Ep. 280 Blind Thought with Andrew Leland
The Stacks
Traci Thomas
4.8 • 1.8K Ratings
🗓️ 16 August 2023
⏱️ 69 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
After living with the retinitis pigmentosa for decades, Andrew Leland; writer, audio producer, and teacher, decided to write about blindness in his debut book, The Country of the Blind: A Memoir at the End of Sight. We discuss how he thought about specificity while addressing a broad audience and why writing about ableism felt so risky to him. We also talk about the concept of "blind thought" and the ongoing debate around blindness being a neutral characteristic.
The Stacks Book Club selection for August is You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi. We will discuss the book on August 30th with Sam Sanders.
You can find everything we discuss on today's show on The Stacks' website:
https://thestackspodcast.com/2023/08/16/ep-280-andrew-leland
Connect with Andrew: Instagram | Twitter | Website
Connect with The Stacks: Instagram | Twitter | Shop | Patreon | Goodreads | Subscribe
SUPPORT THE STACKS
Join The Stacks Pack on Patreon
To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.
Purchasing books through Bookshop.org or Amazon earns The Stacks a small commission.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | You guys, the live and the stacks tour is underway. |
| 0:03.8 | We had an incredible night in Oakland filled with bookish conversations, hot takes, games, |
| 0:08.8 | cocktails. If you missed it, I'm sorry, but don't worry, it's not too late to see the stacks live |
| 0:15.3 | in one of our next four stops. Join me in Chicago with Samantha Erby on August 27th |
| 0:21.6 | in Washington, D.C. with Jason Reynolds on September 24th in New York City with KSA |
| 0:26.9 | Laman on September 25th and in LA on October 18th with some extra special guests that we will be |
| 0:33.6 | announcing real soon. Tickets are selling fast so head to the stackspodcast.com slash tour |
| 0:40.4 | and get your tickets before we sell out. |
| 0:52.5 | Welcome to the stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. |
| 0:55.5 | I'm your host Tracy Thomas and today we are joined by Andrew Leland. |
| 0:59.5 | Andrew is a teacher, producer, editor and writer who just released his first book. |
| 1:04.0 | It's called The Country of the Blind, a memoir at the end of sight. |
| 1:07.4 | The book is fantastic. It is one of my favorites of this year. |
| 1:10.9 | It's part memoir about Andrew's journey with Retinitis Pigmentosa, RP, |
| 1:15.5 | a degenerative eye disease that has made him slowly lose his vision over years, |
| 1:19.2 | and it is also part investigative journalism into blind culture and community. |
| 1:23.8 | Today we talk about how Andrew balanced these two parts in his book, |
| 1:27.5 | his own battle with ableism and writing about it, and the lack of writing on blindness. |
| 1:32.8 | Remember our August book club selection is You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty by Equike |
| 1:36.9 | and Mese. We will discuss the book with Sam Sanders on Wednesday, August 30th. |
| 1:41.8 | Reminder, everything we talk about on each episode of the stacks can be found in the link in |
| 1:46.0 | the show notes. Want more of the stacks? Join the stacks pack. It is just five dollars a month |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Traci Thomas, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Traci Thomas and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.