In conversation with Jesmyn Ward

Tank Magazine Podcast

In this episode of the TANK magazine podcast, Aida Amoako talks with the American novelist Jesmyn Ward. Among her many accolades, Ward was awarded a Macarthur Genius Grant and is the first female author to win two National Book awards for fiction, for Salvage the Bones (2011) and her most recent novel Sing, Unburied, Sing (2017). The subject of this conversation is The Fire This Time, a 2016 collection of essays and poetry that Ward both contributed to and edited, and which was published in the UK in 2018. Inspired by James Baldwin’s essay The Fire Next Time, the collection heralds a new generation of voices speaking out against racism in America in light of recent tragedies and widespread protests across the nation. The text version of this interview can be found in the TANK Summer Reader issue. ?