Esi Edugyan reflects on art, identity and belonging with her Canada Reads novel Washington Black
Mark Tewksbury champions Washington Black on Canada Reads 2022
Victoria-based author Esi Edugyan is no stranger to accolades. A two-time Giller Prize winner and 2021 CBC Massey Lecturer, her fiction often centres on themes of race, identity and belonging. Her award-winning novel Washington Black is no exception.
The epic, globe-spanning saga follows George Washington 'Wash' Black, an 11-year-old enslaved boy who escapes a brutal life on a sugar plantation in Barbados and goes on a journey filled with science, adventure and self-discovery. Washington Black chronicles Wash's growth from child prodigy to man of science, as he travels the world in search of a true sense of self-determination while being haunted — both literally and figuratively — by his past life on the plantation.
The novel won the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize and is being adapted into a TV series, which Edugyan is executive producing alongside Sterling K. Brown who is also acting in the show.
Mark Tewksbury is championing Washington Black on Canada Reads 2022, making it Edugyan's second time having a book on the show. Her novel Half-Blood Blues was defended by Olympian Donovan Bailey in 2014. The 2022 debates will be hosted by Ali Hassan from March 28-31.
Edugyan spoke with CBC Books about writing the novel and what motivates her as a writer.
When did you decide that you wanted to be a writer?
I was always a big reader. But writing never seemed like something that was like a viable career for someone like myself. I didn't really take it seriously, but I always did a bit of dabbling. I started writing poetry — very bad poetry — and then writing short stories.
I guess it was at the end of high school when I had to make a choice as to what I was going to study at university. It didn't matter what I studied, I was going to go to university — my parents were pretty resolute about that. I thought I would study journalism. Once I got to the University of Victoria I was so compelled by the creative writing aspect, which I had also gone to study, but thought of it as something secondary.
But with teachers like Patrick Lane, Lorna Crozier and Jack Hodgins, I became so impassioned and I thought, OK, this is definitely what I want to do.
What was your inspiration for writing Washington Black?
The inspiration ended up being something that didn't make it into the book beyond these bare bones things that are still lingering. I thought I was writing a book about the Tichborne Claimant case, which happened in Victorian England in the 1860s and 1870s. It centred around the disappearance of this aristocratic young man, 25-year-old man from the south of England who was shipwrecked and pronounced dead at sea. But his mother refused to believe that and hired a clairvoyant. She then discovered her son was living in Australia and sent for him to come home. A lot of people saw him as being a pretender, but he became a folk hero for the working class.
There was a whole series of trials in which one of the main witnesses for the defence was a man called Andrew Bogle, who was an ex-slave who had retired to Australia. When he was 11 years old, he was stolen off a plantation in Jamaica by Sir Edward Tichborne. I don't know how he came across this young boy — but he had seen him and somehow decided that he was going to steal him and take him back to England.
I thought that was a fascinating story to have a sense of your life as being one thing and very prescribed and very, very much something that was defined by a lack of freedoms of all kinds. And to be wrenched out of that and taken into this completely alien world, in which you could never have imagined a life for yourself — I found that was my main interest above and beyond all of the craziness of the various trials.
WATCH | Esi Edugyan discusses Washington Black:
So what was your research process like when writing Washington Black?
I did research for like a year before I started writing it. I was just constantly reading, looking at old files online and in the library, these kinds of things, and then started to write. You can research for years and never sit and write a word, but I had to force myself to sit and write after that.
I spent a long time researching also because I had just given birth to my son. I didn't feel like I was in the place where I could sit down and obviously keep the hours that you need to keep to do a book. But there was always time to research something here and there. So it was about a year of research and then two years of writing.
LISTEN | Esi Edugyan on IDEAS:
Your fiction centres the Black experience in different historical periods and you often write about themes of identity. Why do you feel compelled to write these stories?
I think these things are not always wholly self-chosen. I think you write from certain instincts and you write out of your own experience — and you essentially write what's in you. So although I would never have put it that way, that those were my abiding interests, I think maybe given who I am, where I was born, all of these things, this has obviously shaped and defined my own life, and these are things that I'm interested in exploring in literature.
I think you write from certain instincts and you write out of your own experience — and you essentially write what's in you.
LISTEN | Esi Edugyan on The Current:
Can you talk about the theme of freedom — both physical and spiritual — in Washington Black?
That was a theme that emerged very naturally out of the material that I was working with. Obviously he's been born in bondage and then he's in a sense, forced into escaping with this man and is granted a kind of physical freedom. I think this comes out of this Andrew Bogle figure as well with the Tichborne trial, you start to wonder — OK, so now that you have a certain modicum of physical freedom what are the things that you're carrying with you into your life? What are the ways in which you still feel bound up in the trauma of that old life?
