USC logo

White Tears

Published by USC Bedrosian Center on

For our discussion of Hari Kunzru’s White Tears, we return to the question: can America overcome its sin of racism? Or will our collective inability to deal with the consequences of our actions win the day?

White Tears is a genre bending look at white male hipster culture, a ghost story of untold American stories, a revenge tale, a dive into the depths of collectors of the Blues, a beautifully written story about friendship, greed, race, music, New York City, the South … if you have not read this novel, beware – this podcast it mostly spoilers!

We dive into the themes Kunzru explores in this complex novel, relish the strong prose, question the role of cultural memory and American identity.

Featuring Ange-Marie Hancock Alfaro (@AngeMarieH), Aubrey Hicks (@AubreyHi), and David Sloane (@dcsloane53)

Follow us on Twitter! @BedrosianCenter

Special thanks to Penguin Random House for review copies of this critically acclaimed novel!

@penguinrandom

To listen to the Bedrosian Book Club discussion of White Tears click the orange arrow in the Soundcloud player here on this post. Or you can download it and subscribe through ApplePodcasts, Soundcloud, or Google Play

Links & further reading:

RISIT
Families Left Behind: The Hidden Costs of Incarceration and Reentry
Race Records: The Birth Of Black Blues and Jazz
Long Lost Blues by Peter C. Muir

Next Month …

The Fact of a Body by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich is part true crime part memoir. The author writes “It’s about a murder, it is about my family, it is about other families whose lives were touched by the murder. But more than that, it is about how we understand our lives, the past, and each other. To do this, we all make stories.

 

 

Read along with us! Let us know what you think of the book or the podcasts at Facebook or Twitter.

This podcast was produced by Aubrey Hicks and Jonathan Schwartz, recorded and mixed by Corey Hedden.

@AubreyHi @jonHLYP @coreyhedden

Bedrosian Center