Heather Reisman:
Hi, I’m Heather Reisman, and this is Well Said, a podcast on the art and science of
living well.
This podcast is brought
to you by Indigo. Robert Jones, Jr. received his BFA, magna cum laude, in creative writing
and then
an MFA in fiction
from Brooklyn College. He is the writer and activist behind the online social justice community, Son
of Baldwin. His
work to dismantle oppressive systems and tell intersectional stories from a black queer perspective
is making quite an
impact.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
What a gift to build bridges instead of create caverns.
Heather Reisman:
That’s Robert Jones, Jr. His debut novel, The Prophets, has received the kinds of
accolades reserved for a very few. We
hear a grand achievement reminiscent of the work of Toni Morrison, lyricism that recalls the work of
James Baldwin. The
Prophets tells a powerful tale of love, faith, and connection seen through the lens of
two enslaved men on a Deep South
plantation. The book has already earned high praise, and we’re delighted to be joined today by
Robert to talk about his
book. Thank you so much for being here.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Thank you so much for having me.
Heather Reisman:
I have to say, one of the parts of my job I love the most is getting to select books for Heather's
Picks. I can just say
that The Prophets had me at “hello.”
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Oh, that is so kind and generous of you.
Heather Reisman:
The Prophets is your first novel, and you've already been compared to some of the
finest writers of our time.
Congratulations. It is a beautiful and powerful story. Tell us about your calling to write this
story.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Heather, you know, I was an undergraduate student in my final semester. My minor was Africana
studies, and it dawned on
me that I had not read a single work—and I read hundreds upon hundreds of pages of canon—where I
came across a character
or a figure who lived at the intersection of blackness and queerness prior to the Harlem
Renaissance. And so that was a
question in my mind. Where were the black queer people before the Harlem Renaissance? As I did
additional research, I
found references, but they were always references around sexual assault or some form of depravity.
And my question was:
what about love? And because Toni Morrison herself said, “If you cannot find the book you wish to
read, then you must
write it,” I knew I would have to take up the daunting task of imagining and writing what would
eventually become The
Prophets.
Heather Reisman:
So you wanted to write a love story between two black men. What made you decide to situate it, as
you did, in that time
of slavery?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
There is this sense among members of black communities that queerness in black people is the result
of some sort of
trauma—that it is not intrinsic or natural to an African person. Balderdash. It is as natural as the
sun rises. I wanted
to go back into a place where black queerness or black queer figures had been erased and tell a
story that I had not
seen, of two enslaved young men who are not just black but are also queer and in love and what the
ramifications of that
would be for not just themselves but for everyone around them.
Heather Reisman:
Of the many luminaries that you mention in the rich Acknowledgments section of the book, including
Alice Walker, Octavia
Butler, James Baldwin, and Maya Angelou, who among them has most inspired your writing style? Whose
do you feel is
channeling through your fingers as you write?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Toni Morrison. You know, every Toni Morrison novel I ever read, I had to read three times in order
to get what she was
saying. Because it was in plain English, but the way the words were put together was so strange to
me, so different. And
I said if I could just reach out and touch the hem of Toni Morrison's garment and study her, read
all of her works, and
then come back to this and try to do those same things, transform the language, maybe I have
something. Maybe I could
achieve something. She was the one that taught me that writing could be a profession. That it can be
an art. That it
could explain my own life to me. That it could put me in touch with others who share my points of
view and thoughts
about the world. That it could touch others in a way that could be healing. Her work certainly
touched me in a way that
was healing. She saved my life.
Heather Reisman:
Wow. You know, this podcast is meant to inspire our readers, and with people who can help them
understand the art and
science of living well. And so when I hear you say that, it makes me, ah, want to get your point of
view on fiction and
its ability to build empathy.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
I just read an article, about two months ago, that talked about how reading helps build empathy in
people who read. And
so I thought, what a gift to the world to be able to be a writer—to build bridges instead of create
caverns. Reading is
some of the most important thing we do. And I don't understand the idea of writing or reading as a
secondary form—that
we should be focused on other trades, for example, that are considered more valuable to the
society—when I believe art,
and in particular writing, is so crucially important to the human being to… to create full
dimensional human beings who
can look at another human being and say, “I respect you simply because you're here, you exist,
you're alive.” That is
the power of writing.
