Bookshelfie: Women’s Prize Podcast - S4 Ep10: Bookshelfie: Malorie Blackman

Episode Date: March 10, 2022

In a special episode to mark International Women’s Day 2022, multi-award winning author, screenwriter and playwright Malorie Blackman OBE joins host Zawe Ashton to tell her why writing about black joy is so important to her.   After being discouraged from being a teacher because of the colour of her skin, Malorie went on to write over 70 children’s, YA and picture books (some of which have been adapted into hugely successful TV dramas and stage plays), and was the first black Children’s Laureate between 2013 and 2015. As she tells Zawe, the omission of black characters from the books she read as a child fueled her fire, and despite receiving over 80 rejection letters on her writing journey, she persevered. For many readers of colour, her work has allowed them to finally see themselves in literature, and her Noughts and Crosses series of six titles and three novellas are now considered one of the most substantial contributions ever to be made to young adult fiction.   Malorie’s book choices are:  ** Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë  ** Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier ** The Color Purple by Alice Walker ** The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison  ** The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor   Zawe Ashton, acclaimed actress, director, playwright and author, hosts this special edition of the chart-topping Women’s Prize for Fiction Podcast. The new Women’s Prize Podcast season continues to celebrate the best fiction written by women, by interviewing inspirational women about the books that have most influenced their life and career.   This podcast is sponsored by Baileys and produced by Bird Lime Media. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

At Harrison Health Care, we know that lasting health starts with personalized care. We're not just a clinic. We're your partner in prevention, helping you achieve your health and longevity goals. Our expert team combines evidence-based medicine with the compassionate, unhurried care you and your family deserve. Today and for many years to come. When it comes to your health, you shouldn't settle for anything less than exceptional. Visit Harrisonhealthcare.ca.ca.com.com.com. I'm going to try not to cry. This is ridiculous. This is absolutely ridiculous, but this is what happens when you do actually meet your idols. Either they disappoint you or you disappoint yourself.

Well, I'll probably just disappoint myself and try not to cry. But you are, you're a real hero. This is burning. Oh my gosh. Oh, that's so lovely of you. Mine too. With thanks to Bayleys, this is the Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast, celebrating women's writing, sharing our creativity, our voices and our perspectives, all while championing the very best fiction written by women around the world. Hello, I'm Zawi Ashton, and this is a very special edition of the Women's Prize podcast recorded for International Women's Day, 2022. My guest today is unbelievably special. She has sold millions of books around the world.

She is a trailblazing, multi-award winning, including a brailleux. after, author and OBE. She is Mallory Blackman. Mallory, the first ever black woman to become children's laureate, is the author of well over 70 novels, short stories and picture books for children and young adults. After being told by a career's advisor that she couldn't be an English teacher because she was black, Mallory studied computer science and became a systems programmer instead. She brought this knowledge with her when the time came to see.

start her authoring journey, most notably in her first novel, Hacker, which is when I first discovered her age, I think about eight, and later her epic masterpiece of speculative fiction Nauts and Crosses, set in an alternative 21st century Britain in which native Africans have colonised Europe rather than the other way around. Nauts and Crosses became a bestseller, winning numerous awards and inspiring adaptations for radio stage and television. It's an incredible series of six titles and three novellas that are still considered one of the most substantial contributions ever to be made to young adult fiction and they turned 20 years old last year. It's my absolute pleasure to be introducing this author and to be speaking with her today.

I don't know that I would have become a writer or a performer or even considered myself allowed to be a creative professional person unless I had encountered Mallory Blackman at such a formative time. I know so many listeners will feel the same. It's my pleasure to introduce Mallory Blackman. Welcome Mallory to the podcast. Well, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us today for this extremely special iconic for me episode. Oh, well, it's really lovely of you to say so. I mean, you know, more, more. You've asked for more, so I'm going to give you a bit more.

Mallory, I'm really not sure how to contain my excitement at speaking to you in person today. And do forgive me if I don't manage to contain it. You are genuinely a hero of mine. I know you're a self-confessed comic book, sci-fi geek, so it will delight you to know. that I see you as a superhero with extremely special powers. What would my powers be? Your powers are just changing the lives of people, which is, I would say, akin to something like invisibility.

You have written over 70 wildly successful books for children and young adults, multiple screenplays for TV, stage and radio. you're an OBE, a national treasure by way of Barbados, Clapham and Bromley. And after surviving some flat-out racist career advice in your formative years, which we'll get into later, discouraging you from pursuing a career as an English teacher, because of the colour of your skin, you have had what we refer to as the last and loudest laugh

because you have, this is literally the letter that I wrote just in case I met you one day. So please let me get to the end. I'm so sorry to gush. But you've had the last and loudest laugh because you have made the world your classroom and managed to touch so many millions of young people's lives with your work and the imagination and empathy that lives in your exquisite writing. You have been one of my greatest teachers. I suppose I start crying.

Sorry. Oh my goodness, sorry about that. Oh, gosh, I'm choking up here, seriously. Oh, sorry. Oh, I've got a good start to this, isn't it? Oh, my gosh. But it's so true. And I know I speak for so many who've read your work when I say that.

And when I interviewed the novelist Candice Carty Williams for the first episode of this series, she and I literally both had to take a reverent moment of silence when we summoned your name as one of the authors who shaped her because she had chosen noughts and crosses as her second bookshelfy choice and when we referred to you we just had to refer to you as Queen Mallory, Queen Mallory because the esteem with which you're held by those that you've touched with your work honestly is so enormous specifically if not especially among the readers of colour who found you at a formative time in their lives. You know, I know Stormy is obsessed with you and he and Tiny Temperre both immortalised you in song lyrics and you will be past your memoir.

