, 10,000 people gathered to protest Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses. Shortly thereafter, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called for Rushdie and his publishers to be killed. Hitoshi Igarashi, who translated the book in Japan, was murdered. Ettore Capriolo, who translated the book in Italy, was stabbed in an attack. William Nygaard, who published the book in Norway, was shot in the back. 37 people died in an arson attack on a Turkish hotel. It had been an attempt to kill Aziz Nesin, who translated the book for Turkey. Rushdie himself recently lost an eye in a stabbing attack.

To die for your imagination?

This is not acceptable.

I hereby declare that anyone has the right to write about anyone and anything they want to.

You cannot legislate or regulate or discriminate against imagination.

“And what if you track down these men and kill them, what if you killed all of us? From every corner of Europe, hundreds, thousands would rise up to take our places. Even Nazis can’t kill that fast.”

This line is spoken by a character named Victor László in the movie Casablanca. A movie based on a play written by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison, with a script written through a collaboration between the writers Casey Robinson, Julius and Philip Epstein, and Howard Koch.

When it comes to any one of us writing about anyone and anything we want to write about, nothing can kill us fast enough.

And yes, of course I have indirectly alluded to American Dirt several times during this piece.

And this is something that writer and editor Daniel Olivas had to say about American Dirt, when writing about the book in the Guardian:

“American Dirt is an insult to Latinx writers who have toiled — some of us for decades — to little notice of major publishers and book reviewers, while building a vast collection of breathtaking, authentic literature often published by university and independent presses on shoestring budgets. And while the folks who run Flatiron Books have every right to pay seven figures to buy and publish a book like American Dirt, they have no immunity from bad reviews and valid criticism. It’s not that we think only Latinx writers should write Latinx-themed books. No, this is not about censorship. A talented writer who does the hard work can create convincing, powerful works of literature about other cultures. That’s called art. American Dirt is not art.”

And that is how it works. Read it, or don’t. Criticize it, or don’t. Buy it, or don’t. But don’t stop it. When writing stops, we wither.

Sandra Newman has written a new novel called Julia. It is a kind of retelling of 1984. Whereas Winston Smith was the central protaganist in the original, Julia is told from the perspective of Winston Smith’s love interest, Julia. Her job is to “fix” fiction so as to ensure a coherent and consistent “official” narrative of Oceania.

In other words, writing is dangerous because it is created by the imagination, for the imagination.

Be dangerous. Stay free.