March 8, 2022 • 26 mins
Glory talks to author Deesha Philyaw about her National Book Award finalist debut collection, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies. In this episode, they explore Black women’s complex relationship with the church, how Deesha crafts her bold characters, and why writers — especially writers of color — should not play small.
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Speaker 1 (00:16):
Pushkin. Before we get started, let's talk about Pushkin Plus.
Pushkin Plus is a subscription podcast program available on Apple Podcasts.
Members will get access to exclusive bonus content like my
(00:38):
weekly bookmarks, where I talk about how I got a
book agent and what I'm watching on TV that week.
You'll get uninterrupted listening to many of your favorite podcasts
like Revisionis History, Cautionary Tales, and The Happiness Lab. Sign
up for Pushkin Plus on the show page in Apple
Podcasts or at pushkin dot com. Disha Philly y'all grew
(01:13):
up surrounded by women in Jacksonville, Florida, who would eventually
aspire her debut collection of short stories, The Secret Lives
of Church Ladies. I looked at the women who dressed
the part and acted the part, and I was like,
I'm supposed to be them, but I don't know how.
And also these women who aren't like them, they're having
(01:34):
more fun. They're going to hell, but they're having more fun.
Her collection explores the confusing double standards she experienced growing
up in the Black church, where redemption is not readily
available for women and many topics are two taboo to
discuss openly. So I was confused by church. Critics and
(01:58):
readers alike loved the revealing stories, and her book went
on to win the twenty twenty one Penn Faulkner Award
for Fiction. It's also being adapted into a mini series
for HBO Matt which I can't wait to watch. Welcome
to Well Read Black Girl, the literary kickback you didn't
even know you needed. I'm your host, Glory Adam. Each
(02:24):
week I sit in conversation with one of my favorite authors,
and among other things, we talk about the craft of writing.
In my conversation with Disha phil y'all, we talk about
both of our complex relationships with the church, how intimate
she gets with her characters, and how black women have
(02:44):
shaped her life both on and off the page. Hey girl,
how's it going. Hello, I'm great. Thank you for having me.
I am so happy to have you on the podcast
because I have questions on poon questions. I actually read
(03:07):
your book like it was like my secret treat. It
was like my own little thing that I would like
curl up in bed and read and then go to
my group text message and be like, girl, did you
get to this part? Did you read this yet? It
just it just felt so right, like being in the
church and leaning towards the teachings, but also trying to
(03:28):
understand desire and sexuality, and just like your blackness and
being full like you address all these things. It feels
like you. And granted I don't know you know you,
but I feel like I know you. Thank you, thank you.
I mean, it's such an intimate book, and that's really
what I wanted it to be. Really an intimate look
(03:49):
at black women's interior lives and how we speak, how
we speak to each other, how we, you know, talk
about ourselves. That is something so special about our work, right,
Like when we see each other, it feels immediate. It's like, oh,
like she understands. I would love to start from the
very beginning. How did reading and literature up in your childhood?
(04:12):
So I apparently read early. My mom said I could
three when I was three, and she said she read
to me a lot, but to her chagrin, I had
no recollection of being read to. But I remember reading.
I've always been really enamored with language and words early on.
You know. I read Judy Bloom like many of us do.
(04:34):
But I did get into some of James Baldwin's work
and even Tony Morrison and Alice Walker in high school,
but in elementary school, my next door neighborhood was my godmother.
She had a whole bookshelf, which for me was like
having a library at your house, which blew my mind.
And so she had adult novels. So I remember I
was eight, I read The Happy Hooker. I read Portnoy's Complaints. No,
(04:57):
not The Happy Hooker. I was reading stuff that I
had no business reading. And honestly, you know, a lot
of things that I learned about sex was from books.
I remember reading Jackie Collins novels in the library, sitting
on the floor of the public library in Jacksonville and
reading biology books, just trying to figure out this mystery,
(05:19):
you know, of sex. But other books like Louise Merriweather's
Daddy Was a Number Runner, opened up other worlds and
just let me know that there is a big world
out there, and it made me curious and let me
know that I could aspire to go places that could
actually build a life beyond the one that I had.
(05:40):
I read Terry McMillan, Jay California Cooper. You know so
many black women authors because like you said about my book,
those were the stories and the voices that spoke to
me and my experience, and people who were writing about
people that lived like we lived. Always had a very
rich reading life straight through college and into my early
(06:03):
adulthood after college, but I really didn't start writing until
my late twenties. But I have always been a reader.
You mentioned the Happy Hooker, You mentioned Jay California Cooper,
and Terry McMillan, like you had these vast examples of
black womanhood or even just girlhood and coming of age.