Isn't that amazing? That's one of the more bizarre moments in my life actually because it's one of those things where I didn't know about either of them until they happened. And I called my daughter to listen to Tiny Temper. And then she was like, oh my God. And then when Stormsy gave me a name check in one of his songs, and I didn't tell my daughter, I just said, listen to this Stormsy song. So she was listening. And then when he mentioned my name and her eyes just, you know, so wide.

And then she looked at me, she said, does he know how uncool you are? Which is kind of, you know. And I thought, no, it doesn't thankfully. But, you know, but I just, it's so lovely of you to say all that. Gosh, it really did choke me up there, you know. But it is lovely. because it's just one of those things where I sort of come up to my attic and I sort of sit down and I write. And when you write a book, you never know how it's going to be received, whether it's going to sink or swim, or is it going to do well or is it going to sell like stones?

And so, you know, but it's just, it's one of those things where I just, I just have to keep going. Whether it works or it doesn't, it's just, I need to write. I need to let it out and communicate. And it's my way of trying to communicate and connect. with other people, I guess. Well, you have done that. So thank you for your very kind words. No, honestly, Mallory, because when I was eight, I read Hacker, your first novel.

And I had never ever, I'm sure you hear this all the time, read a book with a black family at the center of it, let alone a middle class black family, right? And the particular book cover I had was quite ambiguous. So it wasn't until I saw a headshot of you on the sleeve of the book at the back that I had this aha moment and I thought, wow, okay, now I have permission to imagine the family at the center of this story as black and your brilliant central protagonist Vicky as black. And that is what understanding your identity as the author allowed me to do. And what's tragic and so dangerous is that even at a young age, the presumption. or assumption was already that I had to read through an exclusively white lens until instructed otherwise. And so Hacker was the book that I could use, to use a brilliant quote I heard from you actually, I could use as a window as well as a mirror.

It course corrected my reading life and probably just my life. So that's the thank you out of the way. Are you aware of the profundity of your own literary legacy, Mallory Blackman? Or are you just saying, I don't know what all the fuss is about, really. Well, it tends more towards a latter, quite frankly. But that said, I do understand how important representation is, how important it is to see yourself in literature and see yourself in the films you're watching and the TV programs you're watching

and in the books you're reading and in the music you're listening to. you know, representation matters. And quite frankly, it's lovely of you to say that about kind of when you've read Hacker because I had a similar moment where I've been writing for my entire life. I always loved writing stories and poems, but they were for my own amusement. And it wasn't until I read the colour purple by Alice Walker when I was 21 or 22, that it actually occurred to me that, oh, there are books out there written by black people. And that was what planted the seed that maybe I too could become a published author.

Because before that moment, it had never, ever occurred to me because I had never seen it represented. If you're just used to seeing yourself represented wherever you go, I don't think you can kind of appreciate just what it means to not see yourself, how invisible you feel, how almost irrelevant you feel, because it's almost like you're not worthy of documentation, you're not worthy of inhabiting stories and poems and so forth. And you kind of internalised that. I mean, I know I think I did when I was growing up. And it's unbelievable that you would get to your 20s having not seen yourself or felt visible

because you as a child, Mallory, were a ferocious reader. Indeed, yes. You would live in your local library. you were probably reading 10 times more than the average child. What was it about books, even though you weren't finding this sense of belonging necessarily? What was it that kept you ferociously reading? Was it a sense of belonging even though there weren't these direct representations for you? What it was was a sense of our shared humanity.

It was reading stories where I could empathise as well. sympathize with the characters that I was reading about, even though they didn't look like me. I think fiction is a brilliant conduit, if you like, of a way of kind of connecting and communicating with others because it makes you feel that you're not alone, that others understand how you might feel in any particular situation. But that said, it gave me a sense of shared humanity,

but it's anyone who tells you that children don't notice these things if they can't see themselves in books is, you know, deluding themselves because this child absolutely did. It did feel to me like there was a kind of feast going on, and if you were white, you could pull up a chair, and if you were black, you had to stand back and watch everybody else eat in the world of literature. And it was a world that I loved, but it really did feel that it was not a world that loved me

because I was not part of that world. And so what I would do is I would read things like, you know, Narnia stories or the chalet stories or whatever, and imagine myself in those stories, and imagine myself in those worlds, but it's not the same. And it's not to say, you know, that I didn't appreciate those stories. Of course I did. But the point is there absolutely should be a range of stories.

It speaks to diversity. It speaks to inclusion. It's about white people, white children and white teens, being able to read about people outside of their own experience and culture and color. And we should all have that opportunity to read outside of our own life. because I do think that that's what engenders empathy and sympathy and understanding with others because otherwise there's a vacuum that then people fill with misinformation.

Oh, goodness, you're so right. Everyone can gain from empathy by proximity. I love that. Take George Floyd, for example, and what happened to George Floyd. The reason that I think that was kind of a catalyst is because the fact that somebody filmed, the whole sort of nine minutes of Chauvin kneeling on his neck. And you actually saw that.

And if that didn't kind of move you, whoever you are, whatever your background, then nothing would. And that I feel is kind of like a very visceral and immediate kind of way of just feeling what poor George Floyd must have been feeling when he's saying, I can't breathe, I can't breathe. And I just think that that's what the best in literature does.

