In the final episode of Human Conditions, Brent and Adam turn to Audre Lorde’s Sister Outsider, a collection of prose with exceptional relevance to contemporary grassroots politics. Like Du Bois, Césaire and Baraka, Lorde’s work defies genre: as she argues in this collection, ‘poetry is not a luxury’ but an essential tool for liberation. Throughout her work, Lorde sought to find and articulate new ways of living that encompassed her whole self – as a Black woman, poet, essayist, novelist, mother and lesbian. Brent and Adam discuss Lorde’s radical poetics and politics, and the case for poetry, anger, vulnerability, love and desire as the arsenal of revolution.
This podcast was recorded on 21 August 2024.
This is an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and all our other Close Readings series, subscribe:
Directly in Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3pJoFPq
In other podcast apps: https://lrb.me/closereadings
Further reading and listening from the LRB:
Reni Eddo-Lodge & Sarah Shin: On Audre Lorde
Jesse McCarthy & Adam Shatz: Blind Spots
Sean Jacobs: Chop-Chop Spirit
Ange Mlinko: Waiting for the Poetry
