#102 Kwame Alexander: What My Father Taught Me About Love (2023)

02/14/24 • 37 min

Most people know Kwame Alexander as the Newbery Medal-winning author of The Crossover, the bestselling children’s book about two young brothers hooked on basketball. Long before he was an award-winning author, however, Alexander spent his time writing love poems, in an attempt to impress women and find his voice as a poet and a young man.

But three decades and two marriages later, Alexander is a 54-year-old father of two now reconsidering those relationships from his past, and what exactly he knows - and doesn’t know - about love. And in order to do that, he’s thinking more about the marriage his parents modeled for him as a child, as well as what he learned about love and relationships from his father, a hard-nosed Baptist minister who rarely showed affection. Alexander’s book, Why Fathers Cry at Night, is available wherever you buy books, as is his latest collection of poems, This Is the Honey: An Anthology of Contemporary Black Poets.

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 - 07:25 - Intro

07:25 - 09:50 - on learning to love from watching our parents’ relationship

09:50 - 19:47 - discussing Kwame Alexander’s father’s version of tough love

19:47 - 24:26 - digging into his father’s jazz collection

26:31 - 32:40 - on the vulnerability required to write about broken relationships

32:40 - 35:36 - on talking to our parents and children about love

Read The Transcript For This Episode

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 - 07:25 - Intro

07:25 - 09:50 - on learning to love from watching our parents’ relationship

09:50 - 19:47 - discussing Kwame Alexander’s father’s version of tough love

19:47 - 24:26 - digging into his father’s jazz collection

26:31 - 32:40 - on the vulnerability required to write about broken relationships

32:40 - 35:36 - on talking to our parents and children about love

Read The Transcript For This Episode

Previous Episode

#101 Tim Alberta: My Father, My Faith, and Donald Trump

Longtime political journalist Tim Alberta spent more than three years speaking with pastors and churchgoers across the country in a search for answers about what’s happening in contemporary Evangelicalism. Why were so many congregations becoming more political, and seemingly less invested in traditional Christian values? Why were they so motivated by fear? How could so many Evangelicals support Donald Trump, who doesn’t share their beliefs? And what do all these dramatic changes mean for the future of Evangelicals in the United States, including Alberta's three young sons?

On this episode of Paternal, Alberta discusses his life as an Evangelical Christian, the influence of his born-again Christian father, what he learned about Evangelicalism from speaking with today’s church leaders, and why some churchgoers confronted him at his own father’s funeral about politics in the era of Trump.

Alberta is a staff writer for The Atlantic and the author of the New York Times bestselling book The Kingdom, The Power and The Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism, which is available now wherever you buy books.

Next Episode

#103 Waubgeshig Rice: The Pressure In My Head (2022)

Growing up on the Wasauksing First Nation indigenous reserve in Ontario, journalist and bestselling author Waubgeshig Rice learned early in his life about the value of culture and community. But as an Anishinaabe young man schooled in the challenges his ancestors faced as indigenous people in Canada, Rice was also keenly aware of what happens when a community loses its connection to its history, traditions and culture, and how men can easily fall victim to the effects of intergenerational trauma. On this 2022 episode of Paternal, Rice recounts his experience on Wasauksing First Nation and his sometimes conflicted emotions about growing up on the reserve, as well as the challenges his own father faced in trying to reclaim the family’s Anishinaabe identity. Rice - who penned the celebrated apocalyptic thriller Moon of the Crusted Snow as well as the recently released follow-up Moon of the Turning Leaves, and was dubbed “one of the leading voices reshaping North American science fiction, horror and fantasy” by the New York Times - also discusses the emotional strain he experienced after the complicated birth of his first son, and how masculinity and vulnerability are valued on “the rez.”