american south
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One Burning Question: A Conversation with Evelyn C. White
“I understood in that moment that my life had changed forever. And it has.”
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How to Become a Poet: A Conversation with Ashley M. Jones
“You don’t have to drink yourself into the Great American Poetry Masterpiece.”
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These Places Surround Me: Talking with Quintan Ana Wikswo
Quintan Ana Wikswo discusses her novel, A Long Curving Scar Where the Heart Should Be, delving into the facets of trauma, and her creative processes.
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The Rumpus Mini-Interview Project #125: Tyree Daye
“I think if you are really doing the work, you can’t write about America and not explore race and slavery, and that goes for any writer.”
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To Look for America: A Road Trip, a Soundtrack
One thing I was taught about travel—because my father is a black man born in Alabama in 1950—was that there are safe places for black people to go and places that aren’t as safe.
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Chewing Rocks: A Conversation with David Biespiel
David Biespiel discusses his new book, The Education of a Young Poet, being comfortable in uncertainty, and extending moments in writing.
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VISIBLE: Women Writers of Color: Brooke C. Obie
Brooke C. Obie discusses the historical basis for her debut novel, Book of Addis, writing to dismantle white supremacy, and why Black speculative fiction is integral to her survival.
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Nothing Foreign about It: Talking with Omar El Akkad
Omar El Akkad discusses his debut novel American War, suicide terrorism, fossil fuels, and blankets.
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The Lens Magnifies, the Mirror Reflects: What Photos from the Race War Show Us about Ourselves
[Still photos] grab what otherwise might feel too foreign to understand.
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Basura
[T]erms like “white trash” and basura most accurately reveal those who are doing the defining. Consider what we throw away, and why. Look at what we throw away. Think about the reasons why.
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I Will Not Die for You
Each bug in the water is one less bug on my fruit, I tell myself, ignoring the truth: under the soil, another is born.
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Ward’s Mississippi Is Our Mississippi: Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
Capturing the Delta in harrowing detail, Ward takes readers on a journey from her own home of the Gulf Coast to the Mississippi State Penitentiary.