{"id":13726,"date":"2024-04-04T21:28:49","date_gmt":"2024-04-04T21:28:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/centerforblackliterature.org\/?p=13726"},"modified":"2024-04-18T21:30:09","modified_gmt":"2024-04-18T21:30:09","slug":"celebrating-diversity-the-remarkable-story-of-a-queer-black-writers-path-to-recognition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/centerforblackliterature.org\/celebrating-diversity-the-remarkable-story-of-a-queer-black-writers-path-to-recognition\/","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating Diversity: The Remarkable Story of a Queer Black Writer’s Path to Recognition"},"content":{"rendered":"

Levi Wise-Catoe<\/strong> | <\/span>As a young writer, I was deterred from focusing on poetry because everyone, from my family to my friends to my dog Peanut’s veterinarian, warned me that poetry doesn’t sell and also that poets don’t make money. I became resentful of the fact that I was a poet because every literary agent I sought out never represented the genre of poetry. I intended to turn my poems into songs, and it worked for me. April is Poetry Month, and in the tradition of Poetry Month, I choose to honor Mr. Reginald M. Harris, Jr., a poet and writer and winner of the 2012 Cave Canem \/ Northwestern University Poetry Prize. Harris was honored during the 17th National Black Writers Conference during the Poetry Caf\u00e9 event on \u2018Day Two\u2019 in Brooklyn. We discussed not only a writer’s journey from the dream of becoming a published writer to the actuality of what a writer\u2019s journey truly is beyond the dream but also what it means to be a Black as well as queer writer in the day and age of censorship in America.We also discussed how to survive as a poet.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Levi Wise-Catoe:<\/b> Hello Mr. Reginald Harris, the award-winning poet himself. Who are the poets that inspired you as a young writer? Was there any one poet in particular that you modeled yourself or your work\/style after?<\/span><\/p>\n

