|
For general questions about reservations or event details, please contact the DC Public Library location you are planning to visit. For those in need of disability services related to event registration or room reservation, please reach out to the Center for Accessibility at 202-727-2142 or DCPLaccess@dc.gov. |
A conversation with Chad Sanders and Hannah Oliver Depp.
For Black History Month, join the Library and Loyalty bookstores for an in-person event with Chad Sanders and Hannah Oliver Depp for How to Sell Out by Chad Sanders.
Copies of the book will be available for sale and signing. A limited number will be given away courtesy of the DC Public Library Foundation.
ABOUT THE BOOK
A timely, vulnerable, and cutting-edge exploration of the pressures and pitfalls of writing while Black in America in this urgently needed addition to the national conversation of race, money, and art.
In the summer of 2020, when the nation was erupting in protest over the murder of George Floyd, Chad Sanders was quietly celebrating for selfish reasons. Why? After years of struggling to get his footing as a writer, he’d finally landed a New York Times op-ed. He wrote an essay about the hollow messages of concern he’d been receiving from white friends and colleagues. It went viral, and in the years that followed, he built a solid career as a creator—of books, podcasts, TV shows, and films—by mining his most painful experiences of being Black in America.
Black pain for white money. For Sanders, this was a lucrative trade. One he thought he could work for the rest of his life. But it didn’t take long for him to realize he, like so many other writers, was getting the short end of the stick.
In How to Sell Out, Sanders draws on his personal experiences to offer a wry, darkly comic look at the invisible realities of making a living as a Black writer who writes about race. He relays stories of his time in the tech business, his experiences in TV writers’ rooms, his childhood participation in Jack and Jill, his family and relationships, and the struggles of sharing his racial trauma in exchange for cash. Combining meditations on historical and current events and the intersection of race and class with short creative essays, Sanders sculpts a freewheeling arc that is as funny as it is moving and thought-provoking.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chad Sanders is the author of Black Magic: What Black Leaders Learned from Trauma and Triumph. He is the host of the Yearbook podcast on the Armchair Expert network and the Audible Originals podcast, Direct Deposit. Chad’s work has been featured in The New York Times, Time, Fortune, Forbes, Deadline, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, and other publications. Chad has also written for TV series on Max and Freeform. Chad was raised in Silver Spring, Maryland, and earned his BA in English at Morehouse College. He lives in New York City.
ABOUT THE CONVERSATION PARTNER
Hannah Oliver Depp is the co-owner of Loyalty Bookstores in DC and MD. Loyalty is dedicated to diverse and intersectional literature, programs, and gifts for all ages. Oliver Depp has served on multiple American Bookseller Association committees and task forces. She is currently on the boards of Bookshop.org and New Atlantic Independent Bookseller's Association. She holds a Masters in English from American University and was awarded the 2021 Women’s National Book Association Woman of the Year Award. She can be found on social media @oliverdepp and hopes you are prepared for many pictures of her muppety dog.
AGE GROUP: | Adults |
EVENT TYPE: | Black History Month | Author Talk | Asian/Pacific Islander Month |