(06:23):
How did you come to understand what being a good
girl meant and who you are becoming as you were
reading all these things. I got so much conflicting information
about it, as we, you know, all of us do,
especially those of us who have a connection with the church,
because on the surface, what it seemed like to me
is that there were a lot of rules to be
(06:45):
a good girl. Didn't seem to be any rules for boys,
but it seemed like with girls there was so much
you couldn't do, There was so much risk, there was
so much fear, and then there seemed to be a
war inside because of course we had those natural desires
and urges, and so what I learned early on about
being a good girl is that you had to hide stuff,
(07:08):
you know. And then, of course, as kids were so
self centered and not realizing we got secrets, other people
have secrets too, you know, And that curiosity kind of
extended to the women around me too, And how were
they kind of navigating this idea that you were supposed
to be chased, that sex was reserved for marriage. I
didn't know what to make of the fact that that
(07:28):
wasn't observed by the women around me. My mother was
a single mother, my grandmother was a single mother, and
weren't they good. You know, they didn't go to church,
but they sent me to church, so clearly they were
trying to make me good, and that was a lot
of pressure. You know. My mother had me when she
was eighteen, she got pregnant when she was seventeen, so
I knew, even without her ever saying the words, that
(07:50):
the expectation was that that not happened to me, and
that you know, it'd be something that it happens to you.
You know, there's not this agency. And so it seemed
like being a good girl meant being very passive and
having a lot of desire and wanting and longing to
overcome the appearance of chastity and holiness and being untouched
(08:15):
when you know, what we want most of all, it
was to be touched, you know, yes, and that touch
isn't necessarily always a romantic desire, that is just like
an embrace of love and nourishment, you know. Absolutely. It's
really interesting to hear that your grandmother and mother didn't
go to church, but they were adamant about sending you
to church. So how would you describe your relationship with
(08:36):
the church growing up? Yeah, you know, it was one
of those things like we just accept a lot from
our parents without question. I think our generation is such
that we were to be seen and not heard. And
I only asked about that one time and my grandmother,
you know, her response let me know she didn't want
to talk about it, but what she said was when
I get myself together, when I get right, I'll go
to church. And even as a kid, I was confused
(08:58):
because I was like that, I thought church was where
you go to get right. But in retrospect, I understand
now as two single mothers, my mother and my grandmother
didn't feel welcome at church. You know, I think fear
judgment I think they felt shame, but they clearly weren't
rejecting the church's position around these things because they sent me,
(09:19):
and it was like I could be salvaged, you know, somehow.
And so I went to church and that's all I'd
ever known, and I took everything to heart about being
good and heaven and hell. But I was very terrified
because I was like, I want to get this right.
I looked at the women who dressed the part and
(09:40):
acted the part, and I was like, I'm supposed to
be them, but I don't know how. And also these
women who aren't like them, they're having more fun. They're
going to hell, but they're having more fun. So I
was confused by church. Yeah. Well, when you read the
Bible and you're taking in the messaging the teaching, it
(10:02):
can feel very binary. It's like Yavn's hell black white,
there's nothing in between. And then you're sitting there listening
to the pastor on the pulpit and you're like, how
do I choose, especially when you're young and you're just
trying to figure it all out? That's right. I have
this quote that is one of my favorite of yours
that really just embodies what you're doing with your work.
(10:26):
It's us here. The stories are the kinds of things
that black women whisper amongst ourselves. So those are the
secrets about how we navigate our full humanity, our full sexuality,
our full sexual lives in the face of the church's teachings.
What I really appreciated about your book is this idea
of exploring what it means to heal from those teachings
(10:48):
and accept yourself right. I think my healing came before
I was writing these stories. It came because I got
divorced around the time that my mother and my grandmother died.
They both died the same year, and it was the
same year that I separated from my first husband, And
(11:11):
at that point I looked at my life and it was,
you know, I married a good Christian man. I didn't
have babies or even get pregnant before I was married.
I did everything right, and yet I wasn't happy. I
felt so empty and so lonely and so sad, and
(11:31):
so those things in my relationship with the church kind
of got all tangled up together. I think inside I
had left the church years before I physically left the church,
and after my mother died, I didn't, you know, consider
myself a churchgoer anymore, And so some years later was
working on these stories. They were not as personal in
(11:55):
terms of the church stuff. There was a lot more
mother daughter stuff in the collection that was more what
was happening with me at that moment. You said something
that just made me think of this idea of more
more simply existing and not living. You know, when we
were just like moving through the motions of our lives
without actually having an appreciation for the joy or experiencing
(12:18):
the grief. It's like we're in default mode. And sometimes
it takes these like huge milestones, these huge losses, for
us to hit the reset button and start living again.
So it's like the divorce, the loss of your mother,
the loss of your grandmother, and it's like you have
to reevaluate everything, everything more. With Disha fili'all after the break,
(12:52):
I'm Glory Adam, and you're listening to well Read Black Girl. Today.
