38 min listen
Strange Fruit # 61: Poet Laureate Frank X Walker on Social Justice Through Poetry
FromStrange Fruit
ratings:
Length:
26 minutes
Released:
Jan 21, 2014
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Turn Me Loose: The Unghosting of Medgar Evars has garnered Kentucky's Poet Laureate, Frank X Walker, a nomination for an NAACP Image Award. He calls this book of 49 poems his finest work to date, and says it has an educational component along with its poetry. "The initial motivation was based on having a conversation with my students and finding out that they had no idea who Medgar Evers was." We spoke to Walker on this week's show about his life, his work, and what it means to be Affrilachian. Our Juicy Fruit segment this week looks at the man who got in trouble for paying too much child support, the chef who wants to ban babies from his restaurant, and CeCe McDonald's release from prison. And our very own Jaison Gardner filled us in on his new column, In Visible Ink, appearing every other week in LEO Weekly!
Released:
Jan 21, 2014
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Strange Fruit #56: 'Furious Cool' Co-Author David Henry on the Life of Richard Pryor: This week we spoke with David Henry, co-author of [Furious Cool: Richard Pryor and the World That Made Him](http://www.amazon.com/Furious-Cool-Richard-Pryor-World-ebook/dp/B00CL08LNK), about Pryor's work, and why it was so groundbreaking. "He had this sort of vulnerability about himself that just made him irresistible," David says. "He didn't pull any punches." Throughout their research for the book, David and his co-author (and brother) Joe Henry, learned about how Richard honed his craft, sometimes working the same comedy club every night for a week, each night with an improved version of the previous night's material. We talked about Pryor's surprising comments on his sexual experiences with other men, his openness about his drug use, and why audiences of all races found him so relatable. "When he was on stage by himself with just a microphone, he seemed to understand everything about being a human by Strange Fruit