Podcast appearances and mentions of emily rapp black

Author Emily Rapp Black discusses her book, The Still Point of the Turning World, and her talk at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art on Sunday, December 8.  Watch Video The post Emily Rapp Black appeared first on Elizabeth Appraisals.

This is part two of the series on early childhood death. The Sugars read letters from parents who worry that their grief may overshadow their surviving children. They are joined by the writer Emily Rapp Black, who decided to have another child after learning that her son had a fatal congenital disorder.

In today's 'Craftwork' episode, a conversation with Emily Rapp Black about "truth" in creative nonfiction. Emily is the author of five books of creative nonfiction: Poster Child, The Still Point of the Turning World, which was a New York Times bestseller, Sanctuary, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg, and I Would Die if I Were You (forthcoming). She is Professor of Creative Writing at UC-Riverside and a co-founder, with Gina Frangello, of Circe Consulting, which offers coaching and developmental editing to writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi's email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gina Frangello is the guest in the latest 'Craftwork' episode. We talk about the editorial omniscient point of view—what it is, what it can do, and how to use it in your writing. Gina is the author of the acclaimed memoir Blow Your House Down: A Story of Family, Feminism, and Treason (Counterpoint, 2021). Her other books include Every Kind of Wanting, A Life in Men, Slut Lullabies, and My Sister's Continent. Her short fiction, essays, book reviews, and journalism have been published in Ploughshares, The Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, HuffPost, Fence, Five Chapters, Prairie Schooner, Chicago Reader, and many other publications. She is also the co-founder, with Emily Rapp Black, of Circe Consulting, which provides a variety of services to writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi's email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen to ASCO's Journal of Clinical Oncology essay, “Being on The Other Side; An Oncologist's Perspective on Grieving,” by Shannon MacDonald, an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School and a Radiation Oncologist at the Massachusetts General Hospital & Mass General Brigham. The reading is followed by an interview with host Dr. Lidia Schapira and essay author Shannon MacDonald. MacDonald shares her experience with grief, loss, and love after her husband was diagnosed with a mitochondrial disorder that ultimately took his life. MacDonald explores what grief means and how it can be different from what you originally imagined. TRANSCRIPT Narrator: Being on the Other Side: An Oncologist's Perspective on Grieving, by Shannon MacDonald, MD (10.1200/JCO.22.01363) As an oncologist, I had cared for patients facing grave illness and death. I imagined the loss of loved ones and expected grief to be an unbearable sadness, most poignant in the earliest days and lessening with time. I somehow expected that counseling people who grieved would make me more prepared. When my husband Dan died at age 42 years, I realized that I had no idea how grief felt. It was surreal and disorienting, I was displaced from a life that made sense into a new reality, one my mind acknowledged but my heart and soul would not accept. Dan's initial diagnosis offered a glimpse into a different life. It was unsettling but included us both. When we were newly engaged, Dan abruptly lost vision in one eye quickly followed by the other. I vividly remember the dark, neuro-ophthalmologist's office in New York City where I was a resident. I sat next to a young medical student who appeared fascinated as my 31- year-old fiance´—who did not yet appear blind— struggled to count fingers or the big E projected on the wall before us. As unremarkable magnetic resonance imaging, spinal tap, and laboratory results were posted, rare disorders floated into the differential. Dan had a mitochondrial disorder. My fiance´ had transformed into a medical student case study. It is not possible to understand the impact of a life-altering diagnosis until you are on the receiving end. How dramatically life can change in an instant. How painful the guttural yearning to go back in time can be. Dan and I both came from healthy, loving, families and had a close knit and fun group of friends. Dan had an MBA and ran a family company. I was a doctor in training. We lived active, full lives with plans for our future. We had no medical problems, and although aware as an oncologist that a medical diagnosis can derail a healthy young person's life, we or I never thought this could happen to us. In the weeks that followed Dan's diagnosis, his vision deteriorated. We retreated into a world that included just us. We moved our couch just a few inches from our television. I read menus to Dan at restaurants, and he corrected my mispronunciation of ingredients. I took over as our driver despite being a city dweller with little driving experience. We got handicapped plates, a cane, researched seeing eye dogs, and had a conversation that abruptly ended when I uttered the word “Braille.” One night when I asked why he could not fall asleep, Dan answered, “I am afraid I won't be able to see your face when I wake tomorrow.” We left the lights on and did not sleep that night. Fortunately, Dan's vision loss was not complete and, although painfully slow, he recovered some of his sight. Over time, he reintegrated into his friend circle and work with adaptions and the help of a low vision clinic. We were grateful throughout. Dan was an avid skier and was able to ski again once he realized that muscle memory was more important than vision. With time, he no longer appeared blind. He gained the confidence to return to contact lenses, which allowed him to remove his glasses and sunglasses that hid his eyes. Dan had to face additional challenges. He developed bilateral avascular necrosis of his hips from the single dose of steroids given to him when multiple sclerosis was thought to be his diagnosis. This led to bilateral hip replacements and a year on crutches. This experience taught me to appreciate the subjective nature of function loss: I had perceived vision loss would have the most profound impact on his quality of life, but undergoing hip replacements and loss of mobility were unequivocally worse for Dan. In fact, this triggered such emotional distress that it challenged our relationship more than ever. Anxiety dominated over depression, and rather than medication, Dan used alcohol to soothe his pain. Over time, with therapy and lots of tears, we accepted this life with appreciation for what is truly important and we learned to ignore the trivial. We grew closer than ever, and, for this, I will be forever grateful. I find comfort in the thought that we lived together with more emotion and a deeper passion for each other and for life. Dan died of a sudden cardiac event during a business trip. When his dad called to tell me the news, I was doing yoga, and I recall him asking me “are you sitting down?” So, I kneeled on my yoga mat. I can't recall how many synonyms for death he attempted before he was forced to say the word “dead” to make me understand what had happened. When I got off the phone, I quickly called my sister and bluntly said “Dan is dead” and then repeatedly apologized for not asking her if she was sitting before I told her. I was derailed. I felt utterly unprepared for a life without the man who provided me with guidance, confidence, and experience that I had not had on my own. I never knew what true anxiety was until his death and would never again feel anxious about public speaking after giving his eulogy. I will forever be grateful for the people in my life who sat with me silently, fed me, and even slept in my bed in Dan's place. They would later recall memories in those early disorienting days that I did not. After reading that people often sigh when grieving, I asked my friend Alice if I ever sighed. She looked surprised and responded, “Shannon, you cried softly and sighed all day long.” When I was disappointed that I never dreamed that Dan was alive or woke up having forgotten that he was dead, those closest to me said that I would wake in the middle of the night reaching for him, realize he was not there, and then settle back into some sort of sleep. After his funeral, I became obsessed with determining exactly how he died, as if figuring it out could bring him back. The wait for final autopsy results was excruciating, but the findings of a hypertrophic cardiomyopathy likely related to his mitochondrial disorder was utterly unsatisfying. I remained convinced that if I had joined him for that business trip as I had planned to, I would have been with him, and he would still be alive. I still believe this. I also remember telling his father about my feelings of guilt, and he replied with both surprise and relief saying, “I feel so guilty too.” For months, I could not think of any future and preferred to live in the past. The sadness of missing him was more comforting than the thought of moving forward in a life that did not include him. Although I never thought of doing any harm to myself, I remember