Steven Harvey is the author of numerous books, including his latest collection of essays The Beloved Republic (Wandering Aengus Press). Besides being a founding faculty member of the Ashland University MFA program, Steven is also a Contributing Editor at River Teeth literary magazine and the creator of The Humble Essayist website.

How to write political essays that don’t falter and becoming boring and obvious is a question that has long bedeviled writers. For instance, Philip Lopate’s introduction to The Art of the Personal Essay states that the “enemy of the personal essay is self-righteousness.” Today’s guest, Steven Harvey, finds an adept way around the dilemma by finding moments where there’s an “inwardness in the presence of a social wrong” that the writer can build on, an intimacy that allows for vulnerability, for doubt, for reflection, for one’s humanity to shine through nicely. Another issue for writers is how to navigate a world in which branding has become so prevalent. The solution is really (as Harvey says in this podcast) a matter of finding one’s own distinct voice that can’t be packaged or replicated. Finally, this podcast ends on a very poignant note as Harvey reads from his essay “The Book of Knowledge” about his mother’s suicide when he was an 11-year-old boy.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of ten books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc.

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