I don't believe in comedy as a TV genre - I think there's drama that is funny. Because beyond the laughs, there has to be cost, and there has to be heart.
Michaela CoelRead
In Britain, we need to start presenting the option of being a writer in front of black women. We need to present the idea of being a writer into poorer communities because the majority of black people in this country are working class. We need to let working-class people know that their voices are important.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of representing writers from underrepresented communities, particularly black women and working-class individuals.
Michaela Coel highlights the need for greater representation and acknowledgment of diverse voices in literature, particularly among black women and working-class communities. She advocates for initiatives that inspire and support these groups to pursue writing as a valid and valuable career option, emphasizing that everyone’s story matters and deserves to be told.
In practice
In a speech to inspire young writers, one might cite this quote to emphasize the importance of diversity in literature.
I don't believe in comedy as a TV genre - I think there's drama that is funny. Because beyond the laughs, there has to be cost, and there has to be heart.
I wanted to write a show about an estate that wasn't sad or morbid, like a lot of shows portray working class life to be.
When you've got African parents, you go to uni, do finance, and go into accounting. But I'm not good with systems. I dropped out in my final year of college to become a Christian poet. Then went back to do my A-levels and went to uni in Birmingham to do political science and theology. I lasted 12 weeks.
Growing up on our estate, we were all different colours, but we were all really poor. I never really realised that black was a problem for some people.
We live in a world where if you're white, an upper-class male of extreme privilege, and able-bodied, and you're nothing that takes you away from that norm, then you're going to have - then the world will not assign you problems because of what you are. That is actually the world we live in.
Where I grew up, in Aldgate, east London, one of the poorest boroughs in the country, I saw lots that was real - the bankers with their briefcases, the man next door with five wives, the illegal immigrants in Flat 5. I'm from a world you rarely see on screen, and I want to show it off.
They will not stop me, I will get my education, if it is in home, school or any place
The entering class I joined in 1956 included just nine women, up from five in the then second-year class, and only one African American. All professors, in those now-ancient days, were of the same race and sex.
When I travel, I make certain that I spend at least half of my time in the field. You have to get out to meet people that are in poverty, that are looking to improve their lives. That's something that you can't read in books.
Future generation is the most important thing.
Reading to our children and our grandchildren is something we can all try to do every day of the year. Not only does it give us pleasure but it leads them on a voyage of discovery and enrichment that only books can bring.
Reading is the gateway to so many things that helps makes it possible for seven billion people to live together on one planet. Literature is the great extra-somatic keeper of our knowledge of what it is to be human. Reading elevates us. We read to be our best selves.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.