Yellowface and privilege in publishing
Jan. 8th, 2024 03:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainwatersparkI've wanted to write this post for a while now, except my mind got stuck in the loop of "I want to write about Yellowface but I don't want to read the book because RF Kuang is on my personal hate list" and for some reason, it only just occurred to me that I could just write a blog post about it, lol.
For those who don't know, Yellowface by RF Kuang is a literary fiction novel about a white woman who steals her Chinese American friend's manuscript and passes it off as her own (I've linked the Goodreads page if you want to read a more detailed summary). I decided not to read the book myself because I was burned by RF Kuang after Babel. I did enjoy the first two books in the Poppy War trilogy, but thought the third book was a muddled mess in terms of character arcs and messaging. Babel made me suspect that RF Kuang has developed a bit of an ego after experiencing so much publishing success. And now, here we are.
I enjoyed Cindy's video about the book, and the point about RF Kuang's own financial privilege is an important one that even I didn't know. But something that I don't see enough people talking about is RF Kuang's privileged publishing journey, which for me calls into question just how much of an authority she can be on racism in publishing.
RF Kuang has had a charmed journey through publishing, especially for an author of color. The first book she queried, she landed an agent with it. She went on submission and sold her debut (I assume quickly) at auction to a Big 5 publisher in a "significant" deal (which means $251,000 to $499,000). Her debut may not have been a New York Times bestseller, but it sold very well and earned out its significant advance within a few months, if my memory serves me correctly. Every book deal of hers since then has been for a lot of money. Babel also sold in a "significant" deal. Yellowface alone sold in a "major" deal, which means $500,000 or more. This is the kind of success most authors in general, let alone authors of color, dream of.
Given all this, I just can't take RF Kuang seriously as an "expert" on racism in the publishing industry when she's never had to deal with the most significant gatekeeping authors of color face: difficulty landing an agent, selling a book to a publisher, and earning an adequate advance for our books.
So many authors of color struggle for years to get an agent. So many more have their first book, or even multiple books, die on submission. (I fall into both of these camps.) And even those authors of color who land a book deal are often paid peanuts and have to persevere for years before finally having their big break and being able to earn anywhere near livable advances (if they ever do).
My feeling from reading Babel and a few interviews is that RF Kuang thinks rather highly of her own intellect. It wouldn't surprise me if she assumes that whatever difficulties she may have faced in the industry constitute the worst, most racist experiences ever (including the experience of getting one-star reviews on Goodreads, which is just a majorly cringey attitude). I find that many authors who don't interact much with other authors fall into this insular view. In one interview, Kuang criticized the character of Athena Liu from Yellowface as someone who never uplifts other Asian American authors—and yet I don't recall ever seeing Kuang herself uplifting other Asian American authors, either.
I've seen some people who were awed by the fact that Kuang was able to publish this "exposé" on the publishing industry. But that itself is a marker of privilege. Kuang was already a bestseller; the industry was willing to take a risk on her that it would never do for an "unproven" author. And for crying out loud, do people really think the publishing industry would be hesitant to publish books "exposing" their secrets if they thought they could make a lot of money doing so? No one, for example, would be willing to publish a book from me that talks about the rejection I received from an editor who said "I already acquired another book about an Asian American protagonist [from a different Asian ethnicity]". Or the rejection I received from an agent who said it was "too much" that my protagonist was queer, Chinese, depressed, anxious, and autistic.
In general, I'm tired of financially privileged Chinese Americans being held up as evidence of how "diverse" the publishing industry is. (And I generally consider myself financially privileged, but some of these authors are on a different level—my parents didn't have enough money when I was young to take the family traveling all the time, for example, and I attended public schools.)
For those who don't know, Yellowface by RF Kuang is a literary fiction novel about a white woman who steals her Chinese American friend's manuscript and passes it off as her own (I've linked the Goodreads page if you want to read a more detailed summary). I decided not to read the book myself because I was burned by RF Kuang after Babel. I did enjoy the first two books in the Poppy War trilogy, but thought the third book was a muddled mess in terms of character arcs and messaging. Babel made me suspect that RF Kuang has developed a bit of an ego after experiencing so much publishing success. And now, here we are.
I enjoyed Cindy's video about the book, and the point about RF Kuang's own financial privilege is an important one that even I didn't know. But something that I don't see enough people talking about is RF Kuang's privileged publishing journey, which for me calls into question just how much of an authority she can be on racism in publishing.
RF Kuang has had a charmed journey through publishing, especially for an author of color. The first book she queried, she landed an agent with it. She went on submission and sold her debut (I assume quickly) at auction to a Big 5 publisher in a "significant" deal (which means $251,000 to $499,000). Her debut may not have been a New York Times bestseller, but it sold very well and earned out its significant advance within a few months, if my memory serves me correctly. Every book deal of hers since then has been for a lot of money. Babel also sold in a "significant" deal. Yellowface alone sold in a "major" deal, which means $500,000 or more. This is the kind of success most authors in general, let alone authors of color, dream of.
Given all this, I just can't take RF Kuang seriously as an "expert" on racism in the publishing industry when she's never had to deal with the most significant gatekeeping authors of color face: difficulty landing an agent, selling a book to a publisher, and earning an adequate advance for our books.
So many authors of color struggle for years to get an agent. So many more have their first book, or even multiple books, die on submission. (I fall into both of these camps.) And even those authors of color who land a book deal are often paid peanuts and have to persevere for years before finally having their big break and being able to earn anywhere near livable advances (if they ever do).
My feeling from reading Babel and a few interviews is that RF Kuang thinks rather highly of her own intellect. It wouldn't surprise me if she assumes that whatever difficulties she may have faced in the industry constitute the worst, most racist experiences ever (including the experience of getting one-star reviews on Goodreads, which is just a majorly cringey attitude). I find that many authors who don't interact much with other authors fall into this insular view. In one interview, Kuang criticized the character of Athena Liu from Yellowface as someone who never uplifts other Asian American authors—and yet I don't recall ever seeing Kuang herself uplifting other Asian American authors, either.
I've seen some people who were awed by the fact that Kuang was able to publish this "exposé" on the publishing industry. But that itself is a marker of privilege. Kuang was already a bestseller; the industry was willing to take a risk on her that it would never do for an "unproven" author. And for crying out loud, do people really think the publishing industry would be hesitant to publish books "exposing" their secrets if they thought they could make a lot of money doing so? No one, for example, would be willing to publish a book from me that talks about the rejection I received from an editor who said "I already acquired another book about an Asian American protagonist [from a different Asian ethnicity]". Or the rejection I received from an agent who said it was "too much" that my protagonist was queer, Chinese, depressed, anxious, and autistic.
In general, I'm tired of financially privileged Chinese Americans being held up as evidence of how "diverse" the publishing industry is. (And I generally consider myself financially privileged, but some of these authors are on a different level—my parents didn't have enough money when I was young to take the family traveling all the time, for example, and I attended public schools.)
