Brit Bennett’s novel ‘The Vanishing Half’ combines fiction, history in examining passingPosted in Articles, Interviews, Media Archive, Passing, United States, Women on 2021-12-08 20:49Z by Steven |
Brit Bennett’s novel ‘The Vanishing Half’ combines fiction, history in examining passing
The Columbus Dispatch
Columbus, Ohio
2021-12-05
Nancy Gilson, Special to The Columbus Dispatch
Brit Bennett Miranda Barnes
In Brit Bennett’s novel “The Vanishing Half,” light-skinned African American twin sisters are separated when one of them decides to pass as white, leaving her family behind.
The novel, which delves deeply into the concept of identity, was a New York Times best-seller and designated as one of the newspaper’s best books of 2020.
Bennett, 31, who grew up in southern California, attended Stanford University and the University of Michigan and now lives in New York. She published her debut novel, “The Mothers,” in 2016. She has written numerous essays, including “I Don’t Know What to Do With Good White People” and “Addy Walker, An American Girl,” about the Pleasant Company’s first Black doll.
These days, Bennett is working on her third novel and occasionally appears in public events, mostly virtual, such as her event Sunday presented by the Columbus Metropolitan Library. She spoke recently by telephone with The Dispatch…
Read the entire interview here.