Paul Beatty

Paul Beatty (born 1962 in Los Angeles) is a contemporary American author. Beatty received an MFA in creative writing from Brooklyn College and an MA in psychology from Boston University. He is a 1980 graduate of El Camino Real High School in Woodland Hills, California.

In 1990, Paul Beatty was crowned the first ever Grand Poetry Slam Champion of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe.^[1] One of the prizes for winning that championship title was the book deal which resulted in his first volume of poetry, Big Bank Takes Little Bank.^[2] This was followed by another book of poetry Joker, Joker, Deuce and appearances performing his poetry on MTV and PBS (in the series The United States of Poetry).^[3] In 1993, he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.

His first novel, The White Boy Shuffle, received a positive review in The New York Times from reviewer Richard Bernstein who called the book "a blast of satirical heat from the talented heart of black American life."^[4] His second book, Tuff, received a positive notice in Time Magazine.^[5] In 2006, Beatty edited an anthology of African-American humor called Hokum and wrote an article in The New York Times on the same subject.^[6] His 2008 novel Slumberland was about an American DJ in Berlin. In his 2015 novel The Sellout, Beatty chronicles an urban farmer who tries to spearhead a revitalization of slavery and segregation in a fictional Los Angeles neighborhood.

Novels

• The White Boy Shuffle (1996) ISBN 0-312-28019-X
• Tuff (2000) Alfred A. Knopf, ISBN 0-375-40122-9
• Slumberland (2008)
• The Sellout (2015)

Edited volume

• Hokum: An Anthology of African-American Humor (2006)

Poetry

• Big Bank Take Little Bank (1991) ISBN 0-9627842-7-3
• Joker, Joker, Deuce (1994) ISBN 0-14-058723-3

References

1. ↑ Aptowicz, Cristin O'Keefe. (2008) Words in Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam. Soft Skull Press. Page 45. ISBN 1-933368-82-9.
2. ↑ Aptowicz, Page 46.
3. ↑ Aptowicz, Page 80.
4. ↑ "Black Poet's First Novel Aims the Jokes Both Ways", The New York Times 31 May 1996.
5. ↑ "Tuff", Time Magazine 1 May 2000.
6. ↑ "Black Humor", The New York Times 22 January 2006.

External links

• Article in NY Times by Paul Beatty
• NY TImes review of Paul Beatty's first novel, The White Boy Shuffle
• African American Literature Book Club for Paul Beatty
• Excerpt from Slumberland at BookBrowse
• Interview at Full Stop