I first heard about Jeanine Cummins’ novel American Dirt last November, when I was at the International Book Fair of Guadalajara, the second-largest in the world. As someone who has spent nearly half his life in Mexico and on the border, I was surprised to hear that Cummins’ novel allegedly “a voice to the voiceless”—after all, Mexican authors have been telling their own stories for centuries.
The literary tradition runs deep in Mexico, back to the lyrical works of the ancient poet-king Nezahualcóyotl. Literature and poetry have been taught at the National Autonomous University of Mexico since 1553. While the Puritans of Salem were still hanging witches and marrying their cousins, Mexico had already established itself as a literary hub of the Americas, a legacy that continues well into the 21st century.
When I obtained an advance copy of “American Dirt” and began reading, I was baffled. This was the novel that the US publishing industry had selected to represent Mexico and migrants? Its depiction of this great nation could not have been more inaccurate. The fact that this book was predestined for success by the tastemakers of Big Lit, and later selected for Oprah’s book club, reveals significant blind spots in the US literary world. In the weeks since its release, critics have not only pointed out the extensive errors in the book itself — many of us have called for much deeper changes.
“American Dirt” tells the story of Lydia Quixano and her son, Luca, who flee drug traffickers in Mexico. Leaving their hometown of Acapulco, they cross Mexico aboard the freight train known as La Bestia, alongside hundreds of other migrants headed for the US border.
By now, much has been written about the books deep-seated flaws. In her New York Times review, Parul Sehgal examines not only the book’s awkward prose and flat characters, but the author’s unusual fixation on various shades of “brownness.” Chicano authors Myriam Gurba and David Bowles have written scathing reviews of the book’s stereotypical depictions of Mexico.
I have described many of American Dirt’s cultural and factual inaccuracies at length in other articles, including a review in the UK journal The Blue Nib (“A Poor Imitation: “American Dirt” and misrepresentations of Mexico”). Regional differences within Mexico are glossed over. The author butchers the most rudimentary cultural details, right down to misspelling the main characters’ names. Cultural fetishism is rampant throughout the narrative, including baptizing the fictional drug cartel as “Los Jardineros” (The Landscapers), an unlikely name for a Mexican criminal organization, but one with stereotypical connections to Mexican workers in the US.
The best way I can describe these inaccuracies is through metaphor. Imagine, if you will, a novel that claims to represent the opioid crisis in the US. The author, Li Zhang Wei, is renowned in Beijing, but has only a rudimentary grasp on the English language. His knowledge of American culture stems from a week-long vacation in Honolulu. Still, Mr. Li feels qualified to tell the story of the American Midwest:
“Meet the quintessential, corn-fed American man, Samantha Jhonnson. Samantha’s world falls apart during his bluegrass-prom-dance-mardi-gras, where his barn-raising is attacked by the fearsome Ohio drug lord, Big Pizza Hamburger Eater. Mr. Big is the kingpin of the extremely American criminal organization, the High-Cholesterol Gun-Collecting Quarterbacks.
“Samantha is shocked to learn that many people in the U.S. own firearms. He flees his barbaric home country for the civilization and stability of Canada, a nation known to be free of guns and drugs, on the only means of transportation that is beyond the reach of American organized crime: the freight barges run by New Jersey Teamsters!”
Despite Li Zhang Wei’s best intentions, his fanciful story does not represent us. It does not represent anyone.
The most accurate scenes in Cummins’ book bear a striking resemblance to previous books by Luis Alberto Urrea and Sonia Nazario, as I examine at length in a recent Huffington Post article (“American Dirt Isn’t Just Bad—It’s Best Parts Are Cribbed from Latino Authors”). Therein lies one of the many injustices surrounding “American Dirt.” At its strongest points, the book simply piggybacks on the work and research of previous authors. While hundreds of other emerging Mexican and Chicano authors still struggle to make a living, this book received a seven-figure advance, “to tell the migrant story.”
Since its release on Jan. 21, the book has provoked massive resistance in the literary world. Under the hashtag #DignidadLiteraria, authors are calling for greater representation of Latinos and Latinas in the literary world. On Twitter, the viral hashtag #WritingMyLatinoNovel sparked a wave of hilarious parodies of the book’s inaccuracies.
The mainstream media continues to fixate on the author’s ethnicity, despite the fact that Dirt’s critics have repeated—over and over again—that this is not the issue. Non-Mexican authors are free to write about Mexico; they just need to do their homework first. In giving precedence to Dirt over hundreds of other projects that have been proposed, the publishing industry has not given “a voice to the voiceless,” but rather, replaced authentic and well-informed voices with fantasy. This, in an age when disinformation about Mexico and migrants is already rampant.
Despite the outrage, the book currently stands at #3 on Amazon’s bestsellers list. Like any book that has received the joint blessings of Oprah and Big Lit, it is likely to sell big for a while. However, that’s not the end of the story.
On Feb. 3, authors associated with Presente.org and the #DignidadLiteraria movement held a meeting with the leadership of “Dirt”’s publishers, Flatiron Books and MacMillan Publishing. The publishers made an unprecedented commitment to increase their Latino and Latina staff and authors. The subsequent press release specified:
• “Substantially increasing Latinx representation across Macmillan, including authors, titles, staff, and its overall literary ecosystem;
• “Developing an action plan to address these objectives within 90 days;
• “Regroup[ing] within 30 days with #DignidadLiteraria and other Latinx groups to assess progress.”
The future of these changes remains to be seen. In the meantime, however, it is important to remember the wealth of authentic, well-informed voices that have been writing about Mexico and the border for decades. From Luis Alberto Urrea to David Bacon, Sonia Nazario to Valeria Luiselli, authors have already written on this topic from personal experience and in-depth research. The last 10 years of Mexican cinema has produced a wealth of films on the subject of migration: De Nadie, Sin Nombre, and La vida precoz y breve de Sabina Rivas, among others.
The world of literature and film is filled with the voices of those qualified to tell this story—there is no reason to replace those voices with fantasy.
David J. Schmidt is an author, podcaster, multilingual translator, and homebrewer who splits his time between Mexico City and San Diego, Calif. He is a proponent of fair and alternative forms of trade.
From The Progressive Populist, March 1, 2020
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