What to Read When You Want to Celebrate Black History
Rumpus editors share for their favorite writing that speaks to black history past, present, and future.
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Posts Tagged: The Underground Railroad
Smart Girls, Weird Magic: Talking with Kendra Fortmeyer
Kendra Fortmeyer discusses her first novel, HOLE IN THE MIDDLE.
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What to Read When You Want to See a World More F**ked up Than Ours
Reading suggestions from author Celeste Ng for these f**ked-up times: worlds more—or, okay, just differently—f**ked up than ours.
...moreTouring Trump’s America on Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad
Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad won the National Book Award on Wednesday night. In his acceptance speech he told us, “We’re happy in here; outside is the blasted hellhole wasteland of Trumpland. Be kind to everybody. Make art and fight the power.” Not only was this apt for the evening, but it also describes the […]
...moreStates of Possibility
Whenever I finish a book and I get to the last day of writing the first draft and I only have two pages to go, I put on Purple Rain and Daydream Nation. That’s my ritual. Whenever I put those albums on back to back, I know I’m in the home stretch. Over at Hazlitt, […]
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Anna March’s Reading Mixtape #26: Fiction I Read and Loved This Summer
Not a one of these is a “beach read,” though I read many of them on the beach. Every one of these novels and short story collections transported me deeper into myself. Every one of these books excited me and made me hungry to live more, love more, think more, feel more, give more. What […]
...moreThe Chosen One
Colson Whitehead’s new novel, The Underground Railroad, was announced as an Oprah’s Book Club selection on the day of its release. Speaking to Michelle Dean in the Guardian, Whitehead discusses his reaction to the news: “I called her back and she said: ‘Oprah.’ I said: ‘Shut the front door,’ because I didn’t want to curse. She said: […]
...moreRiding the Underground
The Underground Railroad has always fascinated Americans, and recently it has exploded in popularity, with books, TV shows, and even representation on United States currency. But does the mythologized version of the Underground Railroad live up to actual history? In a recent New Yorker article, Kathryn Schulz examines recent media incarnations of the Railroad: But, as more recent […]
...moreNot a Healer
I thought, why not write the book that really scares you? At the New York Times, Jennifer Schuessler talks with Colson Whitehead about his new book, The Underground Railroad, which features the underground railroad literalized as a railroad, underground.
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