Poets & Writers Theater

“A free society does not ban books.” Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones speaks about her personal journey to develop The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story (One World, 2021) as well as the attempts in certain states to ban the book from schools in this interview for The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

“For most of American history, African American authors have not had the purchase on the American conscience that they have right now,” says Ta-Nehisi Coates about the rise of banning books with themes about race including his own memoir, Between the World and Me (One World, 2015), as well as Ibram X. Kendi’s How to Be Antiracist (One World, 2019) and The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story (One World, 2021) by Nikole Hannah-Jones in this 2021 CBS Mornings interview. “This is really about white children now being exposed to ideas that I think were previously segregated.”

Watch this recording of Greenlight Bookstore’s Poetry Salon event and book release party for Safia Elhillo’s Girls That Never Die (One World, 2022), hosted by Angel Nafis and featuring readings by Jay Deshpande, Shira Erlichman, and Ladan Osman. For more from Elhillo, read her installment of our Ten Questions series.

“I find that writing into shame and toward shame, and coming out of it at the other end is something really interesting,” says K-Ming Chang about the writing process for her story collection, Gods of Want (One World, 2022), in this interview for Reading the Room, a podcast produced and hosted by Jaylen Lopez. Chang’s story collection is featured in Page One in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“Woman of Light is my heart song to my ancestors,” says Kali Fajardo-Anstine in this video in which she talks about her debut novel, out now from One World, and the research and stories of her Indigenous Chicano family that inspired her writing. A profile of Fajardo-Anstine by Rigoberto González is featured in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

In this interview with Charlene Wang for Foster, an online platform for writers to craft stories together, Yanyi discusses answering letters from writers for his online advice column the Reading and his second poetry collection, Dream of the Divided Field (One World, 2022), which is featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“It was important for me to write a book in which I could try to change this country’s consciousness.” Cathy Park Hong speaks about her award-winning essay collection, Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning (One World, 2020), and the urgency to write from a personal perspective in this 2021 video for TIME Magazine’s annual 100 most influential people in the world issue.

“Minor feelings are also the emotions we are accused of having when we decide to be difficult—in other words, when we decide to be honest,” reads Cathy Park Hong from her essay collection, Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning (One World, 2020), in this Yale Review video from their two hundredth anniversary festival in 2020. 

“the highest promise we could offer / was one to a land or man or idea / greater than we.” In this O, Miami video, Nate Marshall reads a poem from his new collection, Finna, out this month from One World. A Q&A with Marshall by Julian Randall appears in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“It’s a novel about how grief makes people hilariously selfish, especially when the internet is involved,” says Kevin Nguyen about his debut novel, New Waves (One World, 2020), in this first episode of Literary Hub’s Sheltering video series hosted by Maris Kreizman. Nguyen also talks about how he’s been spending his time cooking and watching television during the coronavirus pandemic.

“It’s particularly, specifically, about what it means to be Asian American, which is a subject that I’ve always actually kind of avoided. I’ve always indirectly approached it, but I’ve never directly tackled it.” At Malvern Books, Cathy Park Hong describes her experience writing her first essay collection, Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning (One World, 2020), featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, and reads “The End of White Innocence” from the book.

“I wanted to center the emotions and the feelings of the actual enslaved people.” Ta-Nehisi Coates speaks about what inspired him to write his debut novel, The Water Dancer (One World, 2019), as he walks through Thomas Jefferson’s estate, Monticello, with Gayle King for CBS This Morning.

“I just felt this deep need to express myself.... I had a strong desire to understand and to express that understanding.” In this CBS Sunday Morning interview, Ta-Nehisi Coates talks about the purpose of his writing and how the music of Marvin Gaye influences the language in his work. Coates’s debut novel, The Water Dancer (One World, 2019), is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.