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Poet, performer, and scholar Joshua Bennett is the author of three collections of poetry- The Study of Human Life, Owed, and The Sobbing School; a book of criticism, Being Property Once Myself- Blackness and the End of Man; and a work of narrative nonfiction, Spoken Word- A Cultural History. He received his PhD in English from Princeton University, and is currently Professor of Literature and Distinguished Chair of the Humanities at MIT. His writing has been published in The New York Times Magazine, The Paris Review, Poetry, and elsewhere. In 2021, he was the recipient of aGuggenheim Fellowship and aWhiting Award in Poetry and Nonfiction. He lives in Boston.
<b>Advance Praise for </b><i><b>The Sobbing School</b> 'Who can be alive today/and not study grief, Joshua Bennett asks in this arresting debut. Yet these poems are no study <i>in</i> grief. Abounding in tenderness and rich with character, these are no quaint lyrics. They leap into our lives, engaging, crackling with wit and intelligence. It s one of Bennett s unique gifts a virtuosic kind of code switching to deliver a civil tone of <i>I d rather you didn t</i>, while we know what he means is, more provocatively, <i>I wish you would</i>. <b> Gregory Pardlo</b> At a moment in American culture punctuated to a heartbreaking degree by acts of hatred, violence and disregard, I can think of nothing we need to ponder and to sing of more than our shared grief and our capacity not just for empathy but genuine love. Poetry is critical to such an endeavor and Joshua Bennett s astounding, dolorous, rejoicing voice is indispensable. <b> Tracy K. Smith</b> At the heart of Joshua Bennett s debut collection lies grief, but his poems also pay tribute to the human will to endure. There are glimpses here of James Baldwin and Zora Neale Hurston where Bennett s syntactical dexterity and feeling for language meet the rhythm and flow of dangerous music. His poems of identity are also poems of imagery and invention, and they testify to poetry s endless mutability through story and song, lament and praise. <i>The Sobbing School</i> is an essential book for our times. <b> Eugene Gloria</b>
