This is Keisha The Sket, by semi-anonymous author, Jade LB. I was told about this book by a friend in the middle of last year around the time it came out (Thanks Eleanor xx). I luckily got a signed copy which is always extra cool!
It was released with a lot of excitement and hype around it as for many people, this was not the first time they had met Keisha!
Keisha is a very unique account of black British urban girlhood in the early noughties. The story follows 17 year old Keisha as she navigates relationships, sexuality, college, culture and violence as she comes of age in inner-city London.
Often from Keisha’s perspective the reader experiences all the highs and lows of Keisha’s internal monologue as she contends with the label she’s been given on the streets of ‘Top Sket’. Your swept along as you laugh with Keisha and equally experience her pain, in what is the very masculine orientated, often violent world of London’s streets.
Translations…
If you’re unfamiliar with London street culture then this book will plummet you right into the centre of it. In the introduction to this book, the author warns the reader to have the Urban Dictionary close by if you’re not sure how Londoners speak. Having grown up very close to where it’s all set, (Hackney) I found it pretty accessible, however as I write this post I’ll be making ‘translations’ of any words I think non-Londoners might not know !
‘Sket’ – Not the most flattering word to be called. ‘Sket’ refers to a promiscuous girl who sleeps around a lot. According to Urban dictionary it derives from West Indian Slang, ‘Sketel’ which means the same or a girl that has ‘been around the block.’ When I’ve known it being used, it’s derogatory and a pretty unpleasant thing to call any woman. (So don’t).
Language, I think is becomes really important in understanding Keisha the Sket, so getting to grips with the basic London speak is beneficial.
Origins and Author
As said, this book was met with excitement at its announcement, because for many, they had met Keisha when they were her age. ‘Keisha the Sket’ was originally written by the author Jade LB when she was between the ages of 13-15 years old. Around 2005, Jade began releasing chapters of ‘Keisha Da Sket’ on the online platform, Piczo. For those of a similar age, (not me I was still in primary school lol), they eagerly waited for new chapter releases as they gathered round to read Keisha’s latest antics on their flip phones or Nokia bricks.
The newly published editions features the original text written by a young Jade LB or ‘The OG’ version and ‘Keisha Revisited’ where she standardises more of the language and I think refines the plot a bit more. The final part is really interesting, including essays from individual’s that grew up reading Keisha, and what reviving it means to them, this includes one from Candice Carty-Williams, author of Queenie, (a great book).
Language and Female Sexuality
It was interesting reading this right after Emile Zola’s, Nana, (see my last post). Seemingly worlds apart as one is set in C19th Paris and one in early noughties London, they both explore society and it’s treatment of female sexuality.
It is especially in the ‘OG’ version that Keisha’s life is centred around sex. She both fears and celebrates the label of being ‘top Sket’ on her block. She celebrates her developing body in terms of its desirability to men and thinks not of her own enjoyment but how she can please the men.
The narrative is sympathetic to Keisha, and I think this comes through the London speak in which it is written in. The language Keisha uses everyday and therefore to articulate her sexuality is heavily male-orientated. This therefore means that female pleasure does not have a vocabulary in the book where it can be expressed without it being male-dominated. Rather than being just a female issue, Keisha’s sexualisation in the novel at such a young age is centred on her being a black woman.
The men around her are often predatory, older and especially in the 'OG' version the narrative is highly sexualised, being indicative of the street culture around her.
She views her body in a particular way from how society expects her to be, reinforced by media and popular cultural tropes, of the ‘strong sassy black woman’ ‘wit big bum and chest […] sexc thickish thighs’. As this is first written by a teenager, it shows the perpetuation of this stereotype filtering down to younger people. The young Keisha celebrates her body only as far as it is able to please men, but because of the teenage perspective we fall into celebrating with her because her confidence in it is infectious.
Language
‘Slang’ is defined as informal language, more common in speech than in writing’ – One reviewer says ‘Keisha accidently decolonised Literature’. I agree with this, because when before, has this language been published into a book. ‘London Speak’ has some visibility on TV I think now, but it is oftenhas negative depictions alongside inner-city gang culture.
To me I can’t rightly call this ‘slang’. ‘Slang’ doesn’t rightly or justly explain what this style of language is to me. Much to the dismay of our teachers, it was how the majority of people spoke in my school, corrected and punished by teachers wanting us to use ‘standard English’.
This ‘language’ or speech style is more than just text speak, as shown in a number of different words a lot is derived from West Indian culture. I believe the language is a proud emblem of the meshing of cultures that makes up inner city London.
The way someone chooses to communicate shouldn’t be admonished or belittled into insignificance. If we value language at all, then we should celebrate it as something that is not static and constantly changing. This is shown, when every year, we see words being added to the Oxford English Dictionary. Both the old and new version of Keisha follow the same storyline.
Two Stories in One
Whilst there is an excitement, and I hear nostalgia in reading the OG as it was first written. The Revisited version was much needed, as it provided a more intimate insight into Keisha’s emotional journey, and better sequencing of the events in her story. Keisha is more than her sexuality, she desires a future, love and success, but her age shows her up as she cannot see a route to these things outside her narrow world-view. The Keisha Revisited (without delivering spoilers), provides a better answer to this, than the 'OG', obviously showing the maturing of Keisha, with her author.
Things seem to happen so inconsequentially in The OG version and you can very much feel the teenage author behind the words.
However, the adult author has done her past work justice without taking away it’s unique character in making Keisha the indisputable heroine of her own story.
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