Ep. 384 Black Genius Is Not an Outlier with Tre Johnson

Written By Wy'Kia Frelot

This week on The Stacks, essay writer and culture critic, Tre Johnson, joins us to discuss his debut book, Black Genius: Essays on an American Legacy, which examines how black American culture has driven American ingenuity. Tre shares how his grandfather inspired him to write Black Genius and how the book has evolved over the years. We also talk about the struggle of balancing a 9-5 job and making time to write, plus why he decided to leave his job and how that impacted his life as a writer.

For the month of August, the Stacks Book Club pick will be Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. We will discuss the book on Wednesday, August 27th with Alexis Madrigal.

 
 

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TRANSCRIPT
*Due to the nature of podcast advertising, these timestamps are not 100% accurate and will vary.

Tre Johnson 0:00

The thing that I remind a lot of people, or give the perspective a lot of people who at least are sitting at what I perceive to be my peer class status, is that a lot of us have more fat to give in our lives than we realize. I actually do have enough, and when I don't have enough, I have community. And so I think some of this, I think particularly as a man, it was just like, how do I extend myself out on the limb of vulnerability and know that even when the branch breaks, because branches do break from time to time, some something and someone's going to catch you.

Traci Thomas 0:36

Welcome to the Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host, Traci Thomas, and today I am joined by writer and culture critic Tre Johnson. His debut book is called Black Genius: Essays on American Legacy, and it explores black American pop culture and history to discover the extraordinary genius of black folks in the most ordinary of places today, Tre and I talk about famous black geniuses and why that's not the book he wanted to write. Plus we delve into the world of code switching and writing as a full time job the Stacks Book Club pick for August is Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous, Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teaching of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer, we will discuss Braiding Sweetgrass on August 27 with Alexis Madrigal. Quick reminder, everything we talk about on each episode of the stacks can be found in the link in the show notes, if you're listening to this podcast, if you love this podcast, if you want to support independent black media, I got great news for you. We have a Patreon and a substack. You can get bonus content from me. Hot takes, episodes, reading guides and a lot more by showing your love over on those platforms. If you're looking for a readerly community, head to patreon.com/thestacks. And if you're looking more for my thoughts and opinions, you should go to my newsletter at TraciThomas.substack.com, all right, now it's time for my conversation with Tre Johnson.

Traci Thomas 2:07

All right, everybody. I'm very excited today we get to talk about genius and geniuses with the official black genius correspondent to the stacks. That's a brand new title, but we're gonna go with it. I'm joined by Trey Johnson, who is the author of a brand new book called Black Genius: Essays on an American Legacy. Tre, welcome to the Stacks.

Tre Johnson 2:29

Thank you, Traci. I'm so excited. I've been a long time listener, a big time fan. This is so cool.

Traci Thomas 2:34

I you know that always works on me. Anyone telling me they listen to the show or as a fan, every time someone says it, I'm always like, whoa, wow. You've got so much time on your hands to spend time with me, but I appreciate it.

Tre Johnson 2:46

Time well spent.

Traci Thomas 2:47

I appreciate it. I really do. But let's talk more about you. We'll start here. We always start here 30 seconds or so. Can you tell us about Black Genius?

Tre Johnson 2:58

Oh my gosh, yes. So Black Genius, my nonfiction debut book. It's a nine chapter book about cultural genius in the black American community. So it's nine different chapters or nine different experiences. It runs the gamut from comic books to airbrush tees to ATVs digital age to surveillance, and it's just my exploration around cultural, emotional, cerebral genius, as I've seen it in the black community.

Traci Thomas 3:25

Yeah. And one of the things I really appreciate about the book is that you don't pick the black genius that like geniuses that people think of when they think of black geniuses. This isn't a book about James Baldwin or Toni Morrison. You're not going through and like listing genius black athletes or genius black podcasters like myself, which is rude, and I can't believe I even invited you on and you did it specifically name me in the black genius category, but it's fine. We'll get through this interview, but good luck to you in the future.

Tre Johnson 3:56

There's always the paperback.

Traci Thomas 4:00

But my question is, why? Why did you not want to write about sort of black or, why did you want to write about black genius in a way that was more kind of topic based versus specific genius based?

Tre Johnson 4:17

Yeah, that's such a great question. So I think for me, a big part of it is so my like prior slash parallel life has been like working in education for umpteen years, like 20 years or so. And for me, a big part of it was, like a lot of my jobs in education. I was a classroom teacher. I was a program coordinator for youth nonprofits. I did community engagement. I was constantly doing work in black neighborhoods and black communities, and just got to routinely experience and you know, I am someone who grew up in Trent New Jersey, which is a small post industrial American city here in the northeast, but I always thought that my experience as a black kid in our family growing up was singular and. So spending a lot of time having to go into so many different homes over the years through work, I just got impressed upon me about like shit. We have constantly figured out a myriad of ways to get through life, and not like under duress necessarily all the time, sometimes, yes, but a lot of times just like, just the event of joy that comes with being black and being positioned in a certain way in America. So when I set out to start doing the book in a tagline I keep using nowadays is that it's to your point. Like, instead of using household names, I wanted to talk about households. And so a lot of this is from the ground up. You know, like, what have I seen in community centers, churches, schools, neighborhoods, homes. I wanted to fixate on place based and topic based experiences that hopefully touches on, like the multitude of black experiences in the country, and not just a singular fixation around class or status.