It allows us to walk. for a while in someone else's shoes and it allows us to inhabit their lives and not just looking through a window at them but actually being them. I think the very best literature for me makes me feel like I am part and parcel of that story. I am in that character's shoes. I am feeling as they are feeling and that's why I feel it's so important that our literature is diverse and our literature is inclusive so that then it will teach our children and our teens to learn to empathise with others. And God knows, I think we need a lot more of that. When I sat down, I thought, I want to write and I had no clue how to go about it, how to do it, who I was going

to write for, was I going to write for adults, or was I going to write for children? Was I going to write in a particular genre or whatever? And it seemed to me that I love the depth of imagination that you could have when writing children's books and team books. I have heard you say that part of your impetus for writing for younger children and young adults was also to replace those books that you felt that you missed out on as young Mallory. Indeed, yes. It was a way of placing myself front and centre in all the adventures I'd love to have read as a child, which just happened to feature black children and which were not overtly about race.

Because that's the other thing. There was this feeling, especially when I first started writing, where I had a number of people, including some friends, who said, you should be writing about racism. You should be writing about, why aren't you writing about racism? And I thought, you know what, there is more to the black experience than just race. Why are we not allowed to go for a wardrobe into another world? Why are we not allowed to fly or being visible or have adventures

or have friends go missing and we have to find them? And I kind of thought, I want to just write stories that feature black children that don't have anything overtly to do with race. race, it's just children being children and having adventures. Even when I was getting criticism for not writing about racism, I kind of thought, you know what, I can only be true to myself, as Polonia says in Hamlet. So I just thought, no, I'm going to write the stories that I'd love to have read as a child. So your first bookshelfy choice is Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

I love this book. For anyone who hasn't read it, this revolutionary piece of prose earned Charlotte Bronte. the title of First Historian of the Private Consciousness, because it was the first novel to focus on the protagonist's moral and spiritual development through the use of first-person narration. Jane Eyre grows up in the home of a cruel aunt enduring loneliness and her troubled childhood strengthens her natural independence and spirit, which proves necessary when she finds employment at Thornfield Hall as a governess to the young ward of the brooding Mr. Rochester, as she starts. to develop feelings for him, Jane gradually uncovers Thornfield Hall's terrible secret, forcing her to make a choice should she stay with Rochester and live with the consequences or follow her convictions, even if it means leaving the man she loves. This book was given to you by a public librarian at a tender age of 11.

What did you love about it? That's a young age to read Jane Eyre. It was, but I kind of read everything in the children's library, so I have to have a little. had to go on to the adult library and I guess that, you know, and by the which time I knew the librarians like, you know, old friends. And so, you know, this was one of the first kind of books I was given from the adult library to read. And I remember sort of reading the first couple of chapters and thinking, well, this book is really dry. I'm not enjoying this. And the more I read, the deeper I got drawn into it until I think I finished it in a couple of days. And as soon as

I'd finished reading it, I immediately turned to the first page and started it again. Because I loved it so much. And I love the fact that, you know, Jane Eyre is, she's, by her own admission, she's not pretty, she's not terribly clever. But what she does have is she has strength of character. Even though she's not rich, she stands up for herself. And I just love that. If you're not fortunate enough to be born kind of beautiful or rich or whatever, then you know you have to rely on your smarts and you have to rely on your character to kind of get you through things. She must have been in her late teens or early 20s at the very oldest. And so for me she's kind of, she was a very young spirit in the book.

And again, that spoke to me as well. I just felt it was an amazing, amazing book where I could not predict what was going to happen. It's such a special book and she is a very special heroine. Is it equally important to you, Mallory, that your own female characters have this kind of inner strength? What kind of messages do you try to send to your female audiences? Because your female protagonists are unbelievable. I wonder what drives you when you get into these female characters that you've written over your career. I think what it is is I want to present real three-dimensional characters.

I want you to read them and believe them. And that means presenting them warts and all. And I do like strong characters, but you know what? We're all vulnerable. We all have those moments where we don't know which way is up. We don't know which way to turn. We have those moments where we cry. And whether we cry alone or whether we cry in front of other people,

we do have those moments. And there's nothing wrong with that. And that's why I don't want to write characters who are strong in the face of adversity no matter what. Because for me, A, that strikes me as slightly, unbelievable and be, if you're strong no matter what, then what do you have to say to me? Because I'm definitely not strong no matter what. And so I'd rather read about or hear from somebody who is more like me in that sense so that then I can see how they cope with whatever situation they are in rather than someone who fears nothing rises to the occasion on

every single time and so forth. And I mean, if you're writing that kind of character, then for me I would have a sidekick who is more human. I would have someone, a friend or something, who is more relatable. But if I am writing about women in particular and men, you know, because I've written books from a male perspective and a male point of view. And again, it's about showing you don't have to be strong all the time. Yes, my characters, I hope, have resilience. I would say more resilience than strength.

Absolutely. They get through things. But I don't think I would believe in a character who was just, strong all the time. Tell me about you as a young Mallory. What were you like as a child as a young girl? Oh, I was a daydreamer. I lived in my head a lot. I'd make up stories. What if I was invisible? What if I could fly? What if I was suddenly 50 metres tall? What if I could suddenly woke up and I was on another planet? And it was a long walk to school. So I would just kind of play what if games. And I was also kind of a middle child. I've never been afraid of my own company, which which is probably why, you know,

writing suits me. So I would just make up stories that I used to write in my school books. And I was very lucky with my English teachers because none of them said stop wasting school paper, but they would mark them and comment and give me feedback. So that was good. But again, you know, all that time writing stories and poems, and again, it never occurred to me that I could be a writer. It was never suggested to me that I could be a writer. But that said, I would get told off mainly for two things at school, all through my school life. And that was my loud laugh and daydreaming. So that's kind of, I guess, the kind of child I was. I love that, Mallory. And that's so alive in what you write. That daydreaming quality, I think,

it's so important never to let go of, no matter how many bad school reports you get, as I know for myself as an age-old daydream of it as well. Your second bookshelfy choice is Rebecca by Daphne Dumarie. This is a best-selling story of death, deceit, justice and love, one that has never gone out of print and has been adopted several times for stage and screen. It's 1940 film adaptation directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Lawrence Olivier and Jane Fontaine won the Academy Award for Best Picture. This is such a chilling atmospheric novel. It was written in 1938 and is mostly made up of flashbacks in which an unnamed author is whisked from her home. to the brooding Mandalay estate on the Cornish coast by her new husband, a widower, Maxim de Winter.

