-
Notes
- Indiana University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
r ect o r unningfo ot 223 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 notes Pr el ud e 1. Maya Angelou appeared via satellite. 2. See “Tony Brown’s Comments: The Color Purple is White.” The Herald, January 1, 1 986, 2, and Charles Johnson’s Being and Race: Black Writing Since 1970 (1988). 3. Founded in 1937 , the College Language Association is a significant venue for Reed’s speech given that its constituency is mainly African American scholars. As with any predominantly black audience Reed addressed concerning his animosity against feminists, Reed is voicing his concerns, for the most part, to insiders in “the black community.” These insiders fit into two distinct groups: those who are either sympathetic to black feminist issues and might bristle at his pronouncements, or those who fit the typical perception of African Americans as being ambivalent toward feminism and fiercely protective of black men. Generally, Reed approaches primarily black audiences as though everyone fits into the latter category and as if an allegiance to feminism is antiblack and, more specifically, anti–black male. 4. Particular mention should be given to the special collections department of the University of Delaware’s library. There, in the Media 1966–1995 portion of the Ishmael Reed Papers (collection number 398), I gained access to Reed’s appearances on the Today show and Tony Brown’s Journal. 5. In Reckless Eyeballing Tremonisha states that she’s just going to “get fat, have babies, and write write write” (130). Her new play seeks to revise her earlier antimale antics: “It’s about a woman who leaves her husband for another woman only to discover that she’s a batterer” (131).Tremonisha comes to the realization that the real “epidemic” that feminists are averse to reveal is that “women’s shelters are full of women who are fleeing from [the abuse] of other women” (131). 6. With the 2005 Broadway release of the musical production of The Color Purple , produced in part by Quincy Jones and Oprah Winfrey, it is clear that the past criticism Walker endured still haunts her. For example, on Tuesday, November 1, 2005, when Walker was interviewed by Tavis Smiley, she became offended when Smiley compared her to Condoleezza Rice. Smiley attempted to make a connection 224 wr iting the r evol utio nar y bl a ck d iva between the negative reaction Rice received when she attended the memorial service of Rosa Parks in Los Angeles to the negative response to Walker’s project. She responded, “I really don’t appreciate that comparison, actually. I find it very objectionable , because she is someone who has helped the President actually bomb people . . . kill people, starve people . . . enforced sanctions against Cuba, for instance, to hurt many of the people that I deeply love. So this is very different from just writing a novel that is made into a film that people say they’ve never watched, and they’ve never read the book. So the people have been . . . very untruthful, about how they actually perceive the work” (See PBS archives for a copy of the transcript; see http://www.pbs.org/kcet/tavissmiley/archive/200511/2005110 1_ transcript.html). I quote Walker at length not to condemn Smiley for the comparison (in the interview he apologizes profusely and it is clear that he admires Walker and her work), but because I see a similarity between this scenario and the fictional one Reed creates in Reckless Eyeballing. Because Reed equates Tremonisha’s play with Nazi collaboration , it quite possible that he would see the comparison of Walker and Rice as appropriate. 7. For the purposes of this study, I have decided to use the term “black aesthetic” instead of “black arts.” The word “aesthetic,” coupled with the adjective “black,” implies an inherent political agenda in determining a criterion for black art. With the term “aesthetic,” one can also talk about perception and psychological responses to art. This is a significant distinction given that my project deals with the shifting of perceptions or world views from those that are determined by the mainstream population to those determined by African Americans. 8. Here I am trying to make a distinction between an author’s intended audience, the audience the author images for her text...