Joseph Earl Thomas

Two new poems out at @nplusonemag , shout out to @rodriquesque and my favorite @murmurshewrote poem “Happiness Theorem.” Oh and of course @beaniesigelsp

I had the pleasure of speaking to Nell Irvin Painter for UCLA mag last year, and here’s a hope towards more engagement with her work.

In a real regular mode of consideration about failing as a parent, as a writer, as a person who lives within a nation, I’ve been thinking a lot about seriousness, and punishment, and the way this industry punishes seriousness and how useful that is for power, and how we, not exclusively, though especially black people honest about or born into any relationship with negativity, must always be prepared for punishment. ———————————————————————————————-It’s also quite strange to witness moments of what appear to be freedom through unrelenting anger and fatigue. But I “finished” an essay about my grandmother, and by extension The Family, that I’m proud of. I started writing this maybe ten years ago and it’s in the world with special thanks to @harpersmagazine @semifluentmundo and @dalai_mama who all had the misfortune of sustaining many arguments over the use of words through the morning, the evening and the night for months at a time. I’ve also decided to buy back ~2,000 copies of my first book, Sink, which have not sold, so if you’re interested and want to get at me for a reading group, speaking engagement or otherwise bundle of cute coasters, hit me up! More writing forthcoming on video games, dragons, school shootings, basketball, “parenting,” friendship, sex, “literature,” “war,” etc.

PREE Writing Studio is a 4-day residential Writing Studio bringing together acclaimed writers, literary professionals, and emerging writers for an immersive learning experience in Kingston, Jamaica at the University of the West Indies, Mona. We are thrilled to welcome the following tutors & their modules: • Olive Senior (@olivetheauthor ) - “Inviting the Reader to Enter the Story” • Tanya Shirley (@poettanyashirley ) - “From Fact to Poetry” • Joseph Earl Thomas (@jetvgc ) - “Subjunctive Mood: Threads of Tension Across Genre” • Mikie Bennett (@graftonmikie ) - “Punchlines and Rhymes” • Johnny Temple (@johnnytemple127 ) - “On Publishing” As one past participant put it: “The space that PREE created for us was priceless. My heart is full.” 🚨 Applications are now open until May 15 at 11pm JA time 👉 Learn more and apply: preewritingstudio.com, link in bio! Many thanks to our funders @princeclausfund & @hawthorndenfoundation for making this possible!

In his poem, “GIRLHOOD, OR, SO WHAT IF DIAMOND IS A STRIPPER NAME,” Joseph Earl Thomas explores the duality of seeing and being seen. He tugs gently at the multi-coloured thread that is memory, identity and history.

Glad to have this beautiful new issue of @eroticreview wherein my poem “Watching Black Mirror on the Plastic Covered Loveseat” appears, alongside some great art and writing. Special thanks to @lucy.roeber too.

📸 Scenes from our April First Novel Friday with @yeah_okday , @lisaleehello , @__giadina , and the evening’s moderator @jetvgc . Swipe for pics—and be sure to purchase The Oldest Bitch Alive (@astrahousebooks ), American Han (@algonquinbooks ), and Ruins, Child (@ndpublishing ) at bookstore.centerforfiction.org. #bookevents #firstnovelfriday #brooklyn #books #reading

Jewelle Gomez’s The Gilda Stories was one of those books that, really early on made me consider writing as a serious way to engage with the world and composition of a self in relation to it, which, like Gloria Naylor’s Bailey’s Cafe, originally dropped in the early 90’s and was also conveniently offered to me by @aishalikesit while I was moonlighting in literature when I was supposed to be studying medicine elsewhere. Thank god for that. But also, still hits and is ahead of its/our time as they say. I can find my original copy but I’m happy for whichever one of yall stole that jawn.

📚Don’t miss our next First Novel Friday on April 3rd with Morgan Day, author of The Oldest Bitch Alive 🐶; Lisa Lee, author of American Han 🏡; and Giada Scodellaro, author of Ruins, Child 🌆. 🎤Joseph Earl Thomas, winner of The Center for Fiction 2024 First Novel Prize for God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer, will moderate. The evening will start with happy hour in our Members Lounge 🍸, move to readings and a short moderated conversation with the featured debut novelists, and end with book signings and signature cocktails. Go home—or head off to your next Friday night spot—with a new book, friend, and favorite Friday night tradition. 🔗Tickets are on sale now—and they go fast—so visit the link in our bio to get yours! @yeah_okday @astrahousebooks @lisaleehello @algonquinbooks @littlebrown @__giadina @ndpublishing @jetvgc #tbr

Thanks to the double baddie genius of @semifluentmundo & @danielle_j for a beautifully serious & mad playful compilation & the moment to think about a beloved scene in a beloved space, & to @writercruz & @asterixjournal for giving it a home, & to yung L for being a curious kid willing to travel all over with me. & thanks to @therealeve obviously. Y’all can read @shelamal @brittanyerogers & Shamira Ibrahim & them online: /

On Tuesday 3/10 at 7:00 PM, Jodi-Ann Burey and Joseph Earl Thomas will discuss Jodi-Ann’s galvanizing book, AUTHENTIC: THE MYTH OF BRINGING YOUR FULL SELF TO WORK. Jodi-Ann is a wonderful storyteller, and her insights on race, disability, capitalism, and community are absolutely crucial. AUTHENTIC is on our shelves now and will be available for purchase & signing at the event, too. Tickets are pay-what-you-can, and space is limited! Register at the 🔗 in bio.

NEW MARCH COURSE! Against the notion that race and the body are the problems of a nostalgia-laden past, Black Speculative Literature employs the “what if” of speculation as a point of departure for articulating the lived experiences of diasporic black subjects in a range of increasingly diverse aesthetic forms. Not simply a shorthand for fantasy or science fiction written by black writers, Black Speculative Literature works specifically as a locus for a critique of reality that centers the specific alienation of black people in the past, present, and sometimes, the future. While Black Speculative Literature can be thought of as part of a historical tradition that stretches back to the writings of Phyllis Wheatley or Martin R. Delany’s Blake, or the Huts of America, it has garnered increased attention in the 20th Century through writers such as Samuel Delany and Octavia Butler. Especially after the coining of the term Afrofuturism in 1993—which Mark Dery constructed through a series of interviews with Samuel Delany, Tricia Rose and Greg Tate—black speculation has become a common interest in both commercial and critical circles. What is Black Speculative Literature–a genre, a set of heuristics, an invaluable epistemology? What is the relationship between Black Speculative Literature, Afrofuturism, and the writers and scholars whose work is ordered and systematized under these rubrics for coherence and kinship, commerce, or the unchecked reifications of racial composition? What can we learn in reading and theorizing Black Speculative Fiction in the 21st century? “Black Speculative Literature: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Race, and Reality“ with @jetvgc starts online Monday, March 2nd! For more information and to enroll, visit the “Current Courses” link in bio. 📷: Anisia Uzeyman and Saul Williams - Still from Neptune Frost (2024)