Reginald Harris<\/b>: Hello Levi. It\u2019s interesting that you ask this question. Someone else asked me recently who were my \u2018models\u2019 growing up, and I had to answer by quoting Lucille Clifton: \u201cwhat did i see to be except myself?\u201d I encountered very few Black poets in school growing up. I fell in love with Edgar Allan Poe, for example, but in terms of Black poets, Langston Hughes and Gwendolyn Brooks were the only ones I remember being exposed to. Even after I graduated from college (<\/span>NOT<\/span><\/i> an HBCU!) I had no idea there were so many living Black poets until I went to the Cave Canem retreat in 1997. It\u2019s sometimes difficult to realize how different the world is, particularly in the world of education, from what it was in the 1960\u2019s and \u201870\u2019s. The official national celebration of Black History Month didn\u2019t start until 1976 for example, less than 40 years ago. Not so much as a role model in terms of my poetry (although I\u2019m sure it\u2019s there), but when I met her, I was really struck by who Gwendolyn Books was as a person. Before she came to my college to give a reading, I had a lot of dumb ideas about how someone FAMOUS, the first African American Pulitzer Prize winner, was supposed to act. Then when she arrived, she looked and acted like my grandmother or an older member of the family. Very down to earth, very generous \u2013 she bought a copy of the book <\/span>84 Charing Cross Road<\/span><\/i> for a student who was about to visit England and gave away copies of some of her chapbooks to us few Black students. And she read poems written by some Chicago high school students, as well as her own work, during her presentation, which was just amazing to me. Again, very generous. I thought, so THIS is the way you\u2019re supposed to be as a writer in the world. She\u2019s a great model to live up to in that way.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> I loved Lucille Clifton as well. As a young writer, I was always told that poetry doesn\u2019t pay or that being a Black writer doesn\u2019t pay. I noticed that among your accolades, you also worked ‘survival jobs’. How would you advise a young poet pursuing a career in writing in terms of survival while awaiting that big publishing break, fellowship grant, or stipend to arrive?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> \u201cSurvival jobs\u201d Octavia Butler did a lot of temp jobs, and even worked on an assembly line for a while, I think, so she would have time to write. Composer Philip Glass was back to driving a cab and moving furniture the day after his first opera <\/span>Einstein on the Beach<\/span><\/i> premiered at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. All that\u2019s to say, there\u2019s no shame at all in doing what you have to do to live while making art. That too is a natural part of the process, and I\u2019ve never thought otherwise. Don\u2019t quit your day job\u2014but keep working. Writing is not a career you go into if you want to make a lot of money\u2014Some people would say if you wanted to make <\/span>ANY<\/b> money. There are people who have done well as writers, but most of them are nowhere near a Mr. and Mrs. Carter level of living large. Almost all of us have \u2018day jobs\u2019\u2014usually teaching these days\u2014and many are fortunate enough that their jobs involve some form of writing. The only \u2018survival job\u2019 I think I\u2019ve had was my brief time as a \u2018credit liaison\u2019 for a magazine, a job I took because a friend worked there, and I needed the money. I was that person that calls you and says, \u2018Your account is overdue\u2014where\u2019s our money?\u2019 and I was 100% wrong for that job. I wanted to do the other jobs I\u2019ve had, (whether I was successful at all of them is another question), and I learned a lot everywhere I\u2019ve been. One important shift I made when I was at the library in Baltimore, though, was that instead of thinking of myself as a librarian that writes, I began thinking I was a writer that works at the library. I still think of \u2018having a job\u2019 as one thing, and \u2018working\u2019 (i.e., writing) as something else. So, you can put in your 40 hours a week or whatever to pay for food and rent, and then think \u201cOkay, now I need to get some work done.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> What do you love most about being a Black writer? And do you see yourself as a Black writer or simply as a writer?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> Well, I am a Black writer, and I love being part of the continuing conversation within the African diasporic world. I totally understand, though, how some authors want to be thought of as writers first and Black second, because far too often \u2018Black\u2019 can be used as a modifier to diminish or pigeonhole you. I remember the first line of Hilton Als\u2019s essay on Black poet Owen Dodson in <\/span>The Women<\/span><\/i>, where Als is helping to reorganize Dodson\u2019s library, and the poet tells him, \u201cPut the niggers over there.\u201d It\u2019s like that: you\u2019re a Black Writer and so it\u2019s assumed that you write a certain way or MUST write about despair or crime or something Quote <\/span>BLACK<\/span><\/i> Unquote all the time, or someone who\u2019s not Black won\u2019t get anything out of it (or will feel attacked), or everything you write is about Race and not \u2018universal human issues.\u2019 It\u2019s easy to see how creative people would want to totally get away from crap like that. It\u2019s not as bad as it was, but it is still there\u2014Have you seen <\/span>American Fiction<\/span><\/i>?<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC: <\/b>What was that moment like in 2012 when you won the Cave Canem\/Northwestern University Poetry Prize? Do you ever get used to the accolades, or is it always something that feels brand new every time?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>RH:<\/b> My first response when I got the call about the award was, \u2018You\u2019re kidding, right?\u201d And the person on the other side sounded like she was offended! \u201cNo, what do you mean I\u2019m kidding? You won!\u201d Being recognized for anything is wonderful, and for me, it usually feels new and unexpected. And I\u2019m very grateful and happy when it happens.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> How does it feel to be an LGTB author in a day and age of book banning and anti-woke agendas in which the communities of \u201cothers\u201d are under attack? Does it make you want to distance yourself from the rhetoric or forge yourself head-first into the line of conservative fire?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> When I was in my 20\u2019s, the only Black gay writers I knew were James Baldwin and me. Then my first partner took me to DC, and we saw Essex Hemphill and Wayson Jones perform, which was astonishing (and made me think \u201cI\u2019ll never write again\u201d because Essex was so damn good). Black women and men created\u2014and rediscovered\u2014an African-American LGBTQ+ writing tradition in the late 1970\u2019s and 80s, and the book banning forces and others want to erase that time and that tradition, to \u2018return\u2019 to some heterosexual, misogynist, white Christian Nationalist world that never actually existed. So, as a Black person, a Gay person, a writer, a library worker, I take all this <\/span>very<\/span><\/i> personally, and there is no \u2018going back\u2019 into their suffocating fantasy world. Even though we\u2019re tired and the struggle will be long, their agenda must be fought.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC<\/b>: Your book<\/span> Autogeography<\/span><\/i> touches on the themes of race and sexuality in a variety of landscapes and locations, from Havana, Cuba, to Baltimore, which is an amazing artistic achievement. I found it awe-inspiring and thought-provoking. <\/span>Afrolatinidad <\/span><\/i>is a part of the African Diaspora that is sometimes ignored, especially in the United States during election seasons. Considering this year\u2019s theme of the Black Writers Conference, <\/span>All That We Carry: Where Do We Go From Here?<\/span><\/i>, as writers of the vast African diasporic communities, which include Afro-Latinos, Latinx, and Queer communities, where do we go as a community?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> We have to recognize that we ARE a community, that we\u2019re all in this together. There are differences between us, of course, between the experiences of those from across the African diaspora throughout the Americas, but there are many commonalities also. And we all suffer from dealing with life under white supremacy and white supremacist thinking. A few years ago, a friend got into a discussion with someone working at a Cuban restaurant in Jersey City over the lack of any mention of Africa in the thumbnail history of Cuba they had printed on their placemats. False histories like that just can\u2019t continue to be repeated.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> Growing up in the Baltimore\/Maryland area, what are your feelings regarding the Francis Scott Key bridge collapse?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> Baltimore was (is?) very \u201cEast Side\u201d vs \u201cWest Side.\u201d I\u2019m from the West Side and the Bridge is on the East Side, so I had very few opportunities to use it. And it was one of the few bridges I didn\u2019t particularly like going over\u2014it was too high, or I didn\u2019t like the way the guardrails looked or something, I don\u2019t know. It feels weird, sacrilegious, to say I didn\u2019t care for it now that it\u2019s gone. But it is painful. I\u2019m deeply saddened\u2014hurt, actually\u2014by the loss of the Mexican and Central American construction workers during the accident and I think about them and their families a lot. Baltimore is such a difficult city, sad and wonderful and beautiful and terrifying, sometimes all at the same time. I\u2019m still a Baltimorean (in exile) and the city really needs a break. We need time to grieve, and to think about what this might mean in terms of creating the kind of city that we want.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC<\/b>: What are your feelings regarding the racist attacks against Baltimore\u2019s mayor being referred to as the \u2018DEI Mayor\u2019 following the bridge collapse?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> Do you mean the \u2018Duly Elected Incumbent\u2019? Mayor Scott\u2019s response was terrific, I thought, when he said they can say what they want about me because it\u2019s nothing compared to what our ancestors went through. And he\u2019s right when he says it\u2019s just a way for them to get away with calling him The N Word. I also love how the Governor said he didn\u2019t have time for foolishness when a reporter tried to get him to make a comment about it also. Some people have not recovered from Barack Obama being elected president of the United States, and Donald Trump and his ilk have made even more visible this country\u2019s racism\u2014that was always there (usually) just below the surface.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> What are your feelings regarding<\/span> Morgan State canceling its recent homecoming football game after a shooting on campus that left five people injured? Do you think this attack against HBCU is fueled by the current, anti-Critical Race Theory, DEI, Affirmative Action right-wing propaganda?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> I\u2019m not sure what the motive was behind the shooting, so I can\u2019t say if it was related to Right Wing propaganda or not. I do know incidents like that can and will be used to fuel stereotypes of Black people and Black cities as violent and dangerous. It will be more fuel on the fire against college affirmative action programs\u2014\u201csee even their so-called college students are thugs! We can\u2019t let them near Our Children!\u201d Anything negative large or small will be used against us.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC<\/b>: How was your young upbringing growing up in Maryland and how did it shape and inform you as a Black writer and as a Queer Black author? Which in some cases might be a double-negative.<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> I saw the James Baldwin biography <\/span>The Price of the Ticket<\/span><\/i> when it came on PBS in 1989, and there\u2019s a bit in there where an interviewer says to him, when you were starting out, you were Black, poor, and homosexual. You must have thought, “How disadvantaged can you get?” and Baldwin says, \u201cNo, I thought I\u2019d hit the jackpot!\u201d I\u2019ve always loved that. We were working class, working poor, I guess, but I never felt \u2018poor.\u2019 I always thought we were middle class, and when I got a scholarship to a private high school\u2014see, I was DEI <\/span>before<\/span><\/i> DEI!\u2014I thought most of the people out there were rich and <\/span>really<\/span><\/i> rich. I\u2019ve never looked at where I\u2019m from or any situation I\u2019ve been in from the point of view of it being a disadvantage. As Zora Neale Hurston said, \u201cI am not tragically Colored.\u201d And Baltimore really is a good place to get creative work done: a lot of great resources, close enough to the so-called \u201cBig Time” of New York, yet far enough away that you\u2019re not caught up in all that\u2019s going on up here every day. As for being gay\u2014there really is something to be said for being \u2018different\u2019 or out of the mainstream. The view of the world is in many ways clearer from over here. And just as Black people know more about white people than they know about themselves and the larger culture, so too Queers know more and can see things more clearly about so-called straight life than heterosexuals do. And look at who the individuals are that are the true creators and generators of art, music, and culture: mainly all of us over here \u2018on the margins.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> Can you discuss Lambda and some of the things that they are doing in the LGTB community to raise awareness beyond the LGTB community for causes that are often overlooked?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> Over the years, Lambda Literary has been extremely important in promoting and championing LGBTQ+ books and authors. The Lammy awards have helped to raise the profile of a wide range of works from various communities in a wide range of styles and genres. The Writers in Schools program is doing essential work in introducing queer literature to young people. Lambda has also been very forceful in fighting against the various book bans going on around the country. Lambda is going through a transitional period right now\u2014as with many organizations, COVID\u00a0 and the immediate post-lockdown times were difficult, and things haven\u2019t gotten fully back on track\u2014but I\u2019m sure it will always be an important part of the literary community.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC<\/b>: What is the one thought that you would like to leave people with today? It can be a quote from an ancestor or a thought from the top of your head.<\/span><\/p>\n