I'm joined by Disha Filiall, and we're talking about her
twenty twenty debut novel, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies,
and the inspiration behind this collection of beautiful stories. I
(13:12):
want to turn into the book because I know you
leaned a lot on your own experience within the church
and especially the elders around you to create this wonderful
collection of stories. For example, dear sister, Yeah, that's just
one of my favorite stories in the book. It says,
dear Jackie, I've started this letter about five different times
in five different ways. I finally just told myself, you're
(13:35):
either going to read it or you're not, and it's
not going to come down to how I write it.
And the way you started off this letter, I was like,
that's me, Like I do that all the time, do
that all the time. But you're writing throughout the book
is again so sharp. How did you just perfect making
it authentic and really true to the characters. I think
(13:56):
a lot of it is just from listening, especially you
mentioned the elders. And I grew up in a household
with my grandmother. You know, my grandmother and my mother
raised me. And you know that generation like you, you
don't speak, you know, you don't get grown folks business.
And so I learned that if I was just quiet,
I could stay and I could hear things that maybe
(14:18):
I wasn't supposed to hear, things that really kind of
stuck with me, and I think that black women's voices,
especially black women of a certain age, it's like music,
you know, there's just the way that we say things
that's just singular. So some of it has just been
all of those years of listening, and when it came
(14:39):
time to write the book, I was going back in
time and really being in the room with these characters,
and sometimes I would speak the dialogue, whether it was
actual dialogue or their interior monologues, you know, speaking out
loud and just hearing how would she say that, you know,
or what might that actually be like? And some of
(15:02):
these experiences or experiences that lots of us have had,
and you know, just trying to inhabit the characters in
the a moment or if I'm stuck, I'll ask my
characters questions. And a lot of times in interviewing the characters,
you know, eighty percent of what I find out may
not show up in the story, but I know them
better and so that helps me with sort of the
(15:26):
details and specificity of how they might do or say
a certain thing. You know. I try to go for
those details that are very specific and very tender because
it makes it real. I'm very visual so I visualize
the scenes, and even if it's just my character cooking something,
(15:46):
I'm watching her hands and then what is she thinking about?
You know? What am I thinking about? When I'm standing
over the stove. I get intimate with the characters, and
that helps you as a reader to get intimate with
them on the page. I'm so impressed with your tenacity.
You've been writing over like twenty years, right over, yeah,
over twenty years, and it feels, or it appears to
(16:08):
me that you just have a great sense of self discipline, impatience,
patience with you know, actually writing these stories and putting
them together in a way that you feel fit, but
also patience with yourself and your surroundings. Can you talk
about your writing journey and your relationship with patience as
a writer. I don't know that I think of it
(16:29):
as patience. I consider myself a pretty impatient person. But
what happens that I think a lot of women can
relate to if they are mothers, is there's a surrender
that kind of happens, because see patience sounds voluntarily. Surrender
is like I gave up. You know, these are the
(16:52):
cards that I have been dealt. This is the time
that I have to write. These are the realities of
trying to raise children, trying to be married, you know,
trying to balance all of those things. And the legacy
that I think too many of us as black women,
have inherited is one of servitude and long suffering. And
(17:16):
so the journey has been what it's been because I
wasn't able to do the one thing that I really
wanted to do, which was the right fiction. When I
got divorced, I needed to make a living, and so
I started doing what a lot of us do as writers,
this patchwork quilt of income, and so it became less
about these stories I wanted to tell and more about
(17:38):
what do I need to do to make money? You know,
I need to build a profile. I need to build
you know the word they use now, platform and all
of those things. And it was very slow going. I
think about so many writers that when they're able to
do it, it's because somebody else is paying the bills. Right.
It is so hard to do the kind of writing
(18:00):
that you want to do that you can be proud
of and make a living. So we have to do
other things, you know. So I've freelanced. I have written marketing,
brochure for people. I've done project manage, I've just done
all kinds of things while raising my kids, and would
always try to have some time for the fiction, you know,
(18:20):
try to squeeze it in. It took me a really
long time, but the desire was always there. The confidence
was there. Confidence came from my mother and my grandmother
passing away too soon. My mother was fifty two, and
neither of them had done the things that they wanted
(18:41):
to do. I don't even know what they wanted to do.
When my mother would talk about her life, she would
say that I was her greatest accomplishment. And I appreciate
how my mother loved me and sacrifice for me, but
I wish she had had her own goals and her
own dreams and passions and had had the opportunity to
(19:01):
pursue them. And so that's why you know, I've been
dogged because I'm like, she didn't get that chance. My
grandmother didn't get that chance. I have this chance. It
might take me longer, but I'm going to do it
and I'm not gonna play small. I don't have that luxury.
I appreciate that last tidbit because we all need these
different ways to support ourselves, to support our children, to
(19:24):
like actually move towards our dreams. And we can't be
as you said, we can't play small, like we have
to surrender to the reality of our lives, but move
towards the goal with precision and just like a passion.