We soon discover the memory of his dead wife, Rebecca, is not quite yet gone and is forever kept alive by the forbidding and sinister housekeeper Mrs. Danvers. Only when a sailing ship is washed ashore is the truth about Rebecca's death revealed. I mean, I read somewhere, not since Jane Eyre has a heroine face such difficulty with the other woman. So you're too, Oh, there's a theme that's developing, isn't there? There's a theme developing, Mallory. It's not a therapy session,

but I do sometimes string these together. This was another book that was given to you by a librarian. I mean, God bless these librarians. They must have just zoned in on you and thought, there is a mind for molding. Why did it resonate with you? I think it was the first. book I read where the protagonist wasn't actually present in the book, but she had such an

influence over everybody else's lives in the book. It was like she was omnipresent, even though she was dead. What I loved about it was the fact that you kind of feel that when you're reading it, that Max is one type of character. And as his wife, I don't think she's ever given a name. As she learns more and more about Rebecca, and Max's life with Rebecca, she's learning about her husband as she learns about Rebecca. And I don't want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't read it,

but if you haven't read it, go out there and get a copy. I think the final revelation about Rebecca and what she drove Max to and then Rebecca's final laugh at everyone, I just thought was so brilliantly revealed and so amazing to read. And that's another book where I thought, and had to read it again.

And I just love the way that it worked. And I do love books that have, you know, a particular point of view or kind of slightly different in format or form. And I think, you know, with that story, as I said, it was the first one I'd read where the protagonist isn't there, but she does have such an influence. And that book certainly had an influence on me, definitely. It's such a brilliant book.

I didn't realize that Daphne also really struggled at the beginning of her career. I mean, she was a woman writing at a certain time, so that was unfortunately a given. But if she hadn't persevered, we wouldn't have this brilliant book. And you yourself, Mallory, I mean, you came up against, is it 82 rejection letters before your first publication at the age of 28? I mean, what kept that authoring light inside of you burning when you're working as a as a systems programmer and you're trying to get published, what keeps you going? I think it was a yearning to be an author.

It was a yearning to be a writer. It was a yearning to be a published author. It was almost this kind of compulsion in that I felt I had stories to tell and I needed to keep telling them. I did make a deal with myself that I'd wait until I had my thousand projection letter before I kind of even thought about giving up. And luckily for me, I only got to 82. But I just, I'm very lucky.

And I know I am in that I found the thing that just suits me. I've found a career, the job, the profession that suits me down to the ground. And there's so many people where their job is a means to an end. It's to put kind of food on the table and keep a roof over their heads. With me, whether I got published or not, I would never have stopped writing. Because once I started writing with a view to kind of being published, then it would have been, okay, I'll put this one. one in a bottom drawer onto the next one.

Okay, this one didn't work. I'll put this in a bottom draw onto the next one. And I would have just kept doing that. But what I did as well, because I had no clue, is I started doing writing courses at the city lit in London. And that's an amazing place because they have so many

creative courses. When I first started, I did a ways into writing course, which is a course for absolute beginners, and I would not read my stuff out. I would do the assignments and I would bring them in, I just would just never read them out. One time she got exhaust spread into

and she turned to me and she said, Mallory, do you want to be a published writer? And I said, more than anything else in this world. And she looked at me and she said, well, you're going to have to shit or get off the pot, love. And it was the best piece of advice. I mean, at the time I was mortified because the whole class cracked up laughing.

And I kind of was laughing too, but thinking, oh, but, you know, and I just thought, you know what, she is so right. Because either I'm an author or I'm just pretending to be one. And the point of being an author is you've got to share your work. You've got to let people see it. Otherwise, you might as well just stay at home and do your own thing and put it in a bottom drawer or keep it on your computer or whatever.

So after that, I started reading my stuff out. And that's been my philosophy ever since. If you're going to do something, just do it. So to that tutor, thank you so much because, you know, that's the, I think that's a kick up the bum I needed, quite frankly. That helped me on my journey. And then I did a writing for women workshop and I did a writing science fiction class of Lisa Tottle. And I, you know, all classes I did at the city lid still trying to find my voice, still trying to find what I wanted to write.

And then I did a writing for children class. And that's when it clicked in my head that this is what I want to do. I want to write for children. That for me was my way into publishing. I see my first 50-60 rejection letters as serving my apprenticeship because I was so ill-disciplined when I started. I mean, I would write a story and then type the end and correct the typos and things and send it off

because that was my enthusiasm running away with me. And then it was only after a while I thought, no, put it to one side, work on something else, then come back to it, and hone it and work on it and rewrite and edit it properly. And when I started doing that, the quality of my rejection letters began to change. Because then I started getting rejection letters where editors would tell me why they were rejecting the book rather than a flat out. This is not suitable for our list.

