The Tradition - by Jericho Brown (Paperback)

About the Book

"Jericho Brown's daring new book The Tradition details the normalization of evil and its history at the intersection of the past and the personal. Brown's poetic concerns are both broad and intimate, and at their very core a distillation of the incredibly human: What is safety? Who is this nation? Where does freedom truly lie? Brown makes mythical pastorals to question the terrors to which we've become accustomed, and to celebrate how we survive. Poems of fatherhood, legacy, blackness, queerness, worship, and trauma are propelled into stunning clarity by Brown's mastery, and his invention of the duplex--a combination of the sonnet, the ghazal, and the blues--testament to his formal skill. The Tradition is a cutting and necessary collection, relentless in its quest for survival while reveling in a celebration of contradiction"--

Book Synopsis

In this special edition of Jericho Brown's Pulitzer Prize-winning The Tradition, you are invited to participate in an urgent dialogue-sparked by poetry-about what it means to be human. Including a discussion guide and an interview with the author, The Tradition: Civic Dialogue Editionis meant to catalyze and inspire deep and engaging community conversations.

In 2021, the Free Library of Philadelphia selected The Traditionfor their annual city-wide reading program, choosing a book of poetry for the first time ever. The vision was for neighbor to meet neighbor and discuss-in profound and transformative ways-the difficult subjects confronted so powerfully by the poems: racism, homophobia, violence, and the human resolve to compose a joyful life. To encourage other communities-cities, schools, book groups-to follow Philadelphia's lead, Copper Canyon Press collaborated with the Free Library to create The Tradition: Civic Dialogue Edition. The dream is to tap the power of poetry to open hearts, clarify vision, spark conversation, and help make the world a more just and equitable place. And, if we're fortunate, to laugh as freely and share as openly as the poet himself.

Review Quotes

• Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry

• National Book Award Finalist

• "100 Notable Books of the Year," The New York Times Book Review

• One Book, One Philadelphia Citywide Reading Program Selection, 2021

• "By some literary magic-no, it's precision, and honesty--Brown manages to bestow upon even the most public of subjects the most intimate and personal stakes."--Craig Morgan Teicher, National Public Radio

• "Brown's hard-won lyricism finds fire (and idyll) in the intersection of politics and love for queer Black men."--O, The Oprah Magazine

• One of BookRiot's "50 Must-Read Poetry Collections"

About the Author

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for The Tradition, Jericho Brown earned his PhD in Creative Writing and Literature from the University of Houston. He is the recipient of the Whiting Writers Award and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, and the Krakow Poetry Seminar in Poland. His first book, Please (New Issues), won the American Book Award. His second book, The New Testament, won won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was named one of the best of the year by Library Journal. Brown is the director of the Creative Writing Program at Emory University and lives in Atlanta, Georgia.