You know, I was certainly aware and have been aware for, you know, all my literary career that there are moments when a certain Black and almost always male voices, you know, become the, quote-unquote, 'spokesman for a community.' And even before 'Between The World And Me,' that was not a space I really was interested in occupying. Books are an intimate, direct, one-on-one experience, but it is, again, necessarily limited. PALMER: And I said, where's Breonna? Why won't anybody say where Breonna is?ĬOATES: You know, I just - I love books. TAMIKA PALMER: It was about 11 o'clock the next day.ĬOATES: Tells you very matter-of-factually - I think that's how you say it, I think - what happened to her daughter. Here's mine.ĬOATES: You know, and then you - it contrasts with that very bracing moment when Breonna Taylor's mother.

VANCE: (As character) Everyone has a story. Like, I just - I don't have those powers. I was trying to be a writer.ĬOATES: You know, he's not something that I can put in the book or we know how to do myself, much less elicit, you know, as a director or anything. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, 'BETWEEN THE WORLD AND ME')ĬOURTNEY VANCE: (As character) I delivered food for a small deli.

TA-NEHISI COATES: You know, I watch Courtney Vance and what he does.

When I spoke with Coates about the HBO special, I asked him why he wanted to bring his words to the screen.

Actors, including Mahershala Ali and Angela Bassett, present the author's words as part of a kind of visual essay, their monologues mixed in with a collage of historical photographs, news clips and hip-hop. I have always wanted you to attack every day of your brief, bright life in struggle.ĬORNISH: Now it's been reimagined for television. (SOUNDBITE OF FILM, 'BETWEEN THE WORLD AND ME')ĪNGELA BASSETT: (As character) In America, it is traditional to destroy the Black body. The 2015 book 'Between The World And Me' by Ta-Nehisi Coates was an intimate letter between a father and son about being Black, being a man, being American.

Coates between the world and me