“Also, I am a real person”: Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys (2019); or How to Write About Racism in a “Post-Racial” Era

Abstract

In an interview with Deborah Treisman for The New Yorker, Colson Whitehead answered the question of what sets him apart from one of his protagonists (Benji from Sag Harbor (2009)) by saying “Also, I am a real person” (2008). Emphasizing the fictionality of his characters, Whitehead points at the blurry lines between fact and fiction. This is something his metafictional history novels highlight. Although a fictional story, I argue in my talk that in The Nickel Boys (2019), the real person Colson Whitehead refracts a very real America through the lens of a fictional 1960s setting. Being an author, whose work defies categorization, Whitehead consciously makes use of several genres, such as historical metafiction, crime and adventure novels, to unfold a variety of affects and, by doing so, render visible systemic racism in an era that, after electing a Black President, believes to be “post-racial”. Using the example of The Nickle Boys, in my talk I will examine how the use of a 1960s setting in American literature bears the potential to create a range of affects, and, therewith, enables an adequate refraction of racism in contemporary America. I will also show how the interplay between this use of scenery and the use of a mix of genres further enables the potential for a range of affects that render visible the complexity of racism in present-day America.