The book is about him trying to resolve these feelings of being tethered or anchored, or the ways in which he's not allowing himself to be free.
I thought this was interesting because even when Washington manages to escape he's being followed by a sort of bounty hunter figure. And when that fear of his pursuit ends, there's still this way in which he feels anchored to his past life. I think that is natural and normal.
The book is about him trying to resolve these feelings of being tethered or anchored, or the ways in which he's not allowing himself to be free. But also the ways in which this the society in which he's living in won't allow him to be free, looking as he does and having the past that he does. These are just things that I found so interesting.
Washington Black is being adapted into a TV series. What is it like for you seeing your work come to life in that way?
They haven't started filming, so I haven't seen anything like rushes or anything like that. They just did the casting a couple of months ago, which was neat to see who they cast because I instantly thought, that's absolutely perfect. I don't know how they go about doing that, but it's obviously an art in itself.
I've read several of the scripts and I thought it was just fascinating to see. It's just a very different world and a very different way of approaching writing. And it's been interesting to see the same story, but approached from a different angle.
So as a fiction writer, I have to let go in a way. I have to let them do their thing.
I have to say, I think film and television — that's just a completely different medium. So as a fiction writer, I have to let go in a way. I have to let them do their thing. I'm not a screenwriter and I get that it will be its own piece of art that has roots in my novel, but is very much its own thing. And that's exciting to see their interpretation. I'm looking forward to it.
I'm just sitting back and turning my sights toward writing a new book. But I'm hoping to be on location just to see what that's looking like — whether that's in Nova Scotia or elsewhere. And in terms of nuts and bolts, this is not my art and I'm in great hands. So I'm happy to sit back and watch and give my input when it's wanted and required.
What are the things that motivate you as a writer?
The things that always motivated me as a writer. You don't write to win prizes. You don't write to have adaptations. You can't have these things in mind. I write for the pleasure, the language and the thrill of discovering a new story. Also, for the challenge of having to commit to that story for several years — because there are huge periods where you're sick of it and bored.
I still love to read, I love to write, I love language — and these are the motivating things.
But just the feeling of having to be faithful to a story for several years feels like an achievement in and of itself, I think, because it's so hard. But it's just all of the same things — I still love to read, I love to write, I love language — and these are the motivating things. It's the same from when I was 12.
WATCH | Esi Edugyan wins the Scotiabank Giller Prize:
You've won two Gillers and your work has been celebrated and recognized internationally. How do you define success as a writer?
I think it's hard to define. I think it would be disingenuous to say that outside accolades don't matter. I think these are the things that allow you to keep writing and both from the perspective of, it makes it possible to publish your next book — but also psychologically.
I think a lot of writers who don't get enough affirmation early enough can sort of falter and quit and feel despairing. And so it's important to have that outside affirmation.
Can I write something that I personally feel is stronger than what I've just written?
Having said that, I like to have a feeling of trying to write a better novel than the one I've just written. Can I write something that I personally feel is stronger than what I've just written? And that's always going to be the challenge. Whether I succeed or fail, that remains to be determined. But that's always what gets you to your desk — can I do better?
LISTEN | Esi Edugyan on The Next Chapter:
As a Black woman, do you ever feel pressure to speak for more than yourself?
I think any writer writing out of any minority voice, maybe has a little bit of a sense of that when they're writing. Having said that, I don't carry that with me into the room when I'm writing. I feel like that's something very external. And that's something I have no control over.
Whether somebody is looking at my work and taking that as representative of a whole cadre of Canadian writers, that's something I have no control over. I certainly don't carry it with me into my office. When I'm writing, I'm just writing, in a sense for my own pleasure — especially in that first draft.
You've been through the Canada Reads experience before. What does it feel like to be here for the second time?
It always feels unexpected. It's quite unique on the Canadian landscape. It's a very different thing to have your book involved in Canada Reads than in, for instance, the Giller — that's its own thing as well.
I think I think it'll be good. I'm curious. I spoke with Mark Tewksbury, who'll be championing my book, and I was so excited to hear what he had to say about it, the way that he had read it so sensitively and understood it.
What a pleasure it is to meet these ideal readers who grasp everything that you attempted to do in the novel. So that's maybe exciting, just the discussion that people have around your work and around the work of some of everything else that ends up on the shortlist.
Esi Edugyan's comments have been edited for length and clarity.
