Retail booksellers Barnes & Noble recently announced it would be selling new editions of classic novels.
What's the appeal?
The cover art features more diverse characters.
The company's obvious attempt to increase sales by selling the same Eurocentric books with "diverse" covers was largely rejected by people online.
If Barnes & Noble actually wanted to increase sales by promoting diversity, their path should have been obvious.
They could promote great books by people of color, not slap the picture of a POC on one of the same old books written by dead White people.
After all, sticking the slaves on the cover of Gone With The Wind doesn't mean it should top the reading list for Black History Month.
People on Twitter were outraged.
Many found the gesture outright insulting.
The contents of the story are what matter, not the covers.
There are countless amazing books by writers of color.
Several writers put their own work forward as an alternative.
And history also has many diverse writers who would be a better fit for promotions like this one.
If you want to promote diversity in stories, it's not hard to do—highlight the works of diverse authors.
Simple!
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