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I surrender.
I also told myself I'd said pretty much what I wanted to say about whiteness and hist-romance in a book, and a couple of forthcoming essays. Started and deleted tweets - didn't work. Brain's gonna do what brain's gonna do. 1/
I also told myself I'd said pretty much what I wanted to say about whiteness and hist-romance in a book, and a couple of forthcoming essays. Started and deleted tweets - didn't work. Brain's gonna do what brain's gonna do. 1/
Adaptations - one more foray into acad waters and I'm done for a year. It's a talk on Willie, Adaptations, Race, and Romance. What follows is tangetially related to that talk ... in other words, one of the lovely literary black holes I tend to fall into. 2/
A story. Willie’s O was based on an Italian novella, author G Cinthio. In the original "Othello", Iago lusted, Othello got it, Iago set everybody up, Dessi died, Iago died, O was banished and eventually Dessi’s male fam revenge her and slayeth the Moor. 3/
Btw, her fam sanctioned the marriage. Willie reads this and goes, nah fam, don’t like it. I need to spice it up a bit. I know, I’ll adapt it and English it. End result, the "Othello" version probably a fair percentage of the world knows best. 4/
A story, pt 2. "The Duke & I" is the first book in the Bridgerton series (you knew I was going there) published 2000. Fyi, I have read this and 2 others in the series before I quit. I still own my copy of this book; I've only read it once. Not an autoread. 5/
"The D & I" is a romance that perpetuates the bad history of Georgette Heyer and her romance literary descendants. It is a world of balls, fashion, and an aristocracy that ain’t been politically or economically sh*t since Charles II TBH. 6/
It is also a world where English settler colonialism and imperialism is invisible, except in small gestures (tea, sugar, silk, etc). One can walk the London streets, certain streets of course, and see nary a non-white person. Class is important. 7/
Histrom reader: "But Margo, it’s a romance, it’s fiction, and there is “fictional license.” Even your example of Shakespeare proves that such license is acceptable in literature."
Me: True, but what about the "historical"? Othello isn't based on "history." 8/
Me: True, but what about the "historical"? Othello isn't based on "history." 8/
A story, pt 3. 2019: Netflix/Shonda Rhimes announce the adaptation of the the Bridgerton Series. Cheers rise from several corners of Romancelandia, amid a few raised eyebrows about SR's choice. (Me: hello, have you read Sarah Maclean or 9/
Lisa Kleypas for engaging regency hist-rom?) Then the cast announcement and more squees over the "diverse cast" drowned oupt the "umm, have y'all read "The Duke & I"? Nary a Black folk inside based on authorial POV of the whiteness of regency England. 10/
Insert dramatic pause followed by revelation here:
"The Duke and I" was published in 2000. Kretchen Hoolbrook Gerzina published "Black London: Life Before Emancipation" in 1995. OMG, there were Black, Brown, Asian folk in regency London. 11/
"The Duke and I" was published in 2000. Kretchen Hoolbrook Gerzina published "Black London: Life Before Emancipation" in 1995. OMG, there were Black, Brown, Asian folk in regency London. 11/
February 2021: I haven’t watched the Bridgertons. I remain undecided whether to invest my time. I'm also 
by how the series reaffirms a racist tendency in tradional publishing. This is were Willie Shakespeare comes in (you knew he'd show up again). 12/
by how the series reaffirms a racist tendency in tradional publishing. This is were Willie Shakespeare comes in (you knew he'd show up again). 12/
A story, pt 4: racial capitalism and white supremacy - the book trade.
Two of these covers tell no lies about what’s inside. The third...welp 13/
Two of these covers tell no lies about what’s inside. The third...welp 13/
Book covers serve several purposes, to draw attention, to convey an idea as to what might be discovered between the pages. Definitely the case with Willie's O. Unless the "Duke & I's" author revised the book, what you see is not what you get. 14/
So what am I seeing? A familiar rafficking in Black bodies. Covers of editions of "Othello" circulate as part of racial capitalism's white supremacist logic and readers know what they're getting: Iago's deception, Othello's and Dessi's dead body. 15/
These covers are directed at specific gaze, a white gaze, and no matter how you adjust the lens they perpetuate a trafficking in anti-Blackness, in the policing of Black bodies, figuratively (the covers) and literally (Othello's death). 16/
"The Duke & I" ... well, besides the publisher's deliberate campaign to market the book as "diversity" when the romance narrative inside is decidedly not diverse ... as much as a segement of Romancelandia and Netflix may wish it to be. 17
I leave you with these covers (and the usual caveat about typos etc).
Fini
Fini
*trafficking not rafficking...although I am a Shakespearean... nah, not even that works.