RH<\/b>: I\u2019ll use another James Baldwin quote. I think about the part about how the world is held together all the time: <\/span>\u201cLove has never been a popular movement. And no one’s ever wanted, really, to be free. The world is held together, really it is held together, by the love and the passion of a very few people. Otherwise, of course, you can despair. Walk down the street of any city, any afternoon, and look around you. What you’ve got to remember is what you’re looking at is also you. Everyone you’re looking at is also you. You could be that person. You could be that monster, you could be that cop. And you have to decide, in yourself, not to be.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0LWC<\/b>: Thank you so much for your wonderfully engaging responses. For me, my early inspiration from James Baldwin was his book <\/span>Giovanni’s Room <\/span><\/i>(1956), and believe it or not it was a straight white woman, Madonna, who introduced me to it when I read somewhere that she had obtained the rights to the book to remake it as a film. I agree with you, growing up I never felt poor. I grew up in the CCP projects in Paterson, NJ, and when I would watch <\/span>The Jeffersons<\/span><\/i> \u201cMovin\u2019 On Up\u201d, I thought that was us because we also lived in a tall red brick building with a terrace.We lived on the 13th floor and the penthouse 15th floor. Yes, I did see <\/span>American Fiction<\/span><\/i> and read the book <\/span>Erasure <\/span><\/i>and thought that both were amazing!!!<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> I have a strange relationship with <\/span>Giovanni’s Room<\/span><\/i>: I discovered an old 1950s paperback copy of it on a US Coast Guard Cutter in Mobile Alabama, which was weird enough. But then I read it in one night after a bad break-up. So it was a VERY emotional experience. I’ve been a little afraid of the book ever since because it has such personal meaning for me. <\/span>PS: Percival Everett’s new book, <\/span>James<\/span><\/i>, is fantastic.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC<\/b>: Duly noted\u2026 How are you feeling today in an adjective?<\/span><\/p>\n