spending an hour convincing a patient to accept treatment for an advanced cancer only to walk out of her hospital room thinking that if I were her right now, I would do nothing and welcome death. With the support of friends, family, and therapy and the passing of time, I slowly became more functional and was able to reintegrate into society. My grief morphed into anxiety and feelings of guilt when my memories of Dan became less vivid as if I was not honoring him enough. When I finally had the courage to pack his clothes to give to charities, I was saddened that it evoked less emotion because they no longer carried his scent. What I had thought of in the past as “moving on” and a healthy step in the grieving process was not a simple forward advance but came with a longing to return to a period of greater grieving. Moving on and making new memories made me feel disloyal, as though I was abandoning him. With time, I came to accept my new life that was so different than the one I had planned. Eventually, I reached that place that Didion described: “I know why we try to keep the dead alive: we try to keep them alive in order to keep them with us. I also know that if we are to live ourselves there comes a point at which we must relinquish the dead, let them go, keep them dead.”1 But this took time, support, and a disciplined effort to change myself by reimagining my values and creating a new identity that did not include my husband or the children we planned to have together. My evolution aligned with the teachings of social scientist Boss,2 who refuted the idea of finding closure and instead posited that we must learn to live for a future that contains the loss. I learned over time to accept the discomfort it caused me to speak of him in the past tense. I could be true to myself; my identity was shaped by Dan but not in the present. I learned to say “I” instead of “we.” I accepted that my niece and nephews—and all my patients with pediatric cancer—would be the children in my life. I met a man and partner secure enough to be with a woman who speaks about a man she loves that is not him. Grief is personal, and I am only an expert in my personal grief. I found the support from colleagues, family, and friends helped me, but they could not make me feel close to my old normal—only Dan's return could have done that. I learned that some people simply could not acknowledge the loss and that in turn had a profoundly negative effect on our relationship. Even a card or e-mail would have sufficed, but silence created an awkwardness that was hard to bear. I was told by a coworker that a colleague had tried so many times to say something to me but was too afraid that he would say the wrong thing, so he said nothing. Hearing this helped me understand how his silence was not because he did not care but because his fear of hurting me by saying the wrong thing was paralyzing. I also discovered that avoiding conversation that included Dan made Dan feel more dead. I would have preferred to speak of him, even if this made me emotional. I learned to answer the “how are you” question by replying okay, as I could not lie and say “well.” When my nephew died, I texted my sister daily “How are you on a scale of 1- 10?” She loved this. People said perhaps well intended but strange things, such as “don't worry. You are young and will marry again.” and “you are lucky you did not have children and you will be a mother to somebody else's children.” With these comments I heard, “Dan is replaceable” and “it is good thing that you don't have a piece of him in a child you shared.” I recognized that I sometimes needed more space and that loneliness can feel unbearable. I had no way of predicting my needs, which made it difficult to plan ahead. I found it took years to work through my emotional pain and am forever grateful to those who believed in my ability to heal myself. Dr. Lidia Schapira: Hello, and welcome to JCO's Cancer Stories: The Art of Oncology, brought to you by ASCO Podcasts, which covers a range of educational and scientific content, and offers enriching insight into the world of cancer care. You can find all ASCO shows including this one at podcast.asco.org. I'm your host, Dr. Lidia Shapira, Associate Editor for Art of Oncology and Professor of Medicine at Stanford University. Today, we are joined by Dr. Shannon McDonald who's an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and a radiation oncologist at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and Mass General Brigham in Boston. In this episode, we will be discussing her Art of Oncology article; “Being On The Other Side: An Oncologist Perspective On Grieving”. At the time of this recording, our guest has no disclosures. Shannon, welcome to our podcast and thank you for joining us. Dr. Shannon MacDonald: Lidia, thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure and privilege to be here today. Dr. Lidia Schapira: I'd love to start by having you tell us a little bit about what motivated you to write this essay that is so personal and so important, and to share it with the large community of oncologists. Dr. Shannon MacDonald: So, writing it was easy. I found it very cathartic to write about my experience. So, the act of writing it, I did over many years. I started it soon after Dan died, picked it up a couple of years later, and then put it away for a long time, and recently was motivated to pick it up and start writing again based on reading “Beautiful Boy”, which was one of the Art of Oncology pieces and also, based on another medical narrative that I wrote just before this one. And the decision to publish it and make it public was a little more challenging. Dan was a very private person. We spent many years being very private about his medical problems. He never wanted to be seen as having a disability or a medical issue. I think he was wise enough to know he'd be perceived differently, but I made a decision when I gave his eulogy to share some of his medical history and how brave I think he was during that time. And I think one of the reasons to publish it was to help others. I found reading very helpful when I went through this experience and I think helpful in my career as an oncologist, and reading people's stories, short stories, books, any type of reading about the human experience is helpful to try sort of put yourself in those shoes and try to understand what it feels like. And I was also motivated by giving a few talks or joining others to give talks on grief during the pandemic and speaking about my experience and was told by colleagues a long time ago,' we just want to know how it feels'. And when I gave these talks, I think residents in particular, but also, colleagues of any age were very grateful for the sharing of my experience. And it made me feel sharing this was meaningful. Dr. Lidia Schapira: And when you talk about how it feels, the sentiment I took away from reading the essay, and I've read it many times, is how raw that felt. And your wisdom in saying that you had lived as a professional in a culture that's immersed in grief, and you were exposed to suffering, and the suffering of children even, every day in your professional life, and yet you were unprepared. Can you talk a little bit about what you felt helped you to learn to accept and move on or live with Dan's absence? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: Yeah, so I think what you said about being totally unprepared and what I said in my essay was completely true. I guess, I thought somehow that seeing patients suffer, seeing them lose loved ones, seeing parents lose children would have somehow made me more prepared, but it did not at all, I was completely caught off-guard. And I remember calling a colleague who was also 40 and she lost her husband suddenly, about three months after I lost Dan. And one of the first things she cried out when I called her is, “I can't believe I had no idea what this felt like.” And I think that that resonated with me, I felt exactly the same way, and that's what I answered back to her. And as much as we live it and see it every day, it's so different being on the other side of it. I think we see the illness, the sadness, and you think of it for moments. You can't think of it every moment of every day. And I remember hearing people say that person that I lost is in my mind every moment of every day, and I couldn't understand that, but it's true. Somehow, it's constantly there. Even though Dan was gone, he was constantly there, and to do anything meant sort of pushing him out of my mind in order to do another task. And that part is the part that I think is unimaginable. And why would you want to imagine that, and how could anyone? And that is the part that we don't see. And I think as oncologists, we see our patients through a tremendous amount of suffering. We see them at the time of death of a loved one, and then we see them shortly after, but we don't always see them in the weeks, months, years after that loss. So, it was that part that was so unknown to me until that happened. And I think you do what you can to get through it. It's not easy, it's messy, and it's hard. And I can't say that I could give someone advice on how to get through it in a better way. I think you just have to go through it. And that was yeah, the experience I learned from my loss. Dr. Lidia Schapira: So, you say that it's messy and complicated, and in your essay, you reflect also on the reaction that you had or the way that your colleagues responded to this catastrophe that took you by surprise. It was not as if Dan had a chronic illness and was approaching the end, this was totally unexpected despite the fact that he did have an illness. And you talk about the silence of your colleagues as a wound. At least that's the way I interpret it. Can you talk a little bit about that? