Novel on race relations changed author’s life
Despite receiving threats, author believes dialogue is crucial to moving forward
If there’s one word to describe author Jodi Picoult, it’s fierce.
The bestselling author of 23 books has never been one to shy away from hotbutton topics such as sexual abuse, school shootings and assisted suicide.
But there was one issue that eluded Picoult for 25 years. How do you talk about racism in a world seemingly just waking up to the fact that privilege and opportunity are connected to skin colour? And whose story is it to tell?
That’s the challenge behind Picoult’s new novel, Small Great Things, which offers three very different perspectives on race relations.
Picoult’s books always start with the issue at hand, what she refers to as “the thing that keeps me up at night.”
Her first attempt at writing on racism was inspired by a news piece about an African American undercover cop who was shot by a Caucasian co-worker.
“I totally failed. I couldn’t write authentic characters or voice,” she says.
Picoult began doubting whether this was even her story to tell in the first place. “Do I really have the right to write about racism? What could I possibly tell a person of colour something about their lives that they don’t already know?”
It wasn’t until 2012, when Picoult read a story about an African American nurse who was told by her hospital administration that she could not care for a newborn baby at the request of child’s white-supremacist parents, that she found her way in.
She imagined an emergency situation in which the nurse would be forced to take care of the child, which would lead to an arrest.
“It was like a lock turning the key,” Picoult says. Small Great Things unravels the courtroom story from three perspectives: Ruth, the accused nurse; Turk, a staunch white supremacist; and Kennedy, a public defender who has her own complicated personal response to the scenario.
From the onset, Picoult was determined to get this book right.
She spent three years with “sensitivity readers” to ensure she was on the right track. “I should not and would not have written the book without women of colour guiding me,” Picoult says.
She met with two former white supremacists to better understand Turk, whom she calls the most challenging character — she would always feel the need to take a shower after spending any time writing him.
Most importantly, Picoult realized to whom she needed to address her novel. “I was writing to people who look like me. I know how easy it is to point to a skinhead and say, ‘that’s a racist,’ rather than point to yourself,” she says.
“I want people to tap into the privilege that they’ve had and force them to admit the fact that racism isn’t just about prejudice. You could take every skinhead and ship them off to Mars and you’d still have racism, because it’s about power.”
Picoult knows very well now that Small Great Things — which she says has changed her life more than any other of her books — is out in the world she can’t control and the rhetoric surrounding it (she’s already received harassing tweets from white supremacists), or opinions on whether she should have written it in the first place.
But she holds strong in her conviction that more dialogue is the only way to move forward. “This book has woken me up to so much more awareness of the opportunities that I’ve had and why I’ve had them,” she says.
“I think that one of the biggest hurdles we have to face is that we will make mistakes when we talk about race.
“It’s more important to talk about it and know that, and say, ‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t know. Thanks for educating me. I’m going to learn and move forward.’ ”
“I want people to tap into the privilege that they’ve had and force them to admit the fact that racism isn’t just about prejudice.” JODI PICOULT