Black History Month, LIVE from NYPL: Rita Dove and Glory Edim with Salamishah Tillet
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The poet laureate and the literary tastemaker share poems and stories new and old.
Rita Dove’s first new volume of poetry in over twelve years convenes a chorus that sings across decades to explore mortality, justice, art, and terror. From history’s grand exploits to her own personal struggles, Dove offers up in Playlist for the Apocalypse “a lifetime of song.” Dove also appears in the new collection On Girlhood, edited by Glory Edim, the founder of Well-Read Black Girl. On Girlhood, also featuring stories by Jamaica Kincaid, Toni Morrison, Dorothy West, Camille Acker, Toni Cade Bambara, and more, explores the thin yet imperative line between Black girlhood and womanhood.
Dove and Edim speak with with Salamishah Tillet about the words that have shaped them, and the stories that have guided them.
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GET THE BOOKS
Borrow from the NYPL Catalog:
- Playlist for the Apocalypse
- On Girlhood: 15 Stories from the Well-Read Black Girl Library
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RECOMMENDED READING
- Coming soon!
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Glory Edim is the founder of Well-Read Black Girl, a book club and digital platform that promotes Black literature and sisterhood. She won the Innovator’s Award at the 2017 Los Angeles Times Book Prizes.
Rita Dove, Pulitzer Prize winner and former U.S. Poet Laureate, is the only poet honored with both the National Humanities Medal and the National Medal of Arts. Her recent works include Playlist for the Apocalypse, Sonata Mulattica, and the National Book Award–shortlisted Collected Poems: 1974–2004. In 2021 she was awarded the Gold Medal for Poetry from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in Charlottesville, where she teaches creative writing at the University of Virginia.
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