Reckon True Stories

While we're on season break with Reckon True Stories, here's a sneak preview from Season Three of Ursa Short Fiction, Deesha's other podcast with author (and True Stories producer!) Dawnie Walton. Show notes: Follow Season Three in your favorite podcast app. Support the show with a membership or one-time contribution, and get access to bonus episodes: ursastory.com/join Read more about Dawnie Walton's next novel! Contact us via email: [email protected] Produced by: Dawnie Walton, Deesha Philyaw, and Mark Armstrong Associate Producer: Marina Leigh Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon chat with the hilarious and multitalented Samantha Irby, author of multiple wickedly funny essay collections, as well as writer for multiple television series. Samantha talks about her own confidence and how she’s able to write guiltless memoir pieces. She distinguishes between the experiences of watching what she’s written versus reading what she’s written. Has she bougie-ed out of her past? And, of course, what are the ins and outs of comedy-writing? Can it be taught? What are the industry-wide issues with gatekeeping? And who do you write to?  Reading List: Authors, Stories, and Books Mentioned bitches gotta eat! (Samantha Irby blog) “My Mother, My Daughter” (Samantha Irby, The Rumpus 2012) We Are Never Meeting In Real Life (Samantha Irby) Meaty (Samantha Irby) New Year, Same Trash (Samantha Irby)\ Wow, No Thank You (Samantha Irby) Quietly Hostile (Samantha Irby) Watch List: Shrill And Just Like That: Sex and the City Tuca and Bertie Atlanta Mea Culpa Paul Mooney Mike Epps Mo’Nique Shirley Hemphill Nell Carter Listening List: “Upgrade U” (Beyoncé) More from Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon:  The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (Deesha Philyaw) Heavy (Kiese Laymon) Long Division (Kiese Laymon) How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America: Essays (Kiese Laymon) Ursa Short Fiction podcast (Deesha Philyaw and Dawnie Walton) Produced by Ursa Story Company in partnership with Reckon.  Hosted by Deesha Philyaw & Kiese Laymon Show Producers: Dawnie Walton & Mark Armstrong Associate Producer: Marina Leigh Episode Editor: Kelly Araja Reckon Editor In Chief: R.L. Nave Reckon Deputy Editor: Michelle Zenarosa Audience Director: Katie Johnston Creative Strategist: Abbey Crain Sr. Social Producer: Sid Espinosa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon dig into a classic essay by Toni Morrison, “The Work You Do, the Person You Are,” published in The New Yorker in May 2017. They talk about labor and self-identity — how our feelings of worth can become so closely tied to the work we do, in ways that can become unhealthy, both in the corporate world and in the art we create.  Kiese Laymon: “Without labor and work, I don’t know who I am. And I think that’s terrifying.”  Reading List: Authors, Stories, and Books Mentioned “The Work You Do, the Person You Are” Toni Morrison (The New Yorker, 2017) Daddy Was a Number Runner (Louise Meriwether, 1970) “On Writing and the Business of Writing” (Carmen Maria Machado, 2022) Playing in the Dark (Toni Morrison, 1992) "The Cask of Amontillado" (Edgar Allan Poe, 1846) More from Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon:  The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (Deesha Philyaw) Heavy (Kiese Laymon) Long Division (Kiese Laymon) How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America: Essays (Kiese Laymon) City Summer, Country Summer (Kiese Laymon & Alexis Franklin) Ursa Short Fiction podcast (Deesha Philyaw & Dawnie Walton) Produced by Ursa Story Company in partnership with Reckon.  Hosted by Deesha Philyaw & Kiese Laymon Show Producers: Dawnie Walton & Mark Armstrong Associate Producer: Marina Leigh Episode Editor: Kelly Araja Reckon Editor In Chief: R.L. Nave Reckon Deputy Editor: Michelle Zenarosa Audience Director: Katie Johnston Creative Strategist: Abbey Crain Sr. Social Producer: Sid Espinosa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the latest episode of Reckon True Stories, Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon are joined by MacArthur Genius and National Book Award Winner Dr. Imani Perry to discuss genre, personal stories and the ethical commitment to those we write about, the utilization of craft to bring the reader close to the experience and the body, the body as political, Black women and silence, mobility, music, and mothering.  