And I took that as an encouraging sign because if they were taking the trouble to tell me why my story wasn't working, then I felt I had to be getting better. So to all those editors out there who kind of took the time and trouble to kind of tell me why my stories weren't working. Thank you. Gosh, Mallory, you can find optimism anywhere. If you are out there and listening and you are the next Mallory Blackman, listen, these are words to live by. The podcast is made in partnership with Bailey's Irish Queen. Baileys is proudly supporting the Women's Prize for Fiction

by helping showcase incredible writing by remarkable women, celebrating their accomplishments and getting more of their books into the hands of more people. Bayleys is the perfect. adult treat, whether in coffee, over ice cream, or paired with your favourite book. Enjoying the Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast, share the literary love and be a part of the future of the Women's Prize Trust by supporting our charitable programs for writers and readers. Donations of all sizes help us to continue empowering women, regardless of their age, race,

nationality or background to raise their voice and own their story. Search for Support the Women's Prize to find out more. Mallory, your third bookshelfy is a choice that you have said earlier was a defining, defining moment for you. And it is the colour purple by Alice Walker. This is the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that made Alice Walker a household name, set in the deep rural south in the first half of the 20th century. The colour purple is the redemptive tale of Seeley, a young black girl born into poverty and segregation who is writing letters to God,

raped repeatedly by the man she calls father. She bears two children that are taken from her against her will. She is also separated from her beloved sister Nettie, when she's forced into an arranged marriage with the abusive man we only ever know as Mr. When Seeley befriends a glamorous singer Shug Avery, it's the closest proximity she's had to a woman in charge of her own destiny. And gradually we see Seeley disenfranchise. discovering the power and joy of her own spirit. This book was a profound turning point for you,

wasn't it, Mallory? Tell us about how this book fell into your hands and what happened next. Well, this is a book I discovered for myself in the black bookshop in Islington. Oh, that was such a fortuitous discovery because I walked past this book shop and thought, oh, okay, and went in there. And after that, after paying my mortgage and buying food, that's where all my money went, sort of in the black book shop and I kind of bought up every week I'd be down there buying up more books and non-fiction and fiction alike

and the colour purple was one of the first ones I had because as you said it won the Pulitzer and so on so I thought I must read this and it was oh my God what a revelation because as you said it's such a celebration of black womanhood of sisterhood of kind of women having to look after each other

it's not an easy read. It's not a particularly joyous read, certainly not until the end. But I loved Shug Avery's character. I love the friendship and the connection between, you know, Seedy and Shug. And I just, it was such an amazing work.

I read that. And again, that's another one of those books. So I thought, I've got to read this again. And it was an inspiration in that I thought, oh my God, you know,

there are black writers out there and there are black women writers out there. And if there are black women writers out there who are being published, maybe I can be published too. And that was when, as I said earlier, the seed of that idea was planted in my head. Because before that, it never occurred to me that I could be a published writer. And in fact, when I started writing and I was getting all the rejection letters and Alice Walker came over to this country to kind of do a book signing at the Silver Moon Bookshop or Women's Booker. shopping Chang Cross Road at the time, which is sadly no more. But I queued up for two hours waiting to get my book signed and I got to the front of the queue and I said, please could you

write, don't give up. And she said, I can't write that. What does that mean? And I said, well, I really want to be a writer, but I'm getting all these rejection letters. And she looked at me, she said, don't you dare give up. And she actually wrote it in a book. Don't give up, Alice Walker. And I thought, well, I can't give up now. Alice Walker said so. You know, I've got to do what I'm told. So it was kind of like, especially if Alice Walker, tells me not to give up. So it was one of those things where I just thought, no, I'm going to keep going. I'm going to keep going because she was such a huge influence and I'm just really grateful I had the chance to actually meet her. It's one of those things in signings. You don't

get a chance to sit there and chat, but I would have fangled all over that woman. It was, because she had such an impact on my life. I mean, thank you, Alice Walker for creating Mallory Blackman and I'm just for being you yourself, of course. It's so interesting Alice Walker said that I've read that she wrote the colour purple as a longing to connect to the ancestors she knew existed but never met. That really struck a chord with me. I wonder if that strikes a chord for you, Mallory. You have this rich Bayesian heritage and your parents were part of the Windrush generation. And I wonder how the ancestors visit you in your writing, whether that's when you are in the process of writing or when you get the inspiration.

do they occupy your mind or your office space when you're starting to put these beautiful stories together? Oh, absolutely. I know this is going to sound weird, but I absolutely feel them kind of lifting me up when I fall or when I stumble. I absolutely feel them lifting me up when I think, oh, what's the point? And there was a time when I came really, really close to giving up. And I kind of feel that it was kind of this voice inside my head. And whether it was stubbornness or ancestors or whatever saying, no, keep going, keep going, keep going, you've got things to say, keep going. I edited an anthology called Unheard Voices.

You know, it was a collection of stories sensibly about slavery. And in the forward I said, you know, the thing is that as far as I'm concerned, with my heritage, I am descended from survivors. And so I have no right to then just quit and say, well, I can't do this or it's too. hard or whatever because too many people sacrificed too much for me to get to this point. And so how dare I think, you know, okay, it's too hard. I'm not going to do it anymore. And so I kind of feel that, you know, there have been kind of ancestors also giving me a kick up the bum when I needed it because there have been those moments. So I thought, oh God, you know, am I wasting my time here? And maybe I should just give up. Maybe I should just listen to everyone who says that I can't do this or I shouldn't do

this or I'll never get published because I don't publish black people in this country and so on. But, you know, so I kind of feel that it was my ancestor saying, don't you dare give up, you get on with it. And so it's about, okay, if I get 82 rejection letters, and that was over the course of like eight or nine books, then write a 10th one and write an 11th one until somebody says yes and keep going. It just felt to me like so many people had sacrificed through the years to get me to where I was that I didn't have the right to give up. It's beautiful. And of course, Seeley finds power in black female community.

