I never set out to be the first black writer of fantasy and sword-and-sorcery fiction. The position had remained open for quite a while, and when I began to write for the purpose of publication (as opposed to school assignments and personal scribbling), it was still there, and mine for the taking.The road that led me there featured plenty of twists and turns, but the direction in which it led was always plain. I started reading science fiction in the late 1950s, when I was what is today called a “tween.” Andre Norton’s young-adult novels grabbed me right away. Isaac Asimov was still a bit over my head (pun partially intended). I was probably the only black kid within a 100-mile radius to regularly read Famous Monsters of Filmland …When the Edgar Rice Burroughs boom hit in the early 1960s, I was in high school. The Robert E. Howard boom of the late ’60s came during my college years. So did the Lord of the Rings booms. All these booms reverberated as I absorbed them, and kindled my interest in fantasy. As well, the idea of becoming a writer slowly formed in my mind.I still enjoyed science fiction, from hard SF to Harlan Ellison. But fantasy spoke to something deeper inside me … something that stirred, and needed to come out.Something else was speaking, too. The late 1960s were a time of upheaval and change in many areas, including race relations. Pride in black and African history and culture blossomed; and this, too, influenced me. As a result, I began to take a more critical view of the literary otherworlds in which I had spent so much time.From this new perspective, I realized that blacks and Africans were either absent from most fantasy and sword-and-sorcery – or present in such blatantly racist and stereotypical ways that absence would have been a preferable alternative. Suddenly, those otherworlds appeared less inviting.At that point, I could have simply walked away from the genre. I didn’t. Instead, I started writing fantasy and sword-and-sorcery of my own. Go figure.Actually, it was almost inevitable that this is what I would do. The confluence of my reading preferences, the African background I’d been studying and collecting, and my need to express myself in writing occurred in the early 1970s.That’s when I stepped into the vacancy described above. I developed a setting – an alternate-world Africa called Nyumbani. And I created my main character, a black warrior named Imaro.Now, if no strides had been made since the time of Burroughs and Howard, this narrative would stop now, because my work would never have been published – not even in the small-press magazines that gave me my start. The editors would not have read my manuscripts beyond the first couple of pages.But strides had been made, and my manuscripts were read. Some were accepted, some rejected. Just about all of them were what would today be called “Africentric.” I didn’t byline my stories with “Charles R. Saunders, BLACK WRITER.” But I hardly kept my ethnicity a deep, dark secret.Gradually, through the mid-1970s to the ’80s, my one-man march progressed, from appearances in low-circulation zines to ones with larger print runs; from appearances in anthologies to three novels published by DAW Books. The novels were about Imaro, who is my counterpart to Conan the barbarian and the antithesis of Tarzan of the Apes.The books received mostly positive reviews. But DAW discontinued the series because sales weren’t strong enough. Did race have anything to do with that problem? Were fantasy readers – an overwhelmingly white population – more willing to buy a book with an orc on its cover than one with a black man? I didn’t know then, and I don’t know now. At any rate, the DAW debacle derailed my progress as a fiction-writer for nearly two decades.I’m going to digress for a moment, and talk about bad reviews. I’ve had some, and contrary to conventional protocol, I do take them personally, even though I know that in nearly all cases, the reviewer does not know me as an individual. Regardless of that, part of me is in every piece of work I put out in public. The same holds true with any creative work, be it a song, story, or painting. I take praise personally, so why shouldn’t I take criticism personally as well? The key is to recognize that reality for what it is, then move on.I admit I haven’t always practiced what I preach. Back in the days when I was heavily involved in fandom, I would get into raging print wars with people whose criticism I didn’t like. Did I have a chip on my shoulder? Yep, and a big one at that.That chip finally became too heavy, and I laid it down. Now, I only respond to negative reviews in my mind, when I’m alone in a room. In that venue, I basically cuss the reviewer out. I may reread the review later, and see that some legitimate points were made. In that case, I take back the private profanity. If, no matter how hard I look, I can’t find any validity in the criticism, I cuss the reviewer out again, then put the whole thing behind me – preferably when I am on the commode.Eventually, I understood that openly responding to those types of reviews only rewards the reviewer, who gets a two-for-one deal: slagging my work, then getting a rise out of me in the bargain. These days, I only respond in print if a review contains fallacies – or if I find it so offensive that I don’t give a damn how much my reaction stimulates the critic.As for reviews by people who admit they didn’t finish reading the book – and I’ve had a couple of those – my in-the-mind response is: “I tried to read your review, but I couldn’t finish it. Thank you very much, and have a nice day.”Hmm. I guess that digression lasted longer than a moment. Back to the main narrative.After my hiatus from the fantasy field, I made a comeback a few years ago. Night Shade Books re-published my first two Imaro novels – which I had revised – and made plans to publish all five books in the series (I had written a fourth book in the 1980s, and finished a fifth one last year). But Night Shade discontinued the series, because the books weren’t selling enough copies.Talk about deja vu. Yet again, amazing reviews and anemic sales. But I’m not licked yet. I intend to bring the rest of the Imaro books out via print-on-demand. I’ve already published a print-on-demand book about a black Amazon named Dossouye.But you know, one thing the Night Shade people told me was pretty disturbing. They said the response they got from far too many bookstores, distributors and potential reviewers was: “Fantasy is a white realm.” Night Shade didn’t like that response one bit, and neither do I. If Night Shade thought fantasy is a “white realm,” they wouldn’t have considered publishing my books in the first place, and wouldn’t have tried so hard to market them.I refuse to accept a segregated characterization of the genre in which I am so deeply involved. To do so would be an acceptance of defeat. I’m getting on in years now, but the flame that ignited when I started is still going strong. Also, I was the first writer of in the genre (Samuel R. Delany was the first in science fiction), but I’m no longer the only one.Fantasy is not a “white realm.” It’s a world realm. Fantasy is a continuation of, and an elaboration on, the mythology and folklore that constituted humankind’s first literature – tales told by firelight thousands of years ago, when our species first developed the articulate speech and complex thought that won us the world. Europe is not the only place with a rich and ancient tradition of such stories. These traditions exist everywhere, and there’s no reason why the fantasy genre shouldn’t be open to drawing deeply from more than one well.I’ve had my highs and lows over my four-decade-long journey as a writer of fantasy and sword-and-sorcery – or, as I call my variant of it, sword-and-soul. If I had the choice of doing it all over again, I would in a heartbeat, disappointments notwithstanding.And I’m happy to share what I’ve done with people of all complexions and connections.
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