David Remnick Interviews Ta-Nehisi Coates

New Yorker editor David Remnick speaks with the writer Ta-Nehisi Coates, whose celebrated book Between the World and Me explores the persistence of violence against black Americans. Written as a letter to his adolescent son, Coates’s book takes direct inspiration from James Baldwin’s “My Dungeon Shook,” an essay Baldwin addressed to his nephew. Coates talks about Baldwin’s lasting impact on his work, and tells Remnick why he’ll never embrace optimism.