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: Yeah, and it's silence of colleagues and also friends. But I think for me anyway, I can only speak about my personal experience — that was the hardest because it created this awkwardness that was hard to get past. So, in my opinion, it's better to say anything or write something if you can't say something. But also, I also have learned, and I understand that it's just so hard and people are so afraid of saying the wrong thing that it's natural to avoid it or to try to say something, and then be too nervous to say something. But I guess, my advice would be to try to write or say something rather than saying nothing because it's so awkward when nothing is said, and it creates an additional stress on that person that's grieving, and sometimes, a sad loss of a relationship for a time or forever. Dr. Lidia Schapira: Sounds like you have used your experience to now, talk about and write about your personal grief, and you're seen perhaps, as a resource for others or a teacher. What does that feel like? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: It feels good. I'd like to be that as much as I can be. Again, it's only my personal experience. I've received feedback that it's helpful, but I'm sure I wouldn't receive feedback that it was unhelpful or negative feedback. But I think that makes me feel like there's some meaning to the writing and the work that I've done, in speaking to others. And I think there's a lot of oncologists, maybe particularly those new to training that are eager for more teaching in the human experience of what we see every day. They certainly want to learn the trade and the skills, and they can find that in textbooks and in our teaching, but the humanistic part of it is more difficult to learn. So, it's been very rewarding to have colleagues and residents tell me that it felt great to be able to ask in a comfortable setting how it feels to have someone die, so that they can understand better how their patients feel. Dr. Lidia Schapira: Can you reflect a little and share with us some of the sort of milestones in your sort of recalibrating and being able to find joy, and then find a relationship and transform your experience into part of who you are and carry with you, but in a way sort of embrace this new place in your life? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: So, I'd say a lot of steps forward and steps back. And if anyone had told me I would be as happy as I am again, now, right after Dan died or within the first year after he died, I would've said no way, that's never going to happen. I'd say in the initial time of his death and months after his death, I had no desire to ever date or be with anyone again. As I mentioned in my essay, it was easier to live in the past than to think about the present in an identity that was no longer what I knew was my identity or the future, was daunting. And I would say, again, time is different for everyone, but maybe after 10 or 11 months, I could be happy again. I could enjoy friends, I thought I was ready to date. And one of my best friends said, “I don't think you are.” And I said, “I think I am.” And then I wore my wedding ring on the first date I was set up on. And I thought maybe foolishly, “Oh, I don't think he noticed or he cared. He knew I was widowed” and he did. And we didn't go out on another date. But in time, I learned to date other people and not feel guilty about it or disloyal to Dan. As I mentioned, I met someone who allowed me to speak of him, which was very important for me that I not lose that past part of my life, and that person could still come forward into new relationships and new friends and family. I still am very close to my in-laws and keep them as part of my family. And I think that keeping my old identity and what Dan did for me and how he shaped me was very important to me in moving forward. And I feel that I'm able to do that now, and know that he lives on in the person he made me, and the other people that he shaped in his life that was too short. Dr. Lidia Schapira: So, the question I'm sure on our listeners' minds is how has that impacted you in your professional life as a radiation oncologist? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: It allows me to be probably more empathetic rather than sympathetic. I remember being taught in medical school, in my psychology rotation that you can only truly be empathetic if you've been through something. And it's still similar, everyone's experience is different. But for some patients, I think it allows a little more empathy. I think in the initial months, years after Dan died, I was too empathetic. I was too sensitive to the losses that other people experienced. And that made me realize that somehow, maybe I built up some desensitization over time that was very subtle. And after Dan died, I worked hard to build that up again to allow me to work with patients and not be too sad and too empathetic, or too upset by what was happening to them. And I do think that that has happened again, but it's beautiful to be able to empathize, but hard to empathize too much. Dr. Lidia Schapira: So, in the last few minutes, Shannon, I'd love to hear your take on the value of narratives, of stories to bring these topics to our discussions in the clinic, to the curriculum of our trainees, and I think create a community of people who really deeply care about our lived experiences and want to support each other. Dr. Shannon MacDonald: So, I think they're extremely important. I love the narratives. I always look at Art of Oncology and I love the New England Journal of Medicine ‘Perspective', and JAMA's ‘Piece of My Mind '. And I also found books; Joan Didion's, The Year of Magical Thinking, and also, those stories by Emily Rapp Black, The Still Point in the Turning World; When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi. I think those are three books that I tell my residents to read and narratives, I think we need more of that in the curriculum for our residents and students. And I do feel like there's a generation that is craving that more. I don't know if you've seen this in the residents you mentor, but, in ours, I feel that they're asking more and more for that to be part of their curriculum more so than they had a decade ago. And it may be that this generation is just more comfortable speaking about feelings and acknowledging that that's an important part of medicine. And we want to cure patients. We want to help them live with their cancers for a long time with a good quality of life, and we aim to do that. But the reason we aim to do it is so they can have a human experience. So, that part is so important. It's why we do what we do. And I think that it motivates us to take care of our patients and help them to live as well as they can with their disease. Dr. Lidia Schapira: And we become part of their stories too. I've often thought that in some ways, if we have a strong relationship with patients, we are invited to co-edit those illness narratives, and what a privilege that is. Dr. Shannon MacDonald: I agree. Dr. Lidia Schapira: My last question is; what are you reading now? Dr. Shannon MacDonald: So, what I would recommend that I've recently read for the Art of Oncology listeners would be Between Two Kingdoms by Suleika Jaouad. I love that book. It's also a great audio book. She narrates it herself and does a beautiful job with that. I also recently, probably a year ago now, read Sanctuary by Emily Rapp Black, which I thought was very meaningful as well. So, for your readership, those are two books I would recommend. Dr. Lidia Schapira: Well, Shannon, thank you for an extraordinary essay, for the power of your conversation. And for our listeners, until the next time, thank you for listening to JCO's Cancer Stories: The Art of Oncology. Don't forget to give us a rating or a review wherever you listen. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode of JCO's Cancer Stories: The Art of Oncology that is just one of ASCO's many podcasts. You can find all of the shows at podcast.asco.org. Voiceover: The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. This is not a substitute for professional medical care, and is not intended for use in the diagnosis or treatment of individual conditions. Guests on this podcast express their own opinions, experience, and conclusions. Guest statements on the podcast do not express the opinions of ASCO. The mention of any product, service, organization, activity or therapy, should not be construed as an ASCO endorsement. Like, share and subscribe so you never miss an episode and leave a rating or review. Additional Reading: My Beautiful Boy Bio: Dr. MacDonald who is an Associate Professor at Harvard Medica School and a Radiation Oncologist at the Massachusetts General Hospital & Mass General Brigham in Boston.

