Episode 41: Danez Smith
Rachel Zucker talks with Danez Smith, author of [insert] boy and Don’t Call Us Dead (recently shortlisted for the National Book Award) about confessional-testimonial poems, sonnets, essential poems, poets and books, Cave Canem, the MFA industrial complex, not feeling desired, depression, community, living and learning, Minneapolis, living as a full-time artist, their writing space, hanging out with grandma, HIV+ diagnosis, Danez’s new poems, writing a time travel novel, play, getting over imposter syndrome, and the challenges and pleasures of working on a third book after two early successes. Towards the end of the episode Danez reads two new poems.
Books by Danez Smith
When Young Folks Ask Danez Who They Should Be Reading:
Javier Zamora’s Unaccompanied (Copper Canyon, 2017)
Rachel McKibbins’ Blud (Copper Canyon, 2017)
Shane McCrae’s In the Language of My Captor (Wesleyan, 2017)
Chen Chen’s When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities (BOA Editions, 2017)
“Older” Poets/Books That Danez Loves:
Terrance Hayes’ Wind in a Box (Penguin, 2006)
Other Essential Books for Danez:
Essex Hemphill’s Ceremonies (Plume, 1992)
Jericho Brown’s Please (New Issues Press, 2008)
Lucille Clifton’s Collected (BOA Editions, 2012)
Cornelius Eady’s Brutal Imagination (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2001)
Li-Young Lee’s Rose (BOA Editions, 1993)
Cave Canem
Angela Thomas
Philip B. Williams (first mentor at Cave Canem)
Other Important Links/Artists/Organizations
