This Conversation with Author Jason Reynolds is a Gift

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso

Lemonada Media

Society & Culture, Film Interviews, Tv & Film

4.8 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 20 October 2024

⏱️ 85 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

For the past decade, Jason Reynolds has become an inspiring voice in the literary world. He’s a New York Times bestselling author and as of this month, a 2024 MacArthur fellow.

Reynolds sits with us today to share his latest YA novel Twenty-Four Seconds from Now… (7:45), why he was interested in writing a story about boyhood and masculinity (12:05), and an early passage from the book (15:52) that captures the distinct rhythm of his writing (17:59). Then, we talk about the story structure of this new novel (19:00), how Queen Latifah’s Black Reign introduced him to poetry (21:45), and how his early memories of writing (27:45) and a singular high school teacher (35:17) saved his life.

On the back-half, Reynolds describes a meaningful post-college job at rag & bone (46:02), what he’s seen in the education system post-pandemic (59:30), his hope for the next generation (1:02:30), and his lifelong mission to embolden students to see the value in their own narratives (1:14:23).

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The 2024 presidential election is as close and unpredictable a race as we've ever seen.
0:07.0	But we do know one thing, it's going to be decided by voters in a handful of swing states.
0:11.0	I'm CNN's John King. Join me for the podcast all over the map
0:15.0	where I'm traveling across the country to find out what American voters think,
0:18.8	what frustrates them, what gives them hope, and what may motivate them to go into the voting booth.
0:25.0	Listen to all over the map wherever you get your podcasts. Pushkin. You're going to the show. Today I'm joined by author and poet Jason Reynolds.
1:16.0	Over the past 10 years, Reynolds has become one of the most inspiring voices in the literary world.
1:22.0	As the author of books like Long Way Down and All American Boys,
1:26.2	he's a New York Times bestseller, a two-time National Book Award finalist, and as of this month,
1:31.9	a 2024 MacArthur fellow. But his proudest designation
1:36.2	I believe is his role as the ambassador for young people's literature. From
1:40.9	2020 to 2022 he visited both virtually and in person with over 16,000 students and
1:48.0	47 schools across 25 states.
1:52.0	In each classroom though his mission was the same to embolden students to see
1:56.0	the value in their own narratives that they too have a story to tell and that there's a power
2:02.4	in telling it.
2:04.1	Which is precisely why I wanted to sit with Jason, because I don't know about you, but it feels
2:09.0	like at this moment we're telling ourselves a really bad story about everything ourselves, this country,
2:16.8	this election, the future, and even the younger generation that will eventually
2:21.0	have to lead it. And so today, Jason and I talk about the power of
2:25.7	narratives and how we may go about telling a new and hopefully better story. We also talk
2:32.2	about the teachers that changed his life, the classrooms and
	...

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