Heather Reisman:
Empathy has to be the coin of the realm. And if ever there was a moment when we needed it. I'm so
glad to have you share
your perspective on that. I'd love to talk a little bit about your creative process before we get
into the specifics of
this magnificent story. Share a little bit about how you work. How did The Prophets
come to be?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
The very first time I set out to write down what would eventually become The Prophets,
it happened
as a result of an
assignment given to me in my first semester of grad school by Stacey D’Erasmo, an author herself.
She told us to go out
into the world and find physical objects that a character we’re thinking about for a story or a
novel might possess. And
because serendipity exists, I found, in the gutter by the garbage, a pair of shackles in
Brooklyn—just in the street.
And I picked them up. And of course I wondered, “Well, what would somebody be doing with these?” But
the second thought
was, “Whoever I'm writing about is enslaved. This is giving me permission to write what I think I
want to write about,”
which is a black queer character in antebellum slavery. So, I went back and I started jotting things
down. What this
person looked like; how tall they were; the shape of their face; what their hair texture felt like.
Heather Reisman:
Who did that first character become?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
It was Samuel.
Heather Reisman:
Okay.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Whose name originally was Simon. And so I'm writing all about him. And initially, The
Prophets was
going to be told
solely from Samuel's point of view. But then I quickly realized that he did not have enough
information to tell the
story that I was trying to tell. And so I said, okay, maybe it can be between Samuel and his love
interest, Isaiah. But
then I realized the two of them together still did not give me the breadth that I needed to tell the
story. And then I
realized that the story was really the heart of it was their love, and that love needed witnesses.
And so then I said,
all right, these other characters are going to have to have a voice in the narrative, to tell us
what they think about
Samuel and Isaiah and what they share. And from there, I had a dream—and this is the absolute
truth—where I jotted
something down in the middle of the night—in the dark, I don't even remember writing it down—woke up
the next morning,
read it, and it said, “You do not yet know us.” And I said, “Are these the ancestors telling me that
they need a voice
in this narrative?” How do I work that in? Because it's a direct address. So do they talk directly
to me, to the
characters, to the reader? And the answer was “Yes.” And so I started to intersperse the ancestral
voice into this book,
and then came across something else that they said to me, which was, “This is not the beginning, but
here we shall
begin.” And I said,”Oh, they're leading me even further into the past, across the Atlantic, to these
pre-colonial
societies where there's an echo between two characters there and Samuel and Isaiah. And how this all
came together is
the characters were driving me, the entire time. They drove structure. They drove plot. And with the
help of my editor,
the dear Sally Kim, I was able to sort of shape this in a way that felt cohesive. Also, reading Toni
Morrison's Paradise
and Ayana Mathis' The Twelve Tribes of Hattie helped me to think about how multiple
characters can
speak and still feel
part of the same world. And that is how The Prophets shaped itself.
Heather Reisman:
Why do I feel like I've just been able to listen in to the most amazing writing tutorial? I mean,
that's just beautiful.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Thank you.
Heather Reisman:
Here's a quote which lots of people think is from James Baldwin but was actually a tweet you
published a few years ago.
“We can disagree and still love each other, unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and
denial of my
humanity and right to exist.” How did these words inform the stories that you tell, and in
particular this story, just
as we dive into it?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
You know, that is… to me the ultimate moral of The Prophets is that, okay, let's say in
real life
because of your
upbringing, you do not quote-unquote ‘agree’ with my quote-unquote ‘lifestyle’ as a queer person.