The Sugars conclude a two-part series on early childhood death. In Part 2, they read letters from parents who worry that their grief may overshadow their surviving children. They are joined by the writer Emily Rapp Black, who decided to have another child after learning that her son had a fatal congenital disorder. This episode was originally released on November 11th, 2017.

After seeing Frida Kahlo's painting “The Two Fridas,” writer and professor Emily Rapp Black felt an intense connection with the famous Mexican artist—maybe one of the most recognized faces in the world. Rapp Black has been an amputee since childhood. She grew up with a succession of prosthetic limbs, and learned to hide her disability from the world. Kahlo, too, was an amputee, having sustained lifelong injuries after a horrific bus crash during her teenage years, eventually leading to her right leg being amputated. In Kahlo's life and art, Rapp Black saw her own life, from numerous operations to the compulsion to create pain silences. Rapp Black—an award-winning memoirist—tells the story of losing her infant son to Tay-Sachs disease, giving birth to her healthy daughter, and learning to accept her body—and how along her path in life, Frida inspired her to find a way forward when all else seemed lost.  Frida is the subject of Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg (Notting Hill Editions, 2021), Rapp Black's fourth and most recent book. She is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of California, Riverside, where she also teaches medical narratives in the School of Medicine.Music by Stereolab

Welcome to Season 3!We kick the season off with a heavyweight: a NY Times bestseller with an academic background as varied as our conversation.Emily spills the beans about the challenges of learning geometry from someone who's spangled, writing sonnets for dollars and finding her people in the world of musical theatre.Emily also talks about her time at Harvard, and how America gets a lot of its educational values twisted. She also shares her tips on writing.Go Bearcats!Buy Emily's most recent book: Frida Kahlo and My Left LegFor US guestsCheck her out at: https://www.emilyrappblack.com/Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/rightintheschoolies)

At first sight of Frida Kahlo's painting The Two Fridas, author Emily Rapp Black felt an instant connection with the artist. An amputee from childhood, Rapp Black grew up with a succession of prosthetic limbs, and learned she had to hide her disability from the world. Kahlo sustained lifelong injuries after a horrific bus crash and her own right leg was eventually amputated. In Kahlo's art, Rapp Black recognized her own life. In this astoundingly personal presentation, Rapp Black joined us with fellow author Lidia Yuknavitch to explore her own story and her attachment to Kahlo. With candor and vulnerability, she chronicled how Kahlo's art reflected her own, from numerous operations, to the compulsion to create, to silent pain. She told the story of losing her infant son to Tay-Sachs, giving birth to a daughter, and learning to accept her body.  Rapp Black examined how the experiences and art of another can help shape our own lives—and inspire us to find a way forward when all seems lost. Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir, The Still Point of the Turning World, Sanctuary, and Frida Kalho and My Left Leg. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including Vogue; The New York Times; Time; The Wall Street Journal; O, The Oprah Magazine; and the Los Angeles Times. She is a regular contributor to The New York Times Book Review and is the nonfiction editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books. Rapp is currently an associate professor of creative writing at the University of California, Riverside, where she also teaches medical narratives in the university's School of Medicine. Lidia Yuknavitch is the author of the bestselling novels The Book of Joan, a cli fi restorying of Joan of Arc, The Small Backs of Children, and Dora: A Headcase. Her memoir The Chronology of Water is currently being adapted for film by Kristen Stewart. Her book The Misfit's Manifesto is based on her TED Talk “On The Beauty of Being a Misfit.” Her book of short stories, Verge, was published in 2020, and her next novel, Thrust is forthcoming. She founded the creative lab Corporeal Writing in Portland, Oregon. Buy the Book: Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg (Hardcover) Elliott Bay Books  Presented by Town Hall Seattle. To become a member or make a donation online click here.

The Guilty FeministPresented by Deborah Frances-White and Jen Brister Episode 266: Doing It!with special guest Emily Rapp Black Recorded 29 July 2021 via Zoom. Released 9 August 2021. The Guilty Feminist theme by Mark Hodge and produced by Nick Sheldon. More about Deborah Frances-White http://deborahfrances-white.com https://twitter.com/DeborahFW https://www.virago.co.uk/the-guilty-feminist-book More about Jen Brister https://twitter.com/kemahbob https://twitter.com/jenbrister http://www.jenbrister.co.uk https://play.acast.com/s/wtb More about Emily Rapp Black https://twitter.com/emilyrappblack1 https://www.emilyrappblack.com https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Frida-Kahlo-and-My-Left-Leg-by-Emily-Black-author/9781912559268 https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/jun/13/frida-kahlo-and-me-how-the-artist-shaped-my-life-as-an-amputee-emily-rapp-black For more information about this and other episodes… visit guiltyfeminist.com tweet us twitter.com/guiltfempod like our Facebook page facebook.com/guiltyfeminist check out our Instagram instagram.com/theguiltyfeminist or join our mailing list eepurl.com/bRfSPT Come to a live recording Shedinburgh live stream. 13 August. Book now. London Podcast Festival at Kings Place, 4 September. Tickets available soon. Celebration of Feminism at the Southbank Centre, 10-11 September. Book tickets now. Australia and New Zealand tour, October-November. Book tickets now. Thank you to our amazing Patreon supporters. To support the podcast yourself, go to https://www.patreon.com/guiltyfeminist

The novelist Libby Scott has just released her third novel ‘Ways to Be Me' in collaboration with the author Rebecca Westcott. Along with her mum she tells us about her new book and it's realistic portrayal of autism, and her own diagnosis at the age of 10. The presenter, journalist and “Queen of Mean”, Anne Robinson, tells us about becoming the first female host of Channel 4's longest running series Countdown We discuss why the future of the high street needs to put women at the centre of its design and overall regeneration. Mary Portas has done a TED talk and podcast arguing for a new approach by business and customers and has now written a book about it all called “Rebuild”. Suzannah Clarke has published new research saying women are responsible for 85% of spending on the High Street and they need to be taken into account in future planning if the downward trends are to be reversed. Eilidh Doyle is Scotland's most decorated track and field athlete of all time. The Olympic, World and European medal holder had hoped to compete in the Olympics in Tokyo this month but instead announced her retirement from competitive athletics. She tells us about coming to that decision about retirement and why she is involved in a project with Abertay University, where elite athletes and sporting figures share their experiences of unexpected setbacks and coping strategies with people who have been negatively impacted by Covid. And the writer Emily Rapp Black, whose left leg was amputated at the age of four due to a congenital defect, tells us about the instant connection she felt with the artist Frida Kahlo. Her new book ‘Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg' describes how Emily has made sense of her own life and body. Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Rabeka Nurmahomed Editor: Louise Corley

Rachel Weisz seems to have had constant work in the film industry since the early nineties. She's been in all kind of films: historical, action, science fiction, serious, art-house. Now she's diving into the world of superheroes with the new Marvel film, 'Black Widow'. Anita speaks to her about her latest role. The nation is transfixed - after many years of hurt could England be on the road to winning a major trophy? Football journalist Flo Lloyd-Hughes joins Anita. Sri Lankan author Kanya d'Almeida has been named the Commonwealth Short Story Prize Winner of 2021. Her winning piece, "I Cleaned The-" features two women who share a room in a refuge run by nuns, for people who have nowhere else to go. Kanya talks to Anita about her winning story, motherhood, mental health and paying for childcare in Sri Lanka. Northern Ireland politics is stuck. Continued disagreements between the power-sharing parties have led to stagnation in the Northern Irish Assembly, leaving lots of services in the lurch, including access to abortion for Northern Irish women. Now a charity, which is the first port of call for those who want an early medical abortion, says if they don't get funding they'll have to stop. Emily Rapp Black felt an instant connection with the artist Frida Kahlo after seeing her famous painting 'The Two Fridas'. At the age of four, Emily's left leg was amputated due to a congenital birth defect. In her new book ‘Frida Kahlo And My Left Leg', she explores the legacy, life and art of Frida Kahlo which helped her to make sense of her own life and body. Emily writes about the trauma of her son's death and the current discourse and attitudes around disability. Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Frankie Tobi