I've had some complicated things happened in my past, and
I definitely have that like how did you do it?
And I agree with you. It's like, I don't know
(19:45):
if you have a choice, so we don't have time
to waste, right, It's like you have to respond when
you've lost or when you've had difficult things you you know,
it changes you. It changes your perspective, it changes your
sense of urgency. So I'm not saying that I don't
have worries or concerns, but at a certain point we
(20:06):
have to put things into perspective. And as black women,
we're doing it against the tide of a culture that
wants nothing more than for us to not prioritize ourselves,
to continue worrying about things that in the larger scheme
of things don't really matter, but that are a nice distraction.
(20:27):
But I think we just have to be daring like
that and create our own things. I mean, you know
you created well read black girl. You centered us, and
what does that say to other black women? I can
center myself in the things that I'm passionate about too.
When it's time for rapid by, uh okay, already I'm ready.
(21:01):
So literally the first thing that comes to your mind. Okay,
name three items on your desk. David Dennis's book The
Movement made Us some vitamin d oil and lighter to
light a candle. Your life's theme song, Oh goodness? You know,
(21:21):
maybe Ooh Child by the Five Stairsteps, because as a kid,
as a little kid, I love that song and it
was saying that you know, things are gonna get easier,
things are gonna get brighter, and it's just a really
optimistic song. That is a good song. Oh favorite church
snacks Runner Scotch Okay, most memorable church lady, Oh my gosh,
(21:45):
she was my first husband's maternal grandmother, Odessa May Thomas.
Favorite book of all time and why of all time?
Oh my gosh, Daddy was a number runner Louise Merriweather Classic.
Read that book to the covers and pages fell out.
I have owned several copies. Okay, this is the last one,
(22:07):
and it's a film. One which movie the Fighting Temptations
or Kingdom Come, Kingdom Come, that's the one with LLL right,
because even though he has disappointed me later in life,
not the disappointment. Listen, the summer I was fifteen, I
played I Need Love over and over again in my
(22:30):
room because I knew he was singing to me. So
I will always love cool James. Oh, I love that.
Thank you for this conversation, but also just thank you
for all you do for us. Thank you. That means
a lot, Like always so wonderful to come out and
(22:52):
like actually talk to folks and be in like you know,
communion and community. It just feels really good. Now. I
love doing this because I can actually like see people again.
You know. The pandemic has changed so much and it's
made me feel distance. Oh we are going through it.
Oh yeah, we are still going through it, and we're
still showing up for each other and making art and
(23:17):
celebrating art. It's because these are the things that we
can still do safely. You know. We can read, we
can write, we can talk to each other right right.
We can't hold each other right now, but we can
hold each other in our hearts, you know what I mean,
and life just appreciate our work together and still celebrate
each other. So I'm grateful for that. As Black women,
(23:38):
we really do not have time to play small, to
dim our light, to not go after the things we
want in life. Disha Philliall's own hardships were a reminder
for her to move forward and go after her dream
of writing fiction and now Disha's work helps us look
at the walking contradictions in our own lives and even
(24:00):
teaches us how to learn from our mothers and grandmothers
to be better versions of ourselves. Her work reminds me
of the prolific writer Margaret Walker, where in her nineteen
eighty nine poem Lineage, she calls upon her grandmother's My
grandmothers are full of memories, smelling of soap and onions
(24:23):
and wet clay, with veins rolling roughly over quick hands.
They have many clean words to say. My grandmother's were strong,
Why am I not? As they be sure to read
Disha Filiol's The Secret Lies of Church Ladies out now.
(24:46):
We're off next week, so look out for our next
episode on Tuesday, March twenty second. I will be speaking
with britt Bennett about her latest book, The Vanishing Half.
Well Read black Girl is a production of Pushkin Industries.
(25:08):
It is written and hosted by me Glory Edam and
produced by cher Vincent and Brittany Brown. Our associate editor
is Keishall Williams. Our engineer is Amanda ka Wayang, and
our showrunner is Sasha Matthias. Our executive producers are Miya
Lobell and Leetal Molad. At Pushkin thanks to Heather Fane,
(25:32):
Harley Migliori, Jason Gambrel, Julia Barton, Jen Goerra, John Schnars,
and Jacob Wiseberg. You can find me on Twitter and
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and all social media platforms at pushkin Pods, and you
can sign up for our newsletter at pushkin dot Fm.
(25:54):
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to check out my exclusive bookmark series on Pushkin Plus
(26:17):
starting on February eighteenth, you'll hear extended interviews with book
club members, bookstore owners, and more. And do you get
to hear what's on my mind, what's on my radar,
and of course, what's on my reading list? Each week.
