In 1948, Zora Neale Hurston published an article in the Negro Digest titled “What White Publishers Won’t Print.” Today, the issue turns not on what white publishers won’t print, but rather, what they will print when it comes to African-American literature.
When Jerry McMillan’s “Waiting to Exhale,” Toni Morrison’s “Jazz” and Alice Walker’s “Possessing the Secret of joy” all appeared on The New York Times Best Sellers’ list at the same time for several weeks in a row in 1992, the cross-over popularity and appeal of Black women writers was hailed by many scholars and critics as dramatic proof that Black literature was about to have a Second Coming.
Hurston, one of the charter members of the dazzling Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s that featured a Black creative explosion heard around the world is not alive to witness this current mass-produced blitz of African-American-written romance, mystery, science fiction and self-help books — all of a decidedly middle-brow orientation. It has been referred to by some as a “new renaissance” — but is it? And who reaps the financial bonanza?
The critical acclaim and popular success of “hot” Black writers does not obscure the troubling fact alluded to by Hurston nearly 50 years ago: The publishing industry in the United State& is still dominated overwhelmingly by white males, and the role of editor at these houses remains, by and large, the untrammeled province of white males and females.