RH<\/b>: \u2018Emerging\u2019 seems to be the adjective of the day for me today, particularly as it applies to myself as a person, a human being in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

LWC:<\/b> Aren\u2019t we all…? Thank you so much Mr. Harris for speaking with me.<\/span><\/p>\n

RH:<\/b> My pleasure!<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Levi Wise-Catoe | As a young writer, I was deterred from focusing on poetry because everyone, from my family to my friends to my dog Peanut’s veterinarian, warned me that poetry doesn’t sell and also that poets don’t make money. I became resentful of the fact that I was a poet because every literary agent …<\/p>\n

Celebrating Diversity: The Remarkable Story of a Queer Black Writer’s Path to Recognition<\/span> Read More \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-musings"],"yoast_head":"\nCelebrating Diversity: The Remarkable Story of a Queer Black Writer's Path to Recognition - Center for Black Literature<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/centerforblackliterature.org\/celebrating-diversity-the-remarkable-story-of-a-queer-black-writers-path-to-recognition\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Celebrating Diversity: The Remarkable Story of a Queer Black Writer's Path to Recognition - Center for Black Literature\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Levi Wise-Catoe | As a young writer, I was deterred from focusing on poetry because everyone, from my family to my friends to my dog Peanut’s veterinarian, warned me that poetry doesn’t sell and also that poets don’t make money. 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