To find more Pushkin podcasts, listen on iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(26:38):
or wherever you like to listen
Pushkin. Before we get started, let's talk about Pushkin Plus.
Pushkin Plus is a subscription podcast program available on Apple Podcasts.
Members will get access to exclusive bonus content like my
(00:38):
weekly bookmarks, where I talk about how I got a
book agent and what I'm watching on TV that week.
You'll get uninterrupted listening to many of your favorite podcasts
like Revisionis History, Cautionary Tales, and The Happiness Lab. Sign
up for Pushkin Plus on the show page in Apple
Podcasts or at pushkin dot com. Disha Philly y'all grew
(01:13):
up surrounded by women in Jacksonville, Florida, who would eventually
aspire her debut collection of short stories, The Secret Lives
of Church Ladies. I looked at the women who dressed
the part and acted the part, and I was like,
I'm supposed to be them, but I don't know how.
And also these women who aren't like them, they're having
(01:34):
more fun. They're going to hell, but they're having more fun.
Her collection explores the confusing double standards she experienced growing
up in the Black church, where redemption is not readily
available for women and many topics are two taboo to
discuss openly. So I was confused by church. Critics and
(01:58):
readers alike loved the revealing stories, and her book went
on to win the twenty twenty one Penn Faulkner Award
for Fiction. It's also being adapted into a mini series
for HBO Matt which I can't wait to watch. Welcome
to Well Read Black Girl, the literary kickback you didn't
even know you needed. I'm your host, Glory Adam. Each
(02:24):
week I sit in conversation with one of my favorite authors,
and among other things, we talk about the craft of writing.
In my conversation with Disha phil y'all, we talk about
both of our complex relationships with the church, how intimate
she gets with her characters, and how black women have
(02:44):
shaped her life both on and off the page. Hey girl,
how's it going. Hello, I'm great. Thank you for having me.
I am so happy to have you on the podcast
because I have questions on poon questions. I actually read
(03:07):
your book like it was like my secret treat. It
was like my own little thing that I would like
curl up in bed and read and then go to
my group text message and be like, girl, did you
get to this part? Did you read this yet? It
just it just felt so right, like being in the
church and leaning towards the teachings, but also trying to
(03:28):
understand desire and sexuality, and just like your blackness and
being full like you address all these things. It feels
like you. And granted I don't know you know you,
but I feel like I know you. Thank you, thank you.
I mean, it's such an intimate book, and that's really
what I wanted it to be. Really an intimate look
(03:49):
at black women's interior lives and how we speak, how
we speak to each other, how we, you know, talk
about ourselves. That is something so special about our work, right,
Like when we see each other, it feels immediate. It's like, oh,
like she understands. I would love to start from the
very beginning. How did reading and literature up in your childhood?
(04:12):
So I apparently read early. My mom said I could
three when I was three, and she said she read
to me a lot, but to her chagrin, I had
no recollection of being read to. But I remember reading.
I've always been really enamored with language and words early on.
You know. I read Judy Bloom like many of us do.
(04:34):
But I did get into some of James Baldwin's work
and even Tony Morrison and Alice Walker in high school,
but in elementary school, my next door neighborhood was my godmother.
She had a whole bookshelf, which for me was like
having a library at your house, which blew my mind.
And so she had adult novels. So I remember I
was eight, I read The Happy Hooker. I read Portnoy's Complaints. No,
(04:57):
not The Happy Hooker. I was reading stuff that I
had no business reading. And honestly, you know, a lot
of things that I learned about sex was from books.
I remember reading Jackie Collins novels in the library, sitting
on the floor of the public library in Jacksonville and
reading biology books, just trying to figure out this mystery,
(05:19):
you know, of sex. But other books like Louise Merriweather's
Daddy Was a Number Runner, opened up other worlds and
just let me know that there is a big world
out there, and it made me curious and let me
know that I could aspire to go places that could
actually build a life beyond the one that I had.
(05:40):
I read Terry McMillan, Jay California Cooper. You know so
many black women authors because like you said about my book,
those were the stories and the voices that spoke to
me and my experience, and people who were writing about
people that lived like we lived. Always had a very
rich reading life straight through college and into my early
(06:03):
adulthood after college, but I really didn't start writing until
my late twenties. But I have always been a reader.
You mentioned the Happy Hooker, You mentioned Jay California Cooper,
and Terry McMillan, like you had these vast examples of
black womanhood or even just girlhood and coming of age.
