mps Drinking Coffee...

Drinking Coffee Elsewhere by ZZ PACKER

a comment

While interviewing ZZ Packer, Robert Birnbaum asks if she is considered a black writer. " She agrees that she is but adds “I am writing for black people, but I am also writing for whites, for Chinese, for Americans”. Her point: being black doesn’t limit an author to a black audience.
I thought about how frequently authors will respond to a question like this one in the same manor. Acknowledging their race, and confidently sure that they possess the ability to speak to all people regardless of their differences. I hear it all the time but I wonder if it is true. I understand that anyone who pick up this collection becomes Packer’s audience, whoever they me be. But I wonder if we should be just all more honest about the term audience. Should we be considering other factors…. like humor maybe? [I know that’s a bit random. Try to fallow me]

Packer’s stories are filled with great humor. Maybe not knock your socks off funny. But it’s smart and witty. I found myself laughing a lot but because I’ve had this idea of audience on my mind it made me question; who when reading this book would be laughing with me. Who would understand the humor that she incorporates into her work and who would not? While reading the story “Brownies” for the second time, I stopped a moment mid laugh to acknowledge the possibilities. “Caucasian Chihuahuas…What are you? Caucasian?... That was so Caucasian!” (pg 3&4). Being an insider on the joke, I thought that, that was hysterical! Well that is until I flipped the script. Black Chihuahuas. What are you? Black? That was so Black! It just wasn’t as funny anymore and I assume it might not have been as funny for her White audience. [I couldn’t be sure. I meant to ask someone. But It's such an odd question to ask.]

In any case, would it be completely terrible if White people didn’t think that was funny? You know I’m not sure. And this makes me consider all the other features of a writer’s work that can be lost in translation. It makes me more conscious to the fact that even when you read a story you can be an insider or an outsider and I’m starting to consider that the insiders might be a writer’s true audience. For instance in Packer’s stories she tell of the racial divide and black identity that she is accustomed to, in her everyday life as an American. What I am proposing is that the experiences and circumstance she writes about it are best understood by those who who’ve share them with her. This doesn’t exclude everyone else from being her audience. But it might mean that every story [not just Packer’s] has a true audience. One who is best able to catch emotions and views the author shares with the reader. Even they’re simple jokes.

Now if that is the case, something a simple as race [ha] could not be a sufficient divider for every joke in every story or every circumstance our characters face. But I think it worked in the Chihuahua joke to help me acknowledge all the other factors that celebrate an author’s true audience.

The audience within the audience …boy is that deep.


secretary of bestconrnergroup08,

melissapierresaint




the interview: http://www.identitytheory.com/interviews/birnbaum103.html