Fine; I cannot force
you to like me. But what we should have at base is the notion that I am here, I am alive, and I
deserve to be respected
as a human being, as a living creature on this planet. So you must not deny me my rights, and you
must not deny me my
privileges—no matter what you feel personally. If we can get to that baseline, humanity has a
chance. And if we cannot,
we… we risk self-destruction. And that is… I think ultimately the moral of The Prophets
is that we
have many paths we
can go down, but only some of them are going to lead us to our next stage, while the others are
going to lead us to the
fire next time—as James Baldwin might say.
Heather Reisman:
It's so right for this moment. I think that's why so many who have written about the book suggest
that it does have
lessons important to now. If there was one big idea, in addition to the one we just explored, that
you want people to
feel when they finished reading the book?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
I want them to feel angry—at our failures toward one another, our failure of responsibility toward
one another. I want
them to feel the anger of that. But I also want them to feel the hope of how simply we could
overcome it if we just
dared, as Maya Angelou once said, to dare to look into each other's face and say, “Good morning.”
Heather Reisman:
Wouldn’t it be amazing if the anger, that we feel spewing against each other at this moment, could,
as you suggest, be
turned into anger at this behaviour that is unacceptable. Wow.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
And that inspires us to righteous acts.
Heather Reisman:
A good way to think about it. Anger should inspire us to righteous acts. Wonderful. The two main
characters, I yearned
to be back with those characters—for several weeks after the book was finished. So Isaiah and
Samuel, they have the most
tender relationship. What was the most important to you in developing them and in expressing that
tenderness and that
love, and the intensity of it?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
That it be unabashed. Because for so long, queer people… black queer people must live in shame, must
cower in closets,
must deny their natural inclinations because it might be offensive to others. So it was very
intentional that Samuel and
Isaiah would be utterly in love, passionately in love. Because we often don't get to see men in
general vulnerable,
tender, compassionate. Everything is toxic masculinity: strength, we must conquer. Where is the
humanity? And that is
what was most important to me. I wanted to ensure that the reader got, through all the brutality and
all the other
things that are happening in this world, Samuel and Isaiah's humanity.
Heather Reisman:
Beautiful. The women in the book are also especially nuanced. How did you conjure them?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
That was also intentional. I read so many feminist works, umm, so many works by black women. I drew
upon my own life and
thought about people like my grandmother and great grandmother, and their sisters. I thought about
all of the great
black women in the world, such as Shirley Chisholm or Ella Baker. And I thought about how I do not
want to deify—because
that removes their humanity—but I want to imbue these women—because they're human beings, just like
the rest of us,
they're not some special separate species, these are human beings—with wants and desires and
frailties and
vulnerabilities and strengths. And I just wanted to imagine all of that and invest all of that into
these characters.
And also their complaints, because I am a witness for black women. And what they complain about is
patriarchy. And I
wanted to be able to show how patriarchy negatively impacts their lives, and also how they subvert
it. Because they're
clever women and smart women and vulnerable women and beautiful women, and I wanted it all to be in
there.
Heather Reisman:
Was there any point during the 14 years that you wondered would you get to the end, would you stick
with it?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Every single day. I gave up, so many times. Because I thought, one, I do not have the skill to pull
this off. Two, no
one's going to want to read this. And no one's going to care. They're going to see this as some part
of me trying to
push the alleged gay agenda. But the voices would not relent. I had to pay homage to those people
that I'm descended
from, who sacrificed and endured that the dream that one day I, as a black person, could move freely
in the world and
write and read as I please. Because, as you know, I'm descended from people for whom reading and
writing was illegal.
They were threatened with punishment of violence or death if they dared read or write. Who was I,
then, to give up? And
so at the edges of the day—as Toni Morrison would put it—I would write. Because while I was an
undergrad, I was working
three part-time jobs. While I was in grad school, I was working two part-time jobs. And then
eventually a full-time job
where I was writing, which was sapping me of my creative energy. So I would wake up at three o'clock
in the morning to
write about Samuel and Isaiah and their world—the witching hour, the perfect time, and that is how I
got through it.
