Words and Music Episode 2: From The Belly - Etheridge Knight

In the 2nd installment of Words & Music: An audio series exploring the life and work of Indiana writers, Oreo Jones, explores the fascinating life and poetry of an Indiana Icon, Etheridge Knight.

Susan Neville, Adrian Matejka, Hanako Gavia, and Jones discuss Knight’s later years as a poet living in Indianapolis, his critically acclaimed publishings after prison, and the art of meddling.

Born in rural Mississippi, Etheridge Knight would grow to become one of the most prolific voices in the late Black Arts movement in the 70s. In a dark and dreary jail cell in Michigan City, Knight would begin to find his true voice and calling as a pivotal writer/poet of the 20th century. A couple years into his sentence Etheridge would correspond with an American poet, author, teacher, and Pulitzer Prize winner Gwendolyn Brooks, and Detroit’s Dudley Randal from Broadside Press. It was his first published poetry book, “Poems From Prison” that would make a splash in the literary world of poetry.