They ask the question of what we owe of ourselves as writers — and particularly Black writers— to our audience, and they explore what it looks like to maintain boundaries, to self-preserve, and to rest. In Kiese’s words, he calls it learning “the art of not just no, but not now.” Kiese praises Dr. Perry on how she has never written the same kind of book twice, and in this episode, she talks about her inspirations, how she chooses what to write towards, and what questions she is consistently leaning into in her work. Reading List: Authors, Stories, and Books Mentioned South to America (Imani Perry) Breathe: A Letter To My Sons (Imani Perry) Prophets of the Hood: Politics and Poetics in Hip Hop (Imani Perry) Looking for Lorraine: The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry (Imani Perry) May We Forever Stand: A History of the Black National Anthem (Imani Perry) Percival Everett A Dangerously High Threshold for Pain (Imani Perry) Alice Walker Nikky Finney “She Changed Black Literature Forever. Then She Disappeared.” (Imani Perry, New York Times 2021) “‘Palmares’ Is An Example Of What Grows When Black Women Choose Silence” (Deesha Philyaw, Electric Literature 2021) Palmares (Gayl Jones) Robert Stepto Hazel Carby Zora Neale Hurston Katherine Dunham Moms Mabley 1000 Words (Jami Attenberg) Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against “The Apocalypse” (Emily Raboteau) How To Live Free In A Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoir (Shayla Lawson) A Mercy (Toni Morrison) Listening List: Nina Simone Miles Davis “Nobody’s Supposed To Be Here” (Deborah Cox) More from Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon:  The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (Deesha Philyaw) Heavy (Kiese Laymon) Long Division (Kiese Laymon) How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America: Essays (Kiese Laymon) City Summer, Country Summer (Kiese Laymon & Alexis Franklin) Ursa Short Fiction podcast (Deesha Philyaw & Dawnie Walton) Produced by Ursa Story Company in partnership with Reckon.  Hosted by Deesha Philyaw & Kiese Laymon Show Producers: Dawnie Walton & Mark Armstrong Associate Producer: Marina Leigh Episode Editor: Kelly Araja Reckon Editor In Chief: R.L. Nave Reckon Deputy Editor: Michelle Zenarosa Audience Director: Katie Johnston Creative Strategist: Abbey Crain Sr. Social Producer: Sid Espinosa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon discuss the “manosphere,” — specifically how Black men show up in the space of it, and how Black women respond to it. Deesha talks about a “de-centering of romance” and recognition that women have come to see that their lives are full and beautiful without being partnered with a man who does not listen to or respect them.  They are interested in the deconstruction of the notions of masculinity, of repair and accountability, and of the homosociality/eroticism of the manosphere, as well as the pulling away of intimacy between cishet men. And they discuss what the work might look like. Therapy, radical change, deconstructing notions of masculinity, and possibly even retiring the terms “masculinity” and “femininity” altogether. Reading List: Authors, Stories, and Books Mentioned “My Brush with the Black Manosphere” (Nicole Young, Elle 2022) Warsan Shire Act Like A Lady, Think Like A Man (Steve Harvey) bell hooks Audrey Lorde “Men are lost. Here’s a map out of the wilderness.” (Christine Emba, The Washington Post 2023) “How To Be A Better Man Right Now” (Jeff Gordinier, Esquire 2024) Listening List: Jokes On You (podcast hosted by Mel Mitchell and Talle) “The disappearance of men” (Christine Emba, YouTube 2024) Instagram Reel by Ari Jai More from Deesha Philyaw and Kiese Laymon:  The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (Deesha Philyaw) Heavy (Kiese Laymon) Long Division (Kiese Laymon) How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America: Essays (Kiese Laymon) Ursa Short Fiction podcast (Deesha Philyaw & Dawnie Walton) Produced by Ursa Story Company in partnership with Reckon.  Hosted by Deesha Philyaw & Kiese Laymon Show Producers: Dawnie Walton & Mark Armstrong Associate Producer: Marina Leigh Episode Editor: Kelly Araja Reckon Editor In Chief: R.L. Nave Reckon Deputy Editor: Michelle Zenarosa Audience Director: Katie Johnston Creative Strategist: Abbey Crain Sr. Social Producer: Sid Espinosa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices