The Map of Me – true tales of mixed-heritage experience is the 3rd Decibel Penguin Prize Anthology, which includes 14 true stories of mixed heritage from new writers living in the UK. These true personal accounts range from ‘being Irish and Muslim; German-Liberian; half-English, half-Pakistani; Chinese-Brummie; Middle-Eastern-American; Canadian-Zimbabwean; and many more.’
The rear cover text states: ‘Chosen by a panel of judges, which includes author Kate Mosse and Shami Chakrabarti from Liberty, these stories represent the very best writing about the personal experience of being both one thing and another.’ I didn’t like the last sentence: ‘…of being both one thing and another.’What exactly does this mean?
This reminds me a bit of something my cousin Roger said to me many years ago, sometime in the 80’s, which I believe would have been more to the point than ‘…being both one thing and another.’ He said ‘It’s ok for you – you have the best of both worlds.’ Of course now I understand much more of what my cousin was getting at, although when I heard him say it, I didn’t really believe it was my reality at that time.
Maybe it said more about my cousin and how he felt he only had a white perspective of the world and that he couldn’t easily navigate the ‘black’ world – and he perceived that I could and did enter into the ‘black’ world and blended in nicely! I like that now 20+ years later, I am exploring this concept – the world is full of black and white people with a lot of ‘greyness’ that seems to fall by the wayside.
Oops that was a bit of a side track – back to my book review. One more thing that was surprising and disappointing - there was no introduction, which is a missed opportunity, since I would have liked to know how many stories were submitted, how the judges made their selection of the 14 stories, etc.
I found the stories were very well-written and my favourite was Audience by John A Pitts whose biography read, ‘I enjoy the challenge of trying to transfer thoughts through words, music and photography, and then sharing them in a way that helps other people connect with my view of the world. While my writing is a very personal, almost self-indulgent journey, my goal is to use it to make the rest of the world want to hitch a ride with me every now and then!
John was ‘born on a council estate in Sheffield, north England. My father was an African-American soul singer who came to Britain in the 1960s a member of a soul group. My mother, a working-class white girl from Sheffield, fell in love with him when he was on tour and the rest is my history.’
John’s ‘journey’ towards a black identity is interestingly portrayed using his audiences:
My Audience, Aged 8
CHRIS: My best friend with the cool straight hair who all the girls had a crush on.
EMMA: The white girl who was going out with Chris and who I, and most of the boys in my year fancied.
BROS: The famous pop duo who sported the fashionable ripper-jeans look.
MOM: Who, in her all-encompassing, deeply loving way, might as well have been called God.
My Audience, Aged 15
NATHAN, JUNION, MARCUS, LESTER and a plethora of black youths who had a fearsome reputation in my area.
2PAC and BIGGIE: Two talented black musicians who died at the hands of gun violence aged twenty-five.
O-DOG: The coolest character in the film Menace II Society who ‘just didn’t give a fuck’.
EMMA: Chris’s ex, who I was now seeing on the down-low.
My Audience Now, Aged 26 (where John stops acting)
JOHN: A TV presenter, writer, journalist and former youth worker for Sheffield Council. He likes long train journeys, playing football on a Sunday and crispy duck pancakes.
‘And with the end of the performance, I began to stop acting. To stop allowing other people’s needs and ideas of who I should be make me who I am. Whether they saw me as an ‘almost white’ boy who was ‘allowed’ into their club or, with this misguided perception, as a ‘dangerous black man’, I started to understand that the only audience I had to find in my life…
…was myself.
The Map of Me is published by Penguin Books (2008)
This reminds me a bit of something my cousin Roger said to me many years ago, sometime in the 80’s, which I believe would have been more to the point than ‘…being both one thing and another.’ He said ‘It’s ok for you – you have the best of both worlds.’ Of course now I understand much more of what my cousin was getting at, although when I heard him say it, I didn’t really believe it was my reality at that time.
Maybe it said more about my cousin and how he felt he only had a white perspective of the world and that he couldn’t easily navigate the ‘black’ world – and he perceived that I could and did enter into the ‘black’ world and blended in nicely! I like that now 20+ years later, I am exploring this concept – the world is full of black and white people with a lot of ‘greyness’ that seems to fall by the wayside.
Oops that was a bit of a side track – back to my book review. One more thing that was surprising and disappointing - there was no introduction, which is a missed opportunity, since I would have liked to know how many stories were submitted, how the judges made their selection of the 14 stories, etc.
I found the stories were very well-written and my favourite was Audience by John A Pitts whose biography read, ‘I enjoy the challenge of trying to transfer thoughts through words, music and photography, and then sharing them in a way that helps other people connect with my view of the world. While my writing is a very personal, almost self-indulgent journey, my goal is to use it to make the rest of the world want to hitch a ride with me every now and then!
John was ‘born on a council estate in Sheffield, north England. My father was an African-American soul singer who came to Britain in the 1960s a member of a soul group. My mother, a working-class white girl from Sheffield, fell in love with him when he was on tour and the rest is my history.’
John’s ‘journey’ towards a black identity is interestingly portrayed using his audiences:
My Audience, Aged 8
CHRIS: My best friend with the cool straight hair who all the girls had a crush on.
EMMA: The white girl who was going out with Chris and who I, and most of the boys in my year fancied.
BROS: The famous pop duo who sported the fashionable ripper-jeans look.
MOM: Who, in her all-encompassing, deeply loving way, might as well have been called God.
My Audience, Aged 15
NATHAN, JUNION, MARCUS, LESTER and a plethora of black youths who had a fearsome reputation in my area.
2PAC and BIGGIE: Two talented black musicians who died at the hands of gun violence aged twenty-five.
O-DOG: The coolest character in the film Menace II Society who ‘just didn’t give a fuck’.
EMMA: Chris’s ex, who I was now seeing on the down-low.
My Audience Now, Aged 26 (where John stops acting)
JOHN: A TV presenter, writer, journalist and former youth worker for Sheffield Council. He likes long train journeys, playing football on a Sunday and crispy duck pancakes.
‘And with the end of the performance, I began to stop acting. To stop allowing other people’s needs and ideas of who I should be make me who I am. Whether they saw me as an ‘almost white’ boy who was ‘allowed’ into their club or, with this misguided perception, as a ‘dangerous black man’, I started to understand that the only audience I had to find in my life…
…was myself.
The Map of Me is published by Penguin Books (2008)
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