The mid-eighteen-thirties marked the rise of eugenics and racialism, with phrenology emerging as just one of the many pseudosciences that sought to enact, reinforce, and restrict racial difference. Kevin Young More Quotes by Kevin Young More Quotes From Kevin Young One of the most troubling things about the term 'fake news' is that it has become a force field against accusations you don't like. Kevin Young things you news fake A DJ draws a connection between two seemingly disparate things and says, 'Look, they are alike. You can dance to them.' Kevin Young dj look you dance The hoax is the very absence of truth, which usually means art is absent, too - hoaxes regularly substitute claims of reality for imagination, facts for form, acting as if artifice is the antithesis of art. Kevin Young imagination truth reality art Harper Lee's novel 'To Kill a Mockingbird' became iconic almost immediately after appearing in 1960: best-seller status; the Pulitzer Prize the next year; a classic movie soon after, with Gregory Peck in an Academy Award-winning role. Kevin Young status year classic next A poem can provide testimony. A poem can provide solace. It can provide a connection. Kevin Young poem connection solace testimony Blackface remains exoticist and offensive as a practice, not just because of its long tradition of being used to mock black selfhood, sexuality, and speech but because of its assertion that black people are merely white people sullied by dark skin. Kevin Young tradition black long people There is, of course, no larger mass hysteria in American history than the epidemic of racism. Kevin Young american hysteria racism history While claiming advocacy, what hoaxers really exhibit is self-interest. Often, this is because there is only the self to support their false claims; any revelations merely provide further opportunities for details and forgery. Kevin Young opportunities details support self Can you explore real issues as a fake character? Yes - it's called acting. Or fiction. But acting is not a method of engaging with the actual world, just as pretending to know what a character might eat does not a novel make - much less make that make-believe real. Kevin Young you fake character world Rereading 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' I was struck by what I had forgotten of the book: in a manner of pages, we encounter shame, history, ruin, conflicting stories, and wounds badly healed; in short, the South. Kevin Young short shame book history Writers need their totems, their altars. Mine, I feel, share the same randomness and utility of those belonging to painters I know, who are relentlessly visual and even poetic. Kevin Young need feel know belonging I rather think that archives exist to keep things safe - but not secret. Kevin Young things think safe secret I think I go with the Duke Ellington view on music. He said, 'There's two kinds of music - there's good music, and then there's the other kind.' Kevin Young view good think music There's something about the kind of time travel that a poem can provide. It can take you to somewhere else - a culture far from you, a language far from you, but suddenly you're there. You're that person, seeing with that person's eyes. I think that's really tremendous. Even things like cinema or more traditional history can't quite do that. Kevin Young eyes you time history I think poems return us to that place of mud and dirt and earth, sun and rain. Kevin Young place think sun rain I try to have a lot of influences, which is to say not to have one specific influence too strongly; that can end up badly. Kevin Young say end try influence It's hard to describe one's own alchemy that makes one into a writer, but I definitely think American language is so interesting, and specifically Southern language and black Southern language; it's hard to separate Southern language from black language. Kevin Young own think black language I didn't technically grow up in the South, but both my parents were from there. Kevin Young grow-up grow parents up To me, poetry is spoken - not exclusively, but there's a mix of languages in it. That's what I liked about 'For the Confederate Dead;' it has many different tones to it. Kevin Young dead me different poetry I didn't know any poets growing up in Kansas. Kevin Young up know growing growing-up
