When Roxane Gay walks onto the stage at City Recital Hall, the audience greets her with a thunderous round of applause. It’s rare for writers to receive the rockstar treatment — particularly prior to performance — but Gay, author of the wildly popular book Bad Feminist, has clearly struck a chord with her audience. The applause rolls on in waves and it’s quite some time before her interviewer, essayist Durga Chew-Bose, is able to pose her first question at her Sydney Writers’ Festival event.
What follows is a warm, intelligent and incredibly funny dialogue. There is great chemistry between Chew-Bose and Gay — their conversation naturally flows across a broad array of topics, including The Bachelorette, the politics of writing as a woman of colour and, of course, Gay’s new book, a work of fiction aptly titled Difficult Women.
While Gay’s sense of humour brings an engaging levity to the back-and-forth, the conversation is strongest when she grapples more seriously with questions of feminism. Gay is an eloquent, articulate and considered speaker. Her insights into what it means for a woman to be ‘too much’ and our culture’s tendency to pathologise women who transcend their accepted gender role make for incredible food for thought.
The other highlight of this event is audience participation. I’ve attended a number of Sydney Writer’s Festival events over the years, and while audiences are generally attentive, I’ve never seen engagement at quite this level before. When the floor is opened to the audience for Q&A, people surge forth to ask Gay questions both large and small. We hear about what she’s currently reading and listening to (Isadora by Amelia Gray and Bruno Mars), her thoughts on how white women can best be allies to women of colour (stop asking women of colour how and use your common sense), and what young writers can do to combat their often precarious financial situations (get a day job).
In all, this was a thought-provoking, lively conversation between two extremely intelligent women. I’ve yet to read Gay’s latest offering, but after attending this event, it was impossible not to pick up a copy of Difficult Women on the way out of the venue.
– Vee
Vee is a Sydney-based writer/editor. When she’s not out and about, she can usually be found drinking coffee and pretending to work on her new novel. @VeeNaidoo
The Sydney Writers’ Festival runs 22-28 May 2017. Read our guide for the top picks.
