Search results

The Price of the Ticket

by Kia Corthron

Originally published in the July/August 2016 issue of The Dramatist

Three years ago I was standing in the lobby of a theater, the typical Broadway cluster-mob awaiting entrance, with more than half the horde African-American. This would be logical, as the show was the musical revue After Midnight, a refurbishing of a prior concert piece entitled Cotton Club Parade celebrating Ellington-era jazz and dance. Inside, my sister and I were led to our orchestra seats, and I looked around: not another black face in sight. It took me a moment to realize that The Mystery of the Vanishing Black Folks likely would have been quickly resolved had we moved up to the balconies. But from where I sat, observing the complexion of the performers versus that of the onlookers, it was the Cotton Club, the Colors entertaining the Caucasians, and that the upper tiers may have been filled with black faces was not exactly comforting, an economically induced throwback to Jim Crow segregation with African Americans relegated to the peanut gallery.

A newsletter from our publisher.

A newsletter from our publisher.

The refrain we hear over and over, in the United States at least, is that people today are apathetic about politics. Yet it turns out that this is far from the case. Voters in the U.S. and in democracies around the world are more engaged in politics than they've ever been. The catch is that they're disillusioned with the democratic process itself. Only 33% of Europeans have faith in the EU. The U.S. Congress has a 69% negative rating. So what gives? In Against Elections, set to be published on April 17th, David Van Reybrouck diagnoses the symptoms of our ailing democracies and comes up with a radical solution: drawing lots, rather than voting, to determine our politicians, just as the ancient Athenians did. Here as an exclusive excerpt on the Seven Stories Blog is the book's introduction, from former Secretary-General of the United Nations Kofi Annan, and the first chapter of Van Reybrouck's book. 

"I grew up in the colonies and I may not have learned politically correct English, but I did learn that imperialism always comes bearing the best intentions. It kindly enlightens the benighted, as it offers to cure their frustrations. But to be cured, savages must first mime the idiocies of their conquerors: trade when they trade, pray where they pray."

The Seven Stories fiction list began with Nelson Algren stories, with titles like "The Face on the Barroom Floor" and "The Lightless Room." These are not exactly beach reads, nor are the books you'll find below. What you will find are novels rooted in this world, presenting the dignity of people struggling to make sense of it and in one way or another to change it.

So, this is another kind of summer fiction list. We hope you'll find much that will challenge, inspire, and engage, in times of darkness and of light.

All titles 50% off for one week only, through June 14, 5:00PM EST.

A newsletter from our publisher.