Drs. Lucy Kalanithi and Paul Kalanithi explore how to find meaning in the face of mortality. Paul Kalanithi's memoir is When Breath Becomes Air. His essays include “How Long Have I Got Left?” (The New York Times), “My Last Day as a Surgeon” (The New Yorker) and “Before I Go” (Stanford Medicine Magazine). You might also like the 8-minute documentary short “A Strange Relativity: Altered Time for a Surgeon-Turned-Patient.” Dr. Viktor Frankl's seminal book is Man's Search for Meaning. Hear Lucy Kalanithi's TEDMED talk, “What makes life worth living in the face of death.” Poetry in this episode: The Glories of Our Blood and State by James Shirley, Separation by W. S. Merwin.  Many thanks to Emily Rapp Black for collaborating on this episode. Gravity is produced by Wonder Media Network. Original music by Rachel Wardell. Rekha Murthy is our editor. Jenny Kaplan is our executive producer.For more on why we're doing what we're doing, check us out on Instagram and on Twitter. Find Lucy on Twitter at @rocketgirlmd.

Emily Rapp Black is back on the show to share all about her journey to self-love and acceptance through writing her most recent book, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg. She is an author and creative writing professor who is helping others by sharing her own experience and expertise.  Her most recent book was imagined after she spent time at the Frida Kahlo museum. Their shared experience with life-long pain and disability spoke to her and she felt the need to share more about her own story.  She joins me today to chat about her newest book and why she was driven to reveal even more about her life. The path to self-love and acceptance is not straight. It's truly a journey that we are living out each and every day.  It's perfectly normal to find yourself backsliding into self-doubt, but you should have ways to get back on track. Her latest book digs deep into the journey and ways to keep yourself moving forward in your journey.  Listen in to hear more about Emily's story, what she's up to next, and why if you feel a book in you, you should write it. She truly believes we all have a story to tell, but writing a book takes time and dedication. Do you have the willpower to share your own journey? Show Notes: [02:51] Why did she write Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg? [05:23] What did she want readers to take away from the book?  [07:23] How did Frida Kahlo help Emily on her own journey to self-love and acceptance?  [10:00] Her thoughts on getting back on track if you've fallen off the path toward accepting yourself. [11:19] Where did her awareness of Frida Kahlo begin?  [13:16] What did she learn about herself in writing this new book?  [15:15] Emily shares her thoughts on similar character traits she shares with Frida.  [17:21] Does she think that everyone has a story or book in them?  [18:23] Would it benefit aspiring writers to take classes and work on their skill?  [19:52] What is the best part of writing memoirs and what does she still struggle with?  [21:42] Her advice for those of us who are ready to start on the writing journey. [22:14] Connect with Emily. Links and Resources: Emily's Website Circe Consulting Emily on Instagram Emily on Facebook Contact Emily Sanctuary by Emily Rapp Black Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg by Emily Rapp Black Gina Frangello

Jenn Gannon looks at the evolution of the comedy special. Director Joan Sheehy, and actress Kathy Rose O'Brien talk to Seán about In the Middle of the Fields. Sinéad Gleeson reviews Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg, a book by Emily Rapp Black, and Bernie Sherlock, guest conductor for the Chamber Choir Ireland, talks about Shared Ground.

This episode is a very exciting Client Success Story, featuring Emily Rapp Black, a college professor of creative writing,  NY Times best selling author with four published memoirs including her latest, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg.  Emily is also a mother and entrepreneur with two businesses.  She is a Peloton enthusiast, wickedly funny and has never let her ADHD or her prosthetic leg slow her down.  When it comes to business, many of Emily's challenges were related to boundaries, settling limits and charging for the tremendous value she brings to her collaborative writing clients.  Emily knew she was saying “yes” to too many kinds of projects which limited her income and time for her most important goals, like taking a month off every summer to work on her own writing projects.In this episode, we talk about things we addressed through coaching:Identifying your non-negotiables and communicating them with confidence How personal values of sensitivity, empathy and generosity can create challenges in businessGrowing your business by embracing intentional constraints in who you work with, your scope of work and what you charge Today's Podcast Praise for The Driven Woman comes from Tricia Dempsey who says:  “Diann is my new business BFF! Her perspective of driven entrepreneurs is a breath of fresh air. She is such a role model for all of us because she is vulnerable and bold enough to speak about what we are all thinking and at the same time, holds space for those in the messy middle of reaching their goals. Thank you Diann for being a great example of what's possible for us all.”  Thank you, Tricia! Don't forget to leave your own review of The Driven Woman Podcast, so I can read it on a future episode!Apple: https://apple.co/2BZDFzcAndroid: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/the-driven-woman-1194485Are you ready to take things to the next level and work With Diann? Are you ready to invest in making 2021 the year you get back into momentum & move the needle?  Click here to schedule a free 30-minute consultation with Diann to see if her signature 12-week private coaching program is right for you.  Create an ADHD-friendly business and life! https://calendly.com/diannwingert/free-consultationConnect with Diann Online: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coachdiannwingert/ Ways to connect with Emily Rapp Black:Website: https://www.emilyrappblack.com/   https://circeconsulting.net/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilyrappblack/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EmilyRappBlackJust last week, Emily published her latest memoir, “Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg” where she shared her personal journey as an amputee and how she is inspired by the life of Mexican painter, Frida Kahlo (I am a huge Frida fan, and it is one of many things Emily have in common!)  Here is a link to the book on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1912559269?tag=randohouseinc7986-20

This episode is a very exciting Client Success Story, featuring Emily Rapp Black, a college professor of creative writing, NY Times best selling author with four published memoirs including her latest, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg. Emily is also a mother and entrepreneur with two businesses. She is a Peloton enthusiast, wickedly funny and has never let her ADHD or her prosthetic leg slow her down. When it comes to business, many of Emily's challenges were related to boundaries, settling limits and charging for the tremendous value she brings to her collaborative writing clients. Emily knew she was saying “yes” to too many kinds of projects which limited her income and time for her most important goals, like taking a month off every summer to work on her own writing projects.In this episode, we talk about things we addressed through coaching:Identifying your non-negotiables and communicating them with confidence How personal values of sensitivity, empathy and generosity can create challenges in businessGrowing your business by embracing intentional constraints in who you work with, your scope of work and what you charge Today's Podcast Praise for The Driven Woman comes from Tricia Dempsey who says: “Diann is my new business BFF! Her perspective of driven entrepreneurs is a breath of fresh air. She is such a role model for all of us because she is vulnerable and bold enough to speak about what we are all thinking and at the same time, holds space for those in the messy middle of reaching their goals. Thank you Diann for being a great example of what's possible for us all.” Thank you, Tricia! Don't forget to leave your own review of The Driven Woman Podcast, so I can read it on a future episode!Apple: https://apple.co/2BZDFzcAndroid: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/the-driven-woman-1194485Are you ready to take things to the next level and work With Diann? Are you ready to invest in making 2021 the year you get back into momentum & move the needle? Click here to schedule a free 30-minute consultation with Diann to see if her signature 12-week private coaching program is right for you. Create an ADHD-friendly business and life!https://calendly.com/diannwingert/free-consultationConnect with Diann Online: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coachdiannwingert/ Ways to connect with Emily Rapp Black:Website: https://www.emilyrappblack.com/ https://circeconsulting.net/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilyrappblack/Facebook:

