Granta Magazine online has just published this phenomenal conversation between Momtaza Mehri and m nourbeSe philip, reflecting on writing, editing and performing Zong!:
nourbeSe philip: "Zong! by m nourbeSe philip, as told to the author by Setaey Adamu Boateng. Yes? So, as you mentioned, with this white male voice, I turn that trope on its head. It’s the ancestor who is now telling the story, and some of it is told to her by the white man. She filters the story now, which is a reversal of what traditionally happened where it’s the formerly enslaved who is telling the white person the story who then presents it to the world. So that was one aspect of it. The second aspect that came to mind is that this is a text that has to contaminate us. We’re all contaminated in different ways by this horrific experience. And so having that European voice in there is one of the aspects of that contamination."