(06:23):
How did you come to understand what being a good
girl meant and who you are becoming as you were
reading all these things. I got so much conflicting information
about it, as we, you know, all of us do,
especially those of us who have a connection with the church,
because on the surface, what it seemed like to me
is that there were a lot of rules to be
(06:45):
a good girl. Didn't seem to be any rules for boys,
but it seemed like with girls there was so much
you couldn't do, There was so much risk, there was
so much fear, and then there seemed to be a
war inside because of course we had those natural desires
and urges, and so what I learned early on about
being a good girl is that you had to hide stuff,
(07:08):
you know. And then, of course, as kids were so
self centered and not realizing we got secrets, other people
have secrets too, you know, And that curiosity kind of
extended to the women around me too, And how were
they kind of navigating this idea that you were supposed
to be chased, that sex was reserved for marriage. I
didn't know what to make of the fact that that
(07:28):
wasn't observed by the women around me. My mother was
a single mother, my grandmother was a single mother, and
weren't they good. You know, they didn't go to church,
but they sent me to church, so clearly they were
trying to make me good, and that was a lot
of pressure. You know. My mother had me when she
was eighteen, she got pregnant when she was seventeen, so
I knew, even without her ever saying the words, that
(07:50):
the expectation was that that not happened to me, and
that you know, it'd be something that it happens to you.
You know, there's not this agency. And so it seemed
like being a good girl meant being very passive and
having a lot of desire and wanting and longing to
overcome the appearance of chastity and holiness and being untouched
(08:15):
when you know, what we want most of all, it
was to be touched, you know, yes, and that touch
isn't necessarily always a romantic desire, that is just like
an embrace of love and nourishment, you know. Absolutely. It's
really interesting to hear that your grandmother and mother didn't
go to church, but they were adamant about sending you
to church. So how would you describe your relationship with
(08:36):
the church growing up? Yeah, you know, it was one
of those things like we just accept a lot from
our parents without question. I think our generation is such
that we were to be seen and not heard. And
I only asked about that one time and my grandmother,
you know, her response let me know she didn't want
to talk about it, but what she said was when
I get myself together, when I get right, I'll go
to church. And even as a kid, I was confused
(08:58):
because I was like that, I thought church was where
you go to get right. But in retrospect, I understand
now as two single mothers, my mother and my grandmother
didn't feel welcome at church. You know, I think fear
judgment I think they felt shame, but they clearly weren't
rejecting the church's position around these things because they sent me,
(09:19):
and it was like I could be salvaged, you know, somehow.
And so I went to church and that's all I'd
ever known, and I took everything to heart about being
good and heaven and hell. But I was very terrified
because I was like, I want to get this right.
I looked at the women who dressed the part and
(09:40):
acted the part, and I was like, I'm supposed to
be them, but I don't know how. And also these
women who aren't like them, they're having more fun. They're
going to hell, but they're having more fun. So I
was confused by church. Yeah. Well, when you read the
Bible and you're taking in the messaging the teaching, it
(10:02):
can feel very binary. It's like Yavn's hell black white,
there's nothing in between. And then you're sitting there listening
to the pastor on the pulpit and you're like, how
do I choose, especially when you're young and you're just
trying to figure it all out? That's right. I have
this quote that is one of my favorite of yours
that really just embodies what you're doing with your work.
(10:26):
It's us here. The stories are the kinds of things
that black women whisper amongst ourselves. So those are the
secrets about how we navigate our full humanity, our full sexuality,
our full sexual lives in the face of the church's teachings.
What I really appreciated about your book is this idea
of exploring what it means to heal from those teachings
(10:48):
and accept yourself right. I think my healing came before
I was writing these stories. It came because I got
divorced around the time that my mother and my grandmother died.
They both died the same year, and it was the
same year that I separated from my first husband, And
(11:11):
at that point I looked at my life and it was,
you know, I married a good Christian man. I didn't
have babies or even get pregnant before I was married.
I did everything right, and yet I wasn't happy. I
felt so empty and so lonely and so sad, and
(11:31):
so those things in my relationship with the church kind
of got all tangled up together. I think inside I
had left the church years before I physically left the church,
and after my mother died, I didn't, you know, consider
myself a churchgoer anymore, And so some years later was
working on these stories. They were not as personal in
(11:55):
terms of the church stuff. There was a lot more
mother daughter stuff in the collection that was more what
was happening with me at that moment. You said something
that just made me think of this idea of more
more simply existing and not living. You know, when we
were just like moving through the motions of our lives
without actually having an appreciation for the joy or experiencing
(12:18):
the grief. It's like we're in default mode. And sometimes
it takes these like huge milestones, these huge losses, for
us to hit the reset button and start living again.
So it's like the divorce, the loss of your mother,
the loss of your grandmother, and it's like you have
to reevaluate everything, everything more. With Disha fili'all after the break,
(12:52):
I'm Glory Adam, and you're listening to well Read Black Girl. Today.
I'm joined by Disha Filiall, and we're talking about her
twenty twenty debut novel, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies,
and the inspiration behind this collection of beautiful stories. I
(13:12):
want to turn into the book because I know you
leaned a lot on your own experience within the church
and especially the elders around you to create this wonderful
collection of stories. For example, dear sister, Yeah, that's just
one of my favorite stories in the book. It says,
dear Jackie, I've started this letter about five different times
in five different ways. I finally just told myself, you're
(13:35):
either going to read it or you're not, and it's
not going to come down to how I write it.