In conversation with Katie Ford, author of If You Have to Go and three previous collections of poems. Ford is the recipient of a Lannan Literary Fellowship and she teaches at the University of California, Riverside. Bestselling memoirist Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child, an exploration of her childhood as an amputee and March of Dimes spokesperson; The Still Point of the Turning World, an account of her young son's diagnosis and death from a rare congenital disease; and Sanctuary, a reflection on the meaning of ''resilience'' in the midst of grief and new love. Her essays, stories, poems, and reviews have appeared in periodicals such as the New York Times, Vogue, and The Boston Globe, and she is the nonfiction editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books. A former Fulbright scholar and a Guggenheim Fellow, Black teaches Creative Writing at the University of California, Riverside. Black's new book holds a mirror up to the art, disability, and experiences of Frida Kahlo and explains how Black's connection with Frida Kahlo helped her better understand her own life. Books with signed book plates available through the Joseph Fox Bookshop (recorded 6/17/2021)

“I grew up with a disability. I had an artificial leg since age four. I didn't realize it was anything. The goal was to pass and be as normal as possible. At puberty that screeched to a halt.” So begins CoveyClub founder, Lesley Jane Seymour's fascinating conversation with Emily Rapp Black, author of the upcoming book, “Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg.”  Black, whose previous memoir, “Sanctuary” is a brutally honest portrait of a mother struggling to balance the joy of motherhood with the tsunami of grief of losing her first born to Tay-Sachs disease-- says her disability meant she was “always really open. I never had really any privacy. People were asking me rude questions in elevators since age four.” Black, who is now an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at UC-Riverside and at UCR School of Medicine intended to follow in her minister father's footsteps by attending divinity school, says she was in Korea on a Fullbright when she “had a breakdown...I'd never thought about being a disabled woman.” Her new book was inspired by a visit to Frida Kahlo's home La Casa Azul and the exhibit of the corsets and braces and artificial limbs Kahlo wore that she saw on display. “I had a huge body emotional reaction,” Black says. “I had a back brace and the leg…[Kahlo]'s such a pop culture icon. There are CVS socks with Frieda Kahlo's face on it. But what does it mean? No one remembers she was an amputee.”  FREE GIFT! Don't start your reinvention without downloading CoveyClub's starter guide called “31 Badass Tips for Launching Your Reinveintion Without Fear!”

Emily Rapp Black is an author and creative writing professor who is making waves helping women to grapple with grief and find their own words. Her latest book Sanctuary, is her own memoir diving into her journey of loss and finding her resilience. So what does resilience mean to you?  When she was initially going through the loss of her son, people kept commenting on how resilient and strong she was, but that felt off. Resilience is not the same thing as strength. You don’t have to find it, you already have it.  Instead of thinking of resilience as something that you have to cultivate and nurture, think of it as something that you need to find within yourself. Also, know that ours is not a culture built to understand and strengthen resilience. Especially for women.  Listen as we chat about her book, her thoughts on resilience, and why she’s so passionate about teaching others. That passion comes through every single time she mentions her students and the women in her grief group.  We had an amazing conversation and if you’ve ever had a loss in your life, you’ll want to hear it! Show Notes: [02:28] Welcome Emily Rapp Black to the show and hear a bit about her journey toward authorship.  [04:25] Learn more about Emily’s story and why she wrote her most recent book.  [05:38] How do you tap into your resilience?  [07:37] Does society and culture help us to adapt, shift and change?  [09:49] Is her story with grief and loss a part of the book in how she found her resilience?  [11:29] How has our perspective of death changed as a culture?  [14:40] Has she had any big learning moments that have stuck with her?  [16:28] Does she have mentors that have guided her through her writing journey?  [19:14] How does she stay focused and keep writing through the distraction?  [21:33] Emily shares her parting advice.  [23:07] Connect with Emily. Links and Resources: Emily’s Website Circe Consulting Emily on Instagram Emily on Facebook Contact Emily Sanctuary by Emily Rapp Black

One in four adults has a disability in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, yet our country and culture falls behind in supporting this community in many ways to achieve the same opportunities as everyone else. This episode explores the financial inequalities, specifically, as well as some of the emotional and social struggles when you're a person living with a disability, as experienced by guest and memoirist Emily Rapp Black. Black lost her left leg at the age of six, due to a congenital birth defect. She was soon after chosen as the poster child for the March of Dimes. Her experiences living with a disability have led to the publication of several books including Poster Child: A Memoir, The Still Point of the Turning World, and her forthcoming book, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg (June 15, 2021). She is a former Fulbright scholar and recipient of the James A. Michener Fellowship. She is an assistant professor at the University of California, Riverside, School of Medicine. You can learn more about her at www.emilyrappblack.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir, and The Still Point of the Turning World, and most recently, Sanctuary – a memoir. A onetime Fulbright Scholar, she was educated at Harvard University, Trinity College in Dublin, Saint Olaf College and the University of Texas at Austin, where she was a James A. Michener fellow. She has received many many awards and fellowships, most recently a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her work has appeared in Vogue, The New York Times, Salon, Slate, Time, The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal, Psychology Today, O:The Oprah Magazine, The Los Angeles Times and many others. She is a regular contributor to The New York Times Book Review and frequently publishes scholarly work in the fields of disability studies, bioethics, and theological studies. She is currently associate professor of creative writing at the University of California, Riverside, where she also teaches medical narratives in the School of Medicine. She talks candidly with me about writing this book about the death of her son Ronan just before he turned three, of Tay Sachs, and then having a subsequent, and healthy, daughter. Her book is beautiful, gripping and thought provoking and I think you'll find our conversation insightful. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/judy-mandel/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/judy-mandel/support

A searing memoir of a mother's love, the meaning of resilience and the possibilities of life after grief from the New York Times bestselling author of The Still Point of the Turning World. 'Congratulations on the resurrection of your life,' a colleague wrote to Emily Rapp Black when she announced the birth of her second child. The line made Emily pause. Her first child, Ronan, had died before he turned three years old from Tay-Sachs disease, an experience she wrote about in her first book, The Still Point of the Turning World. Since that time her life had changed utterly: she had left the marriage that fractured under the terrible weight of her son's illness, remarried the love of her life, had a flourishing career and given birth to a healthy baby girl. But she rejected the idea that she was leaving her old life behind - that she had, in the manner of the mythical phoenix, risen from the ashes and been reborn into a new story, when she carried so much of her old story with her. More to the point, she wanted to carry it with her. Everyone she met told her she was resilient, strong, courageous in ways they didn't think they could be. But what did these words mean, really? Sanctuary is an attempt to unpack the various notions of resilience that we carry as a culture. Drawing on contemporary psychology, neurology, etymology, literature, art and self-help, Emily Rapp Black shows how we need a more complex understanding of this concept when applied to stories of loss and healing. Interwoven with lyrical, unforgettable personal vignettes from her life as a mother, wife, daughter, friend and teacher, Rapp Black creates a stunning tapestry that is full of wisdom and insight.