Heather Reisman:
Aspiring writers, take note. It's interesting that you refer to part of the motivation, or maybe the
main motivation, to
continue was the sense that you owed something to your ancestors—the story layers and genealogies of
characters
descending from the Kasongo people of Africa.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Now, I should say that the Kasongo people are actually an amalgam, a fictional tribe that I drew
from several tribes’
particular characteristics that I found interesting and that could serve as a contrast against what
we know in Western
cultures. So during my research, I did seek… because there's this idea that there was no such thing
as homosexuality on
the continent of Africa prior to European intervention. Now, the mistake comes in because as Esther
Armah—who is from
Ghana, she's a brilliant artist and activist—she says, “If you asked my grandparents what is a
homosexual, they would
say, ‘I have no idea. We don't have that.’ But if you explain to them what homosexuality meant,
they’d go, ‘Oh, of
course, love, sex.’” Because there was no need to single it out or separate it from the community's
ideas of love and
sex, because there was nothing shameful about it, or sinful, until you have European colonization
and Christianity
saying this is unacceptable. And so when I went back and looked through the anthropological and
sociological record for
these times, I found that African notions of gender, gender identity, sexuality were vastly
different from what we've
come to understand here in the West. Ideas that I thought were universal but was surprised to learn
are not. And so I
wanted to draw on all of that when I was talking about the Kasongo people who I invent. And I drew
from several tribes
like the Dagara tribe—which is a tribe that's in the area we now know as Burkina Faso—where their
queer community
members were considered guardians, guardians of the gates between the Here and the Hereafter. And so
there were all of
these different things that I wanted to pull in, and said this is beautiful and it serves as a
contrast to what we
endure under the Western gaze.
Heather Reisman:
How are you feeling about the incredible reception this book has now received?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Overwhelmed and entirely grateful, because this is not the reception I expected. As a writer who's
putting your… your
first work out into the world for the entire world to comment on, you prepare yourself for the
worst. You prepare to be
critically pulled apart. So I was waiting for that. And the positive reception has been an utter
surprise, because of
that. But it also feels like such a warm blanket, almost like a grandmother's hug. And it's, ah,
just so humbling,
absolutely humbling that people find this work to be of value. I am so grateful.
Heather Reisman:
I could sit here and just listen endlessly, as I'm sure our audience could. So, a few fun questions.
What are you
reading right now?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
I am about to start reading The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett.
Heather Reisman:
Another Heather's Pick! What brings you joy?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Children's laughter. My husband's jokes—they're corny, but they make me laugh. My mother's love. My
sister’s films—my
sister’s a genius filmmaker. My best friend Arlene, who… who has been my friend since the third
grade. We've been
friends for over 40 years. Her family brings me joy because they accept me as one of their own. When
people support one
another rather than tear other people down brings me tremendous joy.
Heather Reisman:
What does purposeful living mean to you?
Robert Jones, Jr.:
It means living with intention. And that intention is always I'm going to do the best that I can and
the moment that I'm
in. And what that means is I'm going to be my best self to other people as well, hoping that from
that example, they
will be their best selves to other people, and that just catches on. Purposeful life.
Heather Reisman:
Beautiful. Thank you, so much. It has been a joy to have you for this time.
Robert Jones, Jr.:
Heather, this has been an utter joy. And thank you so much for having me.
Heather Reisman:
Thank you for tuning in to my conversation with the wonderful Robert Jones, Jr. For more ideas on
living well, and for
access to the books featured in this episode, visit indigo.ca/podcast. If you enjoyed this episode,
please leave us a
rating on Apple Podcasts. You can subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. Well
Said was
produced for Indigo by
Vocal Fry Studios, and is hosted by me, Heather Reisman.
Shivani Persad
The information provided in this podcast should not be relied upon by our listeners as medical
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