And the way you started off this letter, I was like,
that's me, Like I do that all the time, do
that all the time. But you're writing throughout the book
is again so sharp. How did you just perfect making
it authentic and really true to the characters. I think
(13:56):
a lot of it is just from listening, especially you
mentioned the elders. And I grew up in a household
with my grandmother. You know, my grandmother and my mother
raised me. And you know that generation like you, you
don't speak, you know, you don't get grown folks business.
And so I learned that if I was just quiet,
I could stay and I could hear things that maybe
(14:18):
I wasn't supposed to hear, things that really kind of
stuck with me, and I think that black women's voices,
especially black women of a certain age, it's like music,
you know, there's just the way that we say things
that's just singular. So some of it has just been
all of those years of listening, and when it came
(14:39):
time to write the book, I was going back in
time and really being in the room with these characters,
and sometimes I would speak the dialogue, whether it was
actual dialogue or their interior monologues, you know, speaking out
loud and just hearing how would she say that, you know,
or what might that actually be like? And some of
(15:02):
these experiences or experiences that lots of us have had,
and you know, just trying to inhabit the characters in
the a moment or if I'm stuck, I'll ask my
characters questions. And a lot of times in interviewing the characters,
you know, eighty percent of what I find out may
not show up in the story, but I know them
better and so that helps me with sort of the
(15:26):
details and specificity of how they might do or say
a certain thing. You know. I try to go for
those details that are very specific and very tender because
it makes it real. I'm very visual so I visualize
the scenes, and even if it's just my character cooking something,
(15:46):
I'm watching her hands and then what is she thinking about?
You know? What am I thinking about? When I'm standing
over the stove. I get intimate with the characters, and
that helps you as a reader to get intimate with
them on the page. I'm so impressed with your tenacity.
You've been writing over like twenty years, right over, yeah,
over twenty years, and it feels, or it appears to
(16:08):
me that you just have a great sense of self discipline, impatience,
patience with you know, actually writing these stories and putting
them together in a way that you feel fit, but
also patience with yourself and your surroundings. Can you talk
about your writing journey and your relationship with patience as
a writer. I don't know that I think of it
(16:29):
as patience. I consider myself a pretty impatient person. But
what happens that I think a lot of women can
relate to if they are mothers, is there's a surrender
that kind of happens, because see patience sounds voluntarily. Surrender
is like I gave up. You know, these are the
(16:52):
cards that I have been dealt. This is the time
that I have to write. These are the realities of
trying to raise children, trying to be married, you know,
trying to balance all of those things. And the legacy
that I think too many of us as black women,
have inherited is one of servitude and long suffering. And
(17:16):
so the journey has been what it's been because I
wasn't able to do the one thing that I really
wanted to do, which was the right fiction. When I
got divorced, I needed to make a living, and so
I started doing what a lot of us do as writers,
this patchwork quilt of income, and so it became less
about these stories I wanted to tell and more about
(17:38):
what do I need to do to make money? You know,
I need to build a profile. I need to build
you know the word they use now, platform and all
of those things. And it was very slow going. I
think about so many writers that when they're able to
do it, it's because somebody else is paying the bills. Right.
It is so hard to do the kind of writing
(18:00):
that you want to do that you can be proud
of and make a living. So we have to do
other things, you know. So I've freelanced. I have written marketing,
brochure for people. I've done project manage, I've just done
all kinds of things while raising my kids, and would
always try to have some time for the fiction, you know,
(18:20):
try to squeeze it in. It took me a really
long time, but the desire was always there. The confidence
was there. Confidence came from my mother and my grandmother
passing away too soon. My mother was fifty two, and
neither of them had done the things that they wanted
(18:41):
to do. I don't even know what they wanted to do.
When my mother would talk about her life, she would
say that I was her greatest accomplishment. And I appreciate
how my mother loved me and sacrifice for me, but
I wish she had had her own goals and her
own dreams and passions and had had the opportunity to
(19:01):
pursue them. And so that's why you know, I've been
dogged because I'm like, she didn't get that chance. My
grandmother didn't get that chance. I have this chance. It
might take me longer, but I'm going to do it
and I'm not gonna play small. I don't have that luxury.
I appreciate that last tidbit because we all need these
different ways to support ourselves, to support our children, to
(19:24):
like actually move towards our dreams. And we can't be
as you said, we can't play small, like we have
to surrender to the reality of our lives, but move
towards the goal with precision and just like a passion.
I've had some complicated things happened in my past, and
I definitely have that like how did you do it?
