Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Songs My Mother Taught Me: Why the Artist Must Take Sides

Songs My Mother Taught Me: Why the Artist Must Take Sides

Williams, Saul
Williams, Saul

Hardcover

Series: Vanguard

Biographies GeneralLiterary FiguresPoetry Criticism

PREORDER - Expected ship date September 8, 2026

ISBN13: 9798888905852
Publisher: Haymarket Books
Published: Sep 8 2026
Pages: 204
Language: English

Award-winning poet and performer Saul Williams explores how artists today must respond to systemic violence and injustice--in the words of Paul Robeson, by choosing sides.

Songs My Mother Taught Me is Williams' clear-eyed exploration of the role of the artist in these times by answering the question: what radicalized you? He answers by examining how his role models--writers and artists, from Amiri Baraka to local musicians in Brazilian bars to Palestinian hip-hop heads--have responded to imperialist violence, oppression, and genocide. Riffing on Paul Robeson's famous declaration, Williams builds a provocative case for why today's artists cannot remain neutral in the face of injustice. We need songs that crumble empires, he writes, films that teach, remind, and inspire, poems that would make a despot revoke your citizenship.

The radical artists of the Vanguard Series offer new poetry and prose to answer the question, What does poetry have to do with politics?

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