And I wonder are there any female role models that have shaped you, Mallory? Is it Alice Walker or is there someone closer to home? Well, you know, Alice Walker, Myangelo, Tony Morrison, they've all shaped my life. They've all shaped my sort of thinking. But mainly, I think it's my sister definitely has had an influence. After being told at school that certain things weren't for her. but then she went on to get her degree and her MSC and she's a probation officer and she's amazing

and she's, you know, she's one of the smartest people I know. But I think the person who inspired me so much is my mum. My mum is an prime example of someone who keeps getting up and whatever happens, she gets up and she kind of gets on with it. And yes, you know, like we all do, she might rumble about it, but she gets on with it. And she's the one who I think who taught me kind of that resilience and that thing of you keep pushing and you keep moving

and you keep moving forward to try and get what you want. And so, you know, thank you, mum. So she really has been an influence. And what are your mum and sisters' names? My mum's Ruby and my sister's Wendy. Ruby and Wendy, thank you so much for being a resource for our national treasure, Mallory. And you, of course, are national treasures in your own right.

I feel like this moves me seamlessly onto another powerhouse of a woman, and that is your fourth bookshelfy choice by Tony Morrison, and it is The Bluest Eye. This is the debut novel by Nobel Prize winning author Tony Morrison. She was, of course, the first African-American woman ever to win the Nobel Prize for literature. The bluest eye takes place in post-depression, 1940s, Ohio, Morrison's own hometown. It tells the story of an 11-year-old African-American girl, Pocola breed love, deeply harmed by the perpetual racism she faces, as well as the physical and sexual abuse she receives at the hands of

her mother and father, which leave Pocola feeling less than human. The only thing that she associates with power and acceptance is whiteness, leading Pocola as her mental health deteriorates to pray each night to see the world through the bluest eye. This is an unbelievably searing novel and it was banned from many schools and libraries in the USA at the time of publication in 1970. Thankfully it sustained

and I mean it just remains unmatched as an unveiled account of the African American experience during the Depression. I never quite nowhere to start with this novel, Mallory. Tell me how this book influenced you. It was the first Tony Morrison book I read and the writing was so evocative

and lyrical and beautiful. It was so beautifully written, but it was heart-wrenching. It was, this poor girl goes through so much. And at the end, she's kind of like, she has gone crazy and she's kind of, the whole idea would be so much better if she had blue eyes. And why can't she have blue eyes?

And everything that's happening to her. I mean, the whole story is so bleak, but it's so beautifully told. It's a story that stayed with me, but it wasn't a book I was able to read twice. But I am very, very grateful to have read it the once. It was one of those books where I closed the book, absolutely stunned, and had to sit and kind of really kind of think about it for quite some time. And then what I did then is I went out and bought every other book that I could find by Tony Morrison.

So then I read Song of Solomon and Shuler and so on. And I find Tony Morrison such an intellectual powerhouse and such an amazing writer. And she's one of these people where you can't just kind of, you know, sit down and I let the story wash over you. You've got to be there. You've got to engage with it. It's interesting because, you know, with my choices, I don't want to kind of talk about the fifth one until we get there. But I think all these stories were formative. But they also made me think, yes, this is expressing a facet of the black.

experience. But I also, I want to read about Black Joy. I want to write about Black Joy. I want to write about and read about love stories and romance stories and sci-fi stories and adventure stories where it's not bleak at the end, where it's not a kind of basically life is shit and then you die kind of moment. Because I don't believe that. You know, I know in these times, especially with what's going on at the moment in the world, with Russia kind of invading Ukraine and so forth. I kind of think, gosh, we just never seem to get it together on this planet. But you have to have hope and you have to hope that things will get better

and we will learn from our mistakes eventually. And this will stop. But in the meantime, I think we do need books in all genres that have happy endings, have hopeful endings, have unhappy endings. But the bluest eyes certainly was a book. book for me that it felt like a punch in the face when I was reading it. And that's probably why I loved it because it was this idea, not to say that, you know, I want to be punched in a face. I hasten to act, but it was one of those things where it kind of stayed with me and it had an impact.

It had a real impact. I have to mention at this point, your epic, epic series, Nauts and Crosses, Mallory, which was 20 years old last year, which I just see as the most extraordinary milestone, because it really was life-changing when I read this book. There were things that were explored within this book, and Candice Carte Williams said the same thing when she chose it on her episode, is it gave us language that we didn't have for experiences that were very real. And I know that you've said you didn't necessarily write explicitly about race because just your presence and your character's presence was already political. Exactly. But this really was a response, wasn't it, to racism and to events in society and within your own personal life.

I wonder if you can just talk about Nautzen Crosses for a moment and where you feel at this point in time. with this milestone of its 20th anniversary? Well, you know, it was one of those things where, as I said, I was always being criticised about not writing about racism. And I hate being labelled and pigeonholed and boxed in. So I actively kicked against that. But when I had written 49 books and I thought, okay, I want to write something different for my 50th.

And I thought, and it was around the time of the Stephen Lawrence case and what was happening to him. and I watched a documentary about the way the family had been treated by the police. And it made me so angry. And then I thought, you know what, I want to write about this. And I was thinking originally I would write about slavery and the legacy of slavery, which is racism. And then the response from friends and colleagues was underwhelming to say the least. Because, you know, it was kind of from black friends, it was, why do you want to write about that?