S6 Ep 4: In this episode, meet writer and illustrator Mari Andrew, speaker and journalist Antonio Neves, and author and professor Emily Rapp Black. Go behind the mic with these authors and hear what inspired them to write their books, and the ins and outs of what it was like for them to narrate their own work. Am I There Yet? by Mari Andrew: https://www.penguinrandomhouseaudio.com/book/557582/am-i-there-yet/ Stop Living on Autopilot by Antonio Neves: https://www.penguinrandomhouseaudio.com/book/622583/stop-living-on-autopilot/ Sanctuary by Emily Rapp Black: https://www.penguinrandomhouseaudio.com/book/574505/sanctuary/

The Fall, 2019 issue of Alta features the magazine’s first standalone section on books and literature spearheaded by our books editor, David Ulin. In this podcast, we’ll explore how Alta’s Book Guide came to fruition with Ulin, as well as hear from included authors Carolina De Robertis, Matthew Zapruder. The Book Guide adds some serious pages to the magazine. Pick up this issue and you can tell, we’ve gained some paper weight. According to Ulin, now is absolutely the right time for Alta to invest our ink in covering literature. The 28 books highlighted in this special magazine section address topics ranging from immigration, race, and gender—to skateboards, drugs, and the wonders of nature. Each title is by a Western author, and is reviewed by a Western writer such as, Pam Houston on Terry Tempest WIlliams’ Erosion, Alexander Chee on Alex Epsinosa’s Cruising, and Emily Rapp Black on Téa Obreht’s Inland, to name just a few. The section also includes excerpts by Joan Didion and Kimi Eisele. Pick up your copy today!  

The Sugars conclude a two-part series on early childhood death. In Part 2, they read letters from parents who worry that their grief may overshadow their surviving children. They are joined by the writer Emily Rapp Black, who decided to have another child after learning that her son had a fatal congenital disorder. This episode was originally published on November 11th, 2017.

Jennifer Pastiloffis the guest. Her new book, On Being Human: A Memoir of Waking Up, Living Real, and Listening Hard, is available from Dutton. Pastiloff travels the world with her unique workshop On Being Human, a hybrid of yoga-related movement, writing, sharing aloud, letting the snot fly, and the occasional dance party. She has been featured on Good Morning America, New York Magazine, Health Magazine, CBS News, and others for her unique style of teaching, which she has taught to thousands of women in sold-out workshops all over the world. Jen is also the guest speaker at Canyon Ranch and Miraval Resorts, and she leads Writing and The Body workshops with author Lidia Yuknavitch, as well as retreats with Emily Rapp Black. Founder of the online magazine The Manifest Station, when Jen is not traveling she is based in Los Angeles with her husband and son. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writer Emily Rapp Black joins Mallory in The MILK Studio, to talk about the loss of her son, how her childhood was shaped by physical trauma and disability, and about the concept of resilience. Emily is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir and The Still Point of the Turning World. Her writing has appeared in Vogue, the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, O the Oprah Magazine, Brain.Child, The Wall Street Journal and others. Emily is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of California-Riverside, where she teaches creative nonfiction and medical narratives. She is actively engaged in conversations surrounding disability, medical narratives, pediatric palliative care, inequities in health care delivery, and the literature of embodiment, trauma, and recovery. Emily’s book, Sanctuary, is a reexamination of the word resilience, is forthcoming from Random House in 2020 and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. Cartography for Cripples, which examines the intersection of art, disability, and sex through the life and work of Frida Kahlo, is also coming in 2020. Emily lives in Southern California with her daughter and husband. Check her out at www.emilyrappblack.com --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/milk-podcast-getting-in-there-with-moms-id-like-to-know/message Support this podcast:

As we reflect on the new year, we often search for what brings meaning to our lives. Emily Rapp Black, New York Times bestselling author of "The Still Point of the Turning World" and "Poster Child: A Memoir", shares her personal memoirs and what has brought meaning to her life. Emily helps us gain perspective on our own journeys of self acceptance, growth, grief, and what truly matters in life.Emily's website:https://www.emilyrappblack.com/ (https://www.emilyrappblack.com/)Hosted by Stephanie James. Produced by Chris Lanphear for NoCo FM. Hear more great podcasts at https://noco.fm (https://noco.fm)Follow the show:https://www.facebook.com/thesparkpod (https://www.facebook.com/thesparkpod)Follow NoCo FM: https://twitter.com/nocofm (https://twitter.com/nocofm)https://instagram.com/nocofm (https://instagram.com/nocofm)https://www.facebook.com/nocofm (https://www.facebook.com/nocofm)This show is supported by its listeners, and by Audible. With over 180,000 titles to choose from, Audible.com allows you to listen to an immense library of books for every taste on your iPhone, Android, Kindle, tablet, or computer. Audible has a special offer for listeners which includes a free audiobook of your choice and a 30-day free trial.Learn more and get your free audiobook now at https://noco.fm/audible (https://noco.fm/audible). Support this podcast

The Sugars conclude a two-part series on early childhood death. In Part 2, they read letters from parents who worry that their grief may overshadow their surviving children. They are joined by the writer Emily Rapp Black, who decided to have another child after learning that her son had a fatal congenital disorder.

