Paul Beatty's Satire, Complete with Drive-Thru Funerals and the Last Surviving Little Rascal
The Sellout follows the story of one man's quest to get his hometown, the "agrarian ghetto" of Dickens, California, put back on the map after its unceremonious removal. He enlists the help of Dickens' only celebrity resident, Hominy Jenkins, the last surviving original cast member of "The Little Rascals." As Paul Beatty's plot unfolds, so does his particular sense of satirical humor... with the protagonist becoming a slave owner, seeking to reestablish racial segregation, and taking his fight all the way to the Supreme Court. The novel earned Paul Beatty the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. The poet and author answers all of your questions about his career, and about the book!
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