It's so painful. And from white friends, it was, well, why do you want to write about that? it was so long ago. And it was kind of an interesting response where everyone felt they knew what was going to be in the book before I had written a single word. So then I thought, you know what? How can I do this so that I play with people's assumptions and presumptions about the book? And that's when the kind of idea occurred to me of this kind of reverse society where white people are the minority and white people are the ones who people assume they know all about them and their lives without even speaking to them. them, but I wanted to do it from the point of view of good friends, a nought and a cross.

And that's why I even called it Nauts and Crosses, because I didn't want people to read it initially and know what the conceit of the story was, that Callum was white and a nought, and SEPI was black and a cross. And Seffi has a very privileged background. She's the daughter of an MP, and Callum is the son of their housekeeper. So I wanted to play with that. And I remember, actually, when I gave a copy to my mum to read, And she phoned me up, really vexed.

And she said, I'm on page 60. She said, is Callum White or Black? And I said, he's white mum. She said, so the Nauts are White? I said, yes. She said, I thought it was the other way around. I said, no, Callum is white and Sethie's black. She said, now I'm going to have to start the whole story all over again.

And she put the phone down. I could crissed up laughing. And I thought that's exactly the response I wanted to get. Because obviously, whether it's a TV series or a play or something, you immediately see that Callum is white and Cephy is black. But when I originally wrote the book, I wanted to play with people's assumptions about the characters until you were way into it.

And just the fact that it was assumed that the rich girl had to be white and that the poor boy had to be black, I think it was exactly what I wanted to play with, all those assumptions. So, you know, so that's how Nautts and Crosses was born. And the very last one in that series, the sixth one called Endgame, came out last year.

And so it's been quite a journey. It's kind of a series of six novels and three novellas over 20 years. It was kind of one of those moments when I was writing my 50th book. I thought, okay, you want me to write about racism? Then, okay, I'll write about racism, but I'll do it my way. I don't want to follow anybody else's way of doing things or their stories. I want to do this my way. And that's how it was born.

Oh, I love that. I'm vexating Ruby in the process. Exactly. The only review you needed at that time. It was the best review you could have got. Honestly, Mallory, speaking to you is such a pleasure because I can hear in your aspect, I can hear inside of you or what I get from speaking to you is this overwhelming sense of hope. And it does infect all of your work.

I can sort of reread all of your work again in my mind and inflect it with, you know, the little bit of information that I'm getting today. There is always the hope at the core of you. your work, even when you're challenging the most huge subjects and challenging our own sense of internal racism, as you've said, with a series like Nauts and Crosses. I hope so. I hope so. I mean, the thing is about Nauts and crosses. It has a hopeful ending in that the hope is with the next generation. Yes. In the same way that my mum and dad came over to this country and they had to put up with a hell of a lot of crap in the hope that I would have it better. And my

hope is for my daughter has it better than I did kind of growing up especially and so on. So sometimes you put up with stuff because you have no choice, but your hope is that with you putting up with stuff, it means your children don't have to. So true. With the end of Nauts and Crosses, the hope is very much for the next generation and what will happen with the next generation. Your fifth and final book choice this week is the Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Nailer. This is the heralded first novel from Native New Yorker and Yale graduate Gloria Nala. The novel interconnects the deeply moving stories of seven courageous black women. Each has suffered knocks and setbacks. Each has lived a life defined by social injustice. Each has finally

found herself here behind the battered doors of an apartment block on Brewster Place. The women of Brewster Place are a vulnerable yet powerful female community, united in their resilience, humanity and the collective ambition for brighter futures. Mallory, this is a novel. I'm so glad I was able to grab and read it when I read it on your list. It was somewhat of a revelation for you when you read it. And why was that? Again, it's about sort of seven women who inhabit sort of Bruce Place is kind of this house that's kind of falling down really. but it's about their lives and what led them to that point. And again, it's about a community of black women

and black women supporting each other and black women connecting and communicating with each other. And some of the stories are harrowing and some are not and some are kind of uplifting. But what I loved about it was, again, giving a sense of place and purpose and a community of women in the same way that the colour purple did when Seeley discovered Shug and her relationship with Shug and so on. And I love that.

A while ago, when I first started writing, I'd go to literary functions and there'd be me and possibly one or two other people of colour. That would be it. But we would look at each other and we would nod at each other if we were across a room and couldn't immediately speak. And there was a connection there because we knew what it had taken to get into that room. and it's that kind of connection that is there

without having to say anything almost. It almost feels like you already know each other because you are sharing the same experience and what you had to do to get in that space. It's that connection, that immediate connection that you sometimes get. And I kind of felt that with the women of Brewster Place because they were supporting each other

and they were looking after each other. It's that implicit understanding without having to explain if you're talking to people who don't have your life experience, you can end up having to explain all the time. And sometimes it's just very tiring to kind of explain where you're coming from. And almost like having to kind of explain your life and so forth in a way that you don't with people who have a similar experience to you. And I kind of felt that the women of Bruce Deplace spoke to that connection

and that idea of black women supporting each other. and understanding each other and sometimes understanding each other without having to go into detail or explanation. You just say what's happened to you and someone understands. I'm very lucky. I mean, I have friends of kind of all persuasions and so forth, which is the way it should be, but I kind of feel there's a shorthand perhaps in the way

I can communicate with other black women, which means there's less explaining that needs to be done to explain how I'm feeling or what I'm going through or whatever. So, you know, so I kind of feel that that's what that book spoke to. I love that. And I love what you said about that wordless sense of knowing when you have a shared experience with anyone and not having to explain. And we're on such a cultural tipping point moment, Mallory, as we sort of talked about, but before we started this interview. And I wonder if not having to explain is part of how you.

you see our progress and the progress in the world of literature and any creative endeavor actually, is the progress not having to explain who you are and just being able to speak with the work? Is that the achievement that we're sort of looking for that I don't have to say Mallory Blackman, first ever Black children's laureate, I just say Mallory Blackman Children's Laureate, for example. Yeah. Is that the goal? You know, that's such an interesting question. Or actually is that part of the power?