In the Province of the Gods (University of Wisconsin Press) An American's journey of profound self-discovery in Japan, and an exquisite tale of cultural and physical difference, sexuality, love, loss, mortality, and the ephemeral nature of beauty and art. Kenny Fries embarks on a journey of profound self-discovery as a disabled foreigner in Japan, a society historically hostile to difference. As he visits gardens, experiences Noh and butoh, and meets artists and scholars, he also discovers disabled gods, one-eyed samurai, blind chanting priests, and A-bomb survivors. When he is diagnosed as HIV positive, all his assumptions about Japan, the body, and mortality are shaken, and he must find a way to reenter life on new terms. Praise for In the Province of Gods "Like the best memoirs, Kenny Fries’s In the Province of the Gods reminds us of the genre’s twinned truths: first, that the surest way to discover the self is to look out at the world, and second, that the best way to teach others about something is to tell them not ‘what it is,’ but what it means to you. Fries’s deft, questioning prose is as full of compassion as curiosity, and his revelations about himself are no less compelling than what he learns about Japan.”—Dale Peck, author of Martin and John “Elegant and probing, In the Province of the Gods reads like the log of an early adventurer charting a newly discovered land. History, sexual politics, disability, and wooden fortune sticks are blended into an unexpected, tightly written exploration of Japanese culture. Fries may be the guy on the journey, but we’re the ones making the discoveries.”—Susan R. Nussbaum, author of Good Kings, Bad Kings “In this subtle page turner, Fries helps reinvent the travel-as-pilgrimage narrative.  He neither exoticizes nor shies away from the potential pitfalls of a western mind traveling abroad; instead he demonstrates how, through an all too rare open heart and a true poet’s eye, bridges can be built, and understanding deepened, one sincere action at a time.”—Marie Mutsuki Mockett, author of Where the Dead Pause, and the Japanese Say Goodbye “Kenny Fries writes out of the pure hot emergency of a mortal being trying to keep himself alive. So much is at stake here—health, affection, culture, trauma, language—but its greatest surprise is what thrives in the midst of suffering. A beautiful book.”—Paul Lisicky, author of The Narrow Door Kenny Fries is the author of Body, Remember: A Memoir and The History of My Shoes and the Evolution of Darwin’s Theory, winner of the Outstanding Book Award from the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Bigotry and Human Rights. He is the editor of Staring Back: The Disability Experience from the Inside Out and author of the libretto for The Memory Stone, an opera commissioned by Houston Grand Opera. He teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing Program at Goddard College. Photo by Michael R. Dekker Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir, and The Still Point of the Turning World, which was a New York Times bestseller and a finalist for the PEN USA Award in Nonfiction. Her book-length lyric essay, Casa Azul Cripple, which examines the intersection of art, disability, and sex through the life and work of Frida Kahlo, is forthcoming from the New York Review of Books/NottingHill Editions in 2020. She is at work on a book about the resilience of objects and forces in the world called The Wingbeats of Insects and Birds, for which she received a 2017 Guggenheim Fellowship. Emily is currently Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of California-Riverside, where she teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing Program and in the School of Medicine. She lives with her husband, writer and editor Kent Black, and their daughter in Redlands, California.

A woman realizes there are limits to how perfect a mom she can be, or even wants to be. Through loss, a woman discovers that she can still be happy, and her own inner strength and vulnerability. A father and son share the story of the son's transgender coming out and of their family's journey once his transition began. Storytellers Carly Davis, Emily Rapp Black, and Ashton and Dennis Skinner share stories of just some of the things parenthood entails. For more stories like these, visit www.storytellersproject.com.

This week we talk with New York Times bestselling author Emily Rapp Black, who shares with us some of her experiences living as a person with a non-normative body, and what activism looks like for her (here's a hint - she's writes!). We call Cat for some critical actions around protecting immigrant youth in the face of Trump's move to rescind DACA in 6 months, and we give the Golden Pantsuit to some amazing young women in Texas who showed their governor what it looks like to take up space. Subscribe and leave us a review!

This week we talk with New York Times bestselling author Emily Rapp Black, who shares with us some of her experiences living as a person with a non-normative body, and what activism looks like for her (here's a hint - she's writes!). We call Cat for some critical actions around protecting immigrant youth in the face of Trump's move to rescind DACA in 6 months, and we give the Golden Pantsuit to some amazing young women in Texas who showed their governor what it looks like to take up space. Subscribe and leave us a review!

Brief Encounters (W.W. Norton)What anthology could unite the work of such distinct writers as Paul Auster, Julian Barnes, Marvin Bell, Sven Birkerts, Meghan Daum, Stuart Dybek, Patricia Hampl, Pico Iyer, Leslie Jamison, Phillip Lopate, Naomi Shihab Nye, and Lawrence Weschler?  What anthology could successfully blend literary forms as varied as memoir, aesthetic critique, political and social commentary, slice-of-life observation, conjecture, fragment, and contemplation?  What anthology could so deeply and steadily plumb the mysteries of human experience in two or three or five page bursts? For the late Judith Kitchen, editor of such seminal anthologies as Short Takes, In Short, and In Brief, "flash" nonfiction—the "short"—was an ideal tool with which to describe and interrogate our fragmented world.  Sharpened to a point, these essays sounded a resonance that owed as much to poetry as to the familiar pleasures of large-scale creative nonfiction.  Now, in Brief Encounters: A Collection of Contemporary Nonfiction, Kitchen and her co-editor, Dinah Lenney, present nearly eighty new selections, many of which have never been published before, having been written expressly for this anthology. Taken together, as a curated gallery of impressions and experiences, the essays in Brief Encounters exist in dialogue with each other: arguing, agreeing, contradicting, commiserating, reflecting.  Like Walt Whitman, the anthology is large and contains multitudes.  Certain themes, however, weave their way throughout the whole: the nature of family, the influence of childhood, the centrality of place, and the role of memory.  In Lynne Sharon Schwartz's "The Renaissance," for example, the author remembers her relationship with her mother, tracing her own adolescent route from intimacy to contempt.  In "The Fan," Eduardo Galeano dramatizes the communal devotions of the soccer fan.  And in "There Are Distances Between Us," Roxanne Gay considers the seemingly impossible and illogical demands of love.  What binds these and many other disparate essays together is the ways in which they enrich, color, and shade each other, the manner in which they take on new properties and dimensions when read in conjunction. Dinah Lenney is the author of The Object Parade and Bigger than Life, and, with Judith Kitchen, edited, Brief Encounters: A Collection of Contemporary Nonfiction. She serves as core faculty in the Bennington Writing Seminars and the Rainier Writing Workshop, and as the nonfiction editor at Los Angeles Review of Books.Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir, and The Still Point of the Turning World, which was a New York Times bestseller. Her work has appeared in Salon, Slate, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, Redbook, O the Oprah Magazine, and other publications. She lives in Palm Springs and teaches in the UCR Palm Desert MFA Program in Writing and the Performing Arts.Chris Daley’s work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books, DUM DUM ZINE, and The Collagist, where “Thoughts on Time After Viewing Christian Marclay's ‘The Clock’” first appeared. She teaches academic writing at the California Institute of Technology and, as Co-Director of Writing Workshops Los Angeles, offers creative nonfiction workshops for students at all levels. Chris has a Ph.D. in English from the City University of New York Graduate Center. Amy Gerstler is a writer of poetry, nonfiction and journalism. Her book of poems include Scattered at Sea (Penguin, 2015), and Dearest Creature (Penguin, 2009) which was named a New York Times Notable Book, and was short listed for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry. Her previous twelve books include Ghost Girl, Medicine, Crown of Weeds, Nerve Storm, and Bitter Angel, which won a National Book Critics Circle Award in poetry. She was the 2010 guest editor of the yearly anthology Best American Poetry. Her work has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including The New Yorker, Paris Review, American Poetry Review, Poetry several volumes of Best American Poetry and The Norton Anthology of Postmodern American Poetry. She currently teaches in the MFA Writing Program at the University of California at Irvine.Tod Goldberg is the author of a dozen books, including, most recently, Gangsterland. His nonfiction, criticism, and essays have appeared widely, including in the Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, and Best American Essays. He lives in Indio, CA where he directs the Low Residency MFA in Creative Writing & Writing for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Riverside. Jim Krusoe has published five novels and two books of stories, Blood Lake and Abductions. His first novel, Iceland, was published by Dalkey Archive Press in 2002. Since then, Tin House Books has published Girl Factory, Erased, Toward You,and Parsifal. Jim teaches writing at Santa Monica College as well as in Antioch's MFA Creative Writing Program. He has also published five books of poems. His latest novel, The Sleep Garden, is due out this winter from Tin House.