THE
ARGUMENT MUST BE MADE:
STREET
LIT VERSUS TRADITIONAL URBAN LIT
No
matter what your reading pursuit or literary background, it will pretty much be
agreed upon that one of literature’s first edict to writers was to entertain.
This edict appears in all fictional literature and carries the almost explicit
verdict of literary law, but no sooner than urban readers began that quest, they divided the realm of literary
pursuits into two contrasting genres: Tradition urban lit and the more liberal street lit. Oddly enough, it was
this fictional duality that set African-American readers upon their first literary
turning point, and what evolved would forever alter the definition of what great
reading was as well as how the experience was to be pursued. On the one hand,
traditional urban lit sought to stimulate the senses of black readers by
allowing characters to be the objects of their own individual growth and development, whereas street lit
treated characters as the subject of an environment where educational growth
and development was stunted. This was serious business indeed.
If, in our literary evolution, entertainment
was the first serious connection between writer and reader, then great writing
would be the unimpeachable evidence that we, as a collective of readers and
writers, could produce a viable literary heritage . If it was the power to
entertain that would ultimately keep us from degenerating to the level of an
illiterate nation, then the power of great writing is what would separate us from
being masters of our blossoming literary heritage or becoming slaves of it.
Both side of the coin, the
traditionalists as well street lit artists have both sought to reform black
readers via their senses. However both set forth the pretext that their way was
not simply the right way, but the only way. What has ensued is the eternal
question of black lit. What genre of writing satisfies our quest for reading
entertainment best?
For me, I do not wholly believe
that a reader’s fundamental literary outlook is changed because he/she gets entertained. What this
does is basically to usher in the “sexual might makes right” syndrome which is
part and parcel of a lot of traditional
urban novels. In my mind, there remains some doubt, as to whether these
“sexually proficient men and women” of traditional urban lit are heirs of anything
entertaining other than the sexual “one-upmanship” that prevails in the work of
the urban romance elite. No matter wherein one reads inside the realm of traditional
urban lit, what you will find in the wake of such reading is a paint-by-number deadening of the soul where
readers are literary voyeurs into the sexual antics of black America. Are
male-bashing sistas any more entertaining than gun-toting thugs?
Street lit, on the other hand, is
the extreme province of a cold-eyed pessimism where the tenets of dead, black
men (i.e. Iceberg Slim and Donald Goines) are upheld in this “cult of
personality” genre. I further contend
that street lit, while propelled by innovative thought, is intellectually
self-destructive.
Sadly, both genres have, at times,
been an offensive policy against our inner nature. During the First Renaissance,
the writings were designed for the sole purpose of self-preservation. The
spirit of the work from that era was to educate, to foster cooperation rather
than competition which is a basic need of an oppressed people. Street lit induces
men to stare into the prism of the environment and then to draw up a blueprint
to destroy the neighborhood. The work from the Harlem Renaissance forced
readers to stare into the heavens and see that the stars spelled their names. The
enduring novels of Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Chester Himes, Zora Neale
Hurston served to strengthen the core communication between reader and writer.
In conclusion, I argue most vehemently
that we deserve a literary heritage that is life-affirming, works with intellectual
import which is much better than the predatory writings of street lit or the gratuitous
sensuality of urban romance. What both genres have done to such an amazing
extent is that they have acted as an advertisement for our flawed existence, boldly giving a
platform for the literary justification and legitimacy of bad writing on the
one hand and sexual pandering on the other. What a sad pretext on which to
sustain a literary heritage. And while great writing that both entertains and
educates may not wholly satisfy our “off-the-chain” appetite for pillage and
plunder or sexual mischief, it will make grant us the literary concessions we will need as a transport to
carry into the next era of our writings.
There is nothing illusory about the
plight of black folk in America, and sure literature is an escape, However, we
must baptize our writings with the literary blood of all the great authors of
our past and deal realistically with what is going on in our communities. Books
must be a mirror into our souls as a people. What we read must be as real as the colors of the rainbow, or the
alternation of day and night. It is the only way to go if we are to avoid
intellectual Armageddon.
One final word. No other writers in
the history of literature have used their talents in such a derogatory fashion.
Look where you choose on the literary horizon and what you will find is that
writers from other races have brandished their pens as a literary weapon to
uplift the spirit of their people. It was Voltaire, a French writer, who paved
the way for the French Revolution with his writings. Even in this country, it
was the pen of the writers who first impressed upon the masses that they
deserved change.
Where do we go from here?