And I agree with you. It's like, I don't know
(19:45):
if you have a choice, so we don't have time
to waste, right, It's like you have to respond when
you've lost or when you've had difficult things you you know,
it changes you. It changes your perspective, it changes your
sense of urgency. So I'm not saying that I don't
have worries or concerns, but at a certain point we
(20:06):
have to put things into perspective. And as black women,
we're doing it against the tide of a culture that
wants nothing more than for us to not prioritize ourselves,
to continue worrying about things that in the larger scheme
of things don't really matter, but that are a nice distraction.
(20:27):
But I think we just have to be daring like
that and create our own things. I mean, you know
you created well read black girl. You centered us, and
what does that say to other black women? I can
center myself in the things that I'm passionate about too.
When it's time for rapid by, uh okay, already I'm ready.
(21:01):
So literally the first thing that comes to your mind. Okay,
name three items on your desk. David Dennis's book The
Movement made Us some vitamin d oil and lighter to
light a candle. Your life's theme song, Oh goodness? You know,
(21:21):
maybe Ooh Child by the Five Stairsteps, because as a kid,
as a little kid, I love that song and it
was saying that you know, things are gonna get easier,
things are gonna get brighter, and it's just a really
optimistic song. That is a good song. Oh favorite church
snacks Runner Scotch Okay, most memorable church lady, Oh my gosh,
(21:45):
she was my first husband's maternal grandmother, Odessa May Thomas.
Favorite book of all time and why of all time?
Oh my gosh, Daddy was a number runner Louise Merriweather Classic.
Read that book to the covers and pages fell out.
I have owned several copies. Okay, this is the last one,
(22:07):
and it's a film. One which movie the Fighting Temptations
or Kingdom Come, Kingdom Come, that's the one with LLL right,
because even though he has disappointed me later in life,
not the disappointment. Listen, the summer I was fifteen, I
played I Need Love over and over again in my
(22:30):
room because I knew he was singing to me. So
I will always love cool James. Oh, I love that.
Thank you for this conversation, but also just thank you
for all you do for us. Thank you. That means
a lot, Like always so wonderful to come out and
(22:52):
like actually talk to folks and be in like you know,
communion and community. It just feels really good. Now. I
love doing this because I can actually like see people again.
You know. The pandemic has changed so much and it's
made me feel distance. Oh we are going through it.
Oh yeah, we are still going through it, and we're
still showing up for each other and making art and
(23:17):
celebrating art. It's because these are the things that we
can still do safely. You know. We can read, we
can write, we can talk to each other right right.
We can't hold each other right now, but we can
hold each other in our hearts, you know what I mean,
and life just appreciate our work together and still celebrate
each other. So I'm grateful for that. As Black women,
(23:38):
we really do not have time to play small, to
dim our light, to not go after the things we
want in life. Disha Philliall's own hardships were a reminder
for her to move forward and go after her dream
of writing fiction and now Disha's work helps us look
at the walking contradictions in our own lives and even
(24:00):
teaches us how to learn from our mothers and grandmothers
to be better versions of ourselves. Her work reminds me
of the prolific writer Margaret Walker, where in her nineteen
eighty nine poem Lineage, she calls upon her grandmother's My
grandmothers are full of memories, smelling of soap and onions
(24:23):
and wet clay, with veins rolling roughly over quick hands.
They have many clean words to say. My grandmother's were strong,
Why am I not? As they be sure to read
Disha Filiol's The Secret Lies of Church Ladies out now.
(24:46):
We're off next week, so look out for our next
episode on Tuesday, March twenty second. I will be speaking
with britt Bennett about her latest book, The Vanishing Half.
Well Read black Girl is a production of Pushkin Industries.
(25:08):
It is written and hosted by me Glory Edam and
produced by cher Vincent and Brittany Brown. Our associate editor
is Keishall Williams. Our engineer is Amanda ka Wayang, and
our showrunner is Sasha Matthias. Our executive producers are Miya
Lobell and Leetal Molad. At Pushkin thanks to Heather Fane,
(25:32):
Harley Migliori, Jason Gambrel, Julia Barton, Jen Goerra, John Schnars,
and Jacob Wiseberg. You can find me on Twitter and
Instagram at Well Read black Girl. You can find pushkin
and all social media platforms at pushkin Pods, and you
can sign up for our newsletter at pushkin dot Fm.
(25:54):
If you love this show and others from Pushkin Industry,
consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin Plus is a podcast
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ninety nine a month. Look for Pushkin Plus on Apple
podcast subscripts, and if you're already a subscriber, make sure
to check out my exclusive bookmark series on Pushkin Plus
(26:17):
starting on February eighteenth, you'll hear extended interviews with book
club members, bookstore owners, and more. And do you get
to hear what's on my mind, what's on my radar,
and of course, what's on my reading list? Each week.
To find more Pushkin podcasts, listen on iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(26:38):
or wherever you like to listen
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