In his newly released book LETTERS TO MARTIN, award-winning author Dr. Randal Maurice Jelks compiles letters from himself to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Evoking King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail," these meditations speak specifically to the many public issues we presently confront in the United States—economic inequality, freedom of assembly, police brutality, ongoing social class conflicts, and geopolitics. Jelks invites readers to reflect on US history by centering on questions of democracy that we must grapple with as a society. Hearkening to the era when James Baldwin, Dorothy Day, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Richard Wright used their writing to address the internal and external conflicts that the United States faced, this book is a contemporary revival of the literary tradition of meditative social analysis. These meditations on democracy provide spiritual oxygen to help readers endure the struggles of rebranding, rebuilding, and reforming our democratic institutions so that we can all breathe. Joined by Professor Daryl Scott, Jelks brings the conversation to the Busboys audience as he shares with us the thought and process behind this fantastic work. This event is free and open to all, accessible through our Facebook and Youtube pages (@busboysandpoets).
Our event begins at 7:00pm with an introduction from a member of our team, after which the conversation will begin. Signed copies of LETTERS TO MARTIN will be available for purchase before, during, and after the event!We recommend that viewers RSVP in order to receive direct links to the event from Busboy and Poets Books
Dr. Randal Maurice Jelks is a professor, a documentary producer, and award-winning author. Jelks was an executive producer of the documentary I, Too, Sing America: Langston Hughes Unfurled and he currently teaches American Studies, African Studies, and African American Studies at the University of Kansas. His writings have appeared in the Boston Review and the Los Angeles Review of Books, and he also serves as co-editor of the academic journal American Studies.
Daryl Scott is a professor of United States history at Howard University. Joining the faculty at Howard also marked Daryl’s beginning of service as a member of the Executive Council of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH). Daryl researches and writes on American intellectual history, nationalism in the United States, and, currently, convict slavery since 1615. In 1988, Daryl won the James Rawley Prize for the best book in Race Relations History for Contempt and Pity: Social Science and the Image of the Damaged Black Psyche, 1880-1996.