I wonder what you think. I think the explanation, I guess, is part of the story, isn't it? It's part of the story that you're telling. It's part of the, let me tell you about my life. You tell me about yours. It's like the Marvin Gaye song, what's going on? And you know, you talk to me so you can see what's going on. That's what I'm trying to do with my books.

And I think it's one of those strange things where when I wrote Nauts and Crosses, I kind of thought, well, my hope is, that in 10 years, 20 years, whatever, people will look at this and think, well, you know, we've moved on from that. So this is kind of, this is a historical piece. And it's as relevant as it ever was, if not more so, with what's going on in the world at the moment.

And part of me does want to believe that we'll get the Star Trek idea where you will get over this kind of, you look different from me, you think different from me, you are different, therefore you are my enemy. And we'll move past that. we're certainly not there yet. And maybe that's what stories are. Maybe stories are a way of explaining or there are a way of saying,

this is my life, come and take a look, or this is what I want to say. Come and have a read. Come and let me show you who I am. And maybe that's what all creative arts are trying to do. Are they trying to explain in some manner, shape, or form? But what I would say is that there have been voices that have been suppressed

or excluded until very recently. There are voices that people are still trying to suppress when they try, for example, the banning of certain books, especially in America where they have their critical race theory nonsense, which basically means we can't talk about slavery. And we don't want to have books in our schools that address slavery or racism. Let's pretend it doesn't exist kind of thing. Or empire. Exactly.

And exactly. This sort of idea in this kind of. country of the British Empire, but there's very little attention paid to how Britain developed an empire in the first place and the centuries of slavery that gave Britain its wealth. They want to talk about William Wilberforce and the abolition of slavery, but let's talk about how slavery developed in the first base and the centuries that Britain were engaged in the slave trade and the money that Britain made off the back of slaves. But that's something, oh, we don't want to talk about that.

and then they call it critical race theory and let's ban it. You know, so I think we still have a ways to go on that. But I think my ideal would be, as you said, you know, I get sometimes I get introduced as, you know, the first black children's laureate or kind of, you know, and if I do an interview nine times out of 10, I will somehow in some manner, shape or form the subject of racism and what to do about racism will be brought up. and then I've had a number of people say, why do you always talk about racism? And, you know, and I think, because I'm always asked about it. And then I was reading something,

a guardian journalist who said that whenever she's sent to, or asked to interview a black person or a person of color, she's instructed to ask them about racism. And then people say, oh, you should stop playing the race card, but we're always dealt it. So, you know, so I kind of feel that I would like to think we would get to a place where the first,

of anything, the first gay person doing this or the first black person doing that or the first woman doing whatever. I remember a few years ago there was a big news story about their first female conductor was going to be conducting the last night of the proms or whatever. And I thought, this should not be news. You know, a man or woman or whatever, this should not be news, but it was. And so it is this thing of getting to the state where it's so-and-so is going to be conducting this, so-and-so's on the cover of whatever. And it's, oh, well, good for this. and we move on as opposed to it's the first of whatever because, you know, like it's something to celebrate when I kind of think, yeah, but why is it taken till now

to get to this point? Absolutely. So that's the half empty way of looking at it. Why is it taken so long to get this point? But the half full way of looking at it is, but at least it's happening. But I do hope that we get to the point where it is no longer remarkable. Mallory, glass, half full, Blackman. Thank you.

Thank you for that. And thank you for your choices and your words and sharing everything that you have. I do have to be a little bit mean to you, even though you're my number one icon, and ask you to choose one book from your list as the book that you would take on with you into the future of your next 50 books that you're going to write. Which is the one that you would keep close if you had to choose? Oh, wow. That is me. Goodness, me. I didn't want to be mean to matter. You know, I suppose my Desert Island book, the book that I would want to return to,

I guess maybe would be Rebecca. All the other books are amazing and phenomenal, but they are, some of them are kind of, they hit hard. And if I were going to take something on into the future, it would be something I would want to keep returning to. Yeah, it would either be. Rebecca or the women of Brewster Place, I think either one of those two would kind of stand me in good stead. I'm sure I can have it arranged that you are the only person in our 10 episodes

who's allowed to take two with you. Thank you. Okay. That's my gift back to you, Mallory. I'm not going to find the words to say thank you here. But Mallory, thank you so much for helping so many of us see ourselves. When no one else was, you are so prolific. so talented and so loved. Oh, thank you for being my guest today

and for appearing on the back of that book. I'm so glad I turned to the back of Baca when I was nine and saw your face because you've been a guiding light since then. Oh, Zawah, thank you so much. That is so lovely. Thank you. I'm crying again. Sorry.

Thank you so much, Mallory. What a pleasure to talk to you and to have you share your choices and so much about your life and work with us today. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you. I'm Zaui Ashton and you've been listening to the Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast. It has been my deep pleasure to host these 10 brilliant women on season four. Thank you to all my guests for their time and for their honesty and passion and joining us to amplify female voices in literature.

please do keep listening and please of course do keep reading please rate and review this podcast it is the easiest way to help spread the word about the female talent you've heard about today thanks so much for listening and I really hope to see you next time you've been listening to the Women's Prize for Fiction podcast

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