The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books was this past weekend, April 22-23rd, at the University of Southern California. San Diego Literary Scene attended Marlon James' panel, which was Sunday, in the Ronald Tutor auditorium.
James' first novel, John Crow's Devil, was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Commonwealth Writers Prize, as well as being made a New York Times Editor's Choice. His second novel, The Book of Night, won the 2010 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, Minnesota Book Award, and was a finalist for the 2010 National Book Critics Circle Award in fiction.
James is also the author of The Book of Night Women, which won the 2010 Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Minnesota Book Award, and was a finalist for the 2010 National Book Critics Circle Award in fiction and an NAACP Image Award.
His most recent novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings, won the 2015 Man Booker Prize for Fiction. It was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and won the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature for fiction, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for fiction, and the Minnesota Book Award. It was also a New York Times Notable Book.
James was interviewed by Davan Maharaj, L.A. Times editor. James is from Jamaica, and Maharaj is from Trinidad, so the two of them spent some time poking fun at the cultural differences between the two Caribbean countries throughout the Q&A.
The 1976 assassination attempt on Bob Marley serves as the backdrop for A Brief History of Seven Killings, which is a fictionalized account of that period in Jamaican history, but also about so much more. James read two sections from the book aloud before discussing it. The story is narrated by a large cast of characters, which includes politicians, gang members, C.I.A. operatives, corrupt cops, fixers, drug traffickers, a Rolling Stone journalist, and more. James grew up in Jamaica, and he said that anytime something happened in Kingston, reports of the event would vary depending on who one spoke with for details. It seemed like everybody had a small piece of the story, and the only way to get a complete picture of events was to speak with multiple people. Therefore, James said that he employed the device of having multiple narrators in the book in order to tell the story through each character's eyes in order to provide readers with a broad, and broader, perspective. James said he wrote the novel this way because it reflects his personal experiences.
The Q&A centered primarily on A Brief History of Seven Killings, but Maharaj & James also discussed post-colonialism, Jamaica, other Caribbean writers & their work, music, and James' writing process, among other things. James' first novel, John Crow's Devil, had been rejected over 70 times before finally being published. Once published, it received wide acclaim. Maharaj used this fact to encourage people not to give up, and to continue to believe in their work despite what publishers might say or do. For James, this persistence in shopping the book around seems to be an example of his basic personality because James stated that, once he pursues a path - even if that path is one that can only end badly - he has to follow it through to the end. James, who lives in Minneapolis now, shared the story of how he and his friends decided to break into Prince's estate as an example of his, sometimes, reckless behavior. Outcome: James & his friends were stopped at the fence by Prince's security guards after James tried to jump it, they never made it onto the property, and luckily for them, they were not arrested.
Labels: Author Appearances
