Thank you, Eric Jerome Dickey

Unlike Zora Neale Hurston, Eric Jerome Dickey worked for prosperity instead of obscurity; he will have the appropriate African-American grand homegoing traditions, including a headstone visible from afar. This respect and appreciation for the most tireless Black writers during their human lifetimes is what America owed Zora, her predecessors and her peers. Now, he joins her as an ancestor looking down.

My Fave 2020 Reads

Warm winter wishes to all... I'm a fan of books but I also loved some short reads as my favorites of 2020. All are worthy time fillers to cozy up with in any season!

On Native Son & Richard Wright…

This was my introduction to the great Black American novel. I was hooked.

“Black Woman Gossip” Update: More Essential Black Women’s Story Collections

"Black Woman Gossip" listed my favorite black women story collections, including Alice's IN LOVE AND TROUBLE: STORIES OF BLACK WOMEN. In particular I noted the transfer of African oral tradition to the printed word, with the necessity to shortcut African-American speech for varieties of oppressive reasons leading to virtues of expression and cadence, and, of course, secrets. Since then, today's publication of Deesha Philyaw's THE SECRET LIVES OF CHURCH LADIES (West Virginia University Press, 2020) pinched me like a church lady would, to tell me it's time for an update.

“I allow myself creative freedom to make whatever kind of art I feel like in the moment…” – Tiffany Gholar

Gholar has a provided missive for a new way to write about the creative life, art-making and (most specifically) Black women navigating those historically troubled waters for all talents.

Tiffany Gholar Tells the Truth

Gholar's display of glorious art and life-giving paintings, completed across five years, come with grown woman commentary about what it took to see each piece through. In wisdom, she snakes the darkest corners of life- grief, breakups, economic peril- in a chronology of change and chaos where blank canvas was the steadiest hold.