Dead Parents Society

Jamie-Lee Josselyn (@jljosselyn) and Kristen Martin (@kwistent) discuss Hope Edelman's 1994 book Motherless Daughters, which has remained successful in the more than 2 decades since its release. Jamie-Lee and Kristen, whose mothers died from suicide and cancer respectively, discuss the book's form, its longevity, how it enables readers to both connect through their own experience and learn about losses much different from their own, and other topics. For more on Hope Edelman, visit: http://hopeedelman.com/ or follow her on Twitter: @hope_edelman.

Jamie-Lee talks with the writer Scott Gould, who is the director of creative writing at the South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts and Humanities, about how he approaches working with high school students who are facing difficult personal material, including, but not limited to loss and grief. They discuss general classroom pedagogy, specific essays to use in discussions, and more.

The poet and essayist Victoria Newton Ford joins Jamie-Lee, Maya, and Sabrina to discuss her poem "Elegy for Clitoris" from Connotation Press. Victoria has said that she writes "to tell the truth, and the truth is often hideous. And though it feels good to write, I don't write to make the reader feel good, particularly. I write to make you feel. To honor my own feeling, which is another way to honor the fact that I exist. And so, it is my duty to witness and speak while I'm here."

Bassini Apprentices Maya Arthur and Sabrina Qiao interview Jamie-Lee Josselyn on her essay, "When News of a Suicide Comes During Memoir Class" from LitHub in September 2016. They discuss how personal history and the writing that comes from it converges with and remains separate from the work of a creative writing teacher.

Arielle Brousse, author of the TinyLetter "Grief Beach" joins Jamie-Lee, Maya, and Sabrina to discuss how she came to write a weekly letter to friends and others about her difficult year of loss and how the form of a TinyLetter has impacted her writing, her grieving, and her relationships. They also discuss writing about not just grieving the death of two of her grandparents, but the end of a long-term relationship as well.