Traci Thomas 5:53

Yeah, these words are not synonyms to me, but because you use it now, it has me thinking like you mentioned, you know, like black joy. Why did you want to write a book about black genius and not a book about Black joy or, like, celebrating blackness? Because I feel like those are all sort of three different things. So what was it about the genius aspect that really stuck out to you?

Tre Johnson 6:15

Yeah, I mean, I think probably like you and many other people listening to us would agree with like, you know, we get undercut as black folks all the time for how sharp and inventive and amazing we are. And, you know, I really appreciate all the other like black underlined fill in the blank, whatever kind of other stories have been out there. But I think explicitly looking at cultural genius inside of the community was something that I don't think people have appreciated enough or celebrated enough. And to your question and to your point, you know, I think inside of what I hopefully have accomplished in the book is through the unpacking of genius, is to understand that joy does exist inside of that, that it's not one versus the other, it's not an hierarchical status or state of being that part of the things that we kind of create and do does give us joy in everyday life. And so I wanted to kind of, and some of it also gives us, like, opportunity and mobility. And I wanted to kind of explore all those things underneath genius.

Traci Thomas 7:16

Yeah, I think also, like just hearing you talk, it's making me think about the ways that black, like, the way that joy is almost like a simple thing, and anybody can have joy, right? Like, Black joy, like, Isn't that so cute? Like, babies are joyful, right? Like people who don't have any, you know? I mean, it even extends to some of the, like, really ableist depictions of people with, like, mental disability, where it's like, oh, but they're so happy, they're so simple. And I feel like genius is demands a sort of respect, in a way that some of the other words that are more like quote, unquote, accepted about black people does not require 100% agree.

Tre Johnson 8:01

And I think, like, I think what you're saying is bringing up for me is, like, this idea that, like, you know, I think one of the big things about the title, I think works and the orientation the book that works is that, no, you get a word genius, and you you get, you get an automatic kind of depiction or fixation around what you must be kind of gesturing towards. And again, to your point, having read the book, this isn't about exploring or unpacking the very well valued and celebrated kind of, like cultural, talented 10th of black American pop culture or history that's been done 20 times over. And there's glimpses of those types of folks here and there inside the book. But again, I just think that happens to I think the hard thing that I wanted to do is just like, expand our notion of appreciation, because I think what could be turned against us, in a lot of ways, is that that fixation on like the celebrityness of black genius can kind of make people seem like outliers to the black American experience, and I don't think that's true. I know that's not true, right? So I did this book, right?

Traci Thomas 9:06

And like, oh my god, this made me think so many things, but I feel like there's also this underlying racism where it's like any white person could become the next Steve Jobs, right? Like, it's like that, like, white genius is just like, sleeping in your parents garage, or, like, hit it, like, it's like, you, if you had, I mean, this is gonna sound horrible, I think, I don't know. Maybe not, but there's this, like, there's this version of a movie where a person who's experiencing homelessness, who's white, picks up a pen and, like, draws this thing and becomes Picasso. And while there are examples of that story, there's that movie with Jamie Foxx where he's like, plays an instrument or something, he's like, blind and homeless and whatever. Yeah, it's just like in real life, that benefit of the doubt is not extended to black people experiencing homelessness or otherwise. But just like that. Black like, I think what your this book does is reminds people, and I want to get to audience in a second about or reminds people that black genius exists, but also like, could be lurking anywhere, like, in a threatening, awesome way.

Tre Johnson 9:06

Yeah, I don't.

Traci Thomas 9:06

I appreciate that sort of undertone of like, obviously, we have these geniuses, but also we have so many geniuses you don't even, you can't even see, I think, in the section about education, you talk about all these black kids that you've met, or at least some who are like savants of internet culture, or like internet technology, who can flip a tick tock or a vine or whatever, like they can do, and you're just like, if education encompassed this, yeah, this would be an honor roll. You know? What do they call it? I can't think of the word. Kids who are like, special, get gifted, gifted and talented. And I thought that moment really resonated with me. Because I think, I mean, I think this is obviously true for black kids, but I think just in general, creativity is so undervalued that the genius behind creativity takes so much outside reinforcement of like someone else saying you're a genius.

Tre Johnson 9:06

That's right.

Traci Thomas 9:31

That is adds a layer to the whole thing. This is not a question. This is just thought.

Traci Thomas 10:09

Well, if I can, like, throw something in there too, around one of the things I try, you should tell me if this actually is accomplished with the book. But like, you know, a big thing I wanted to do is, like, pop culture wise and historic and historically, so much of black genius has been validated by this, like kind of undercurrent notion that, thank God, a white person recognized this thing. Yes, and it's, it has often been an orientation around black genius is elevated and like crystallized, because it's, it's benefited from some type of white watering. And, you know, I think white people, obliquely, kind of appear in this book by dent, talking about the American context. But what I was careful to try and do is not say like, Thank God to this tension, cultural tension, point that it was able to be able to express if anything, the reverse, I think, I try to point out is true is that when we've endeavored to do something different, we've attracted unwanted white attention to try and squash things.

Traci Thomas 12:30

Yeah, before we switch over to audience, and while we're sort of on the topic of like, of recognized air quotes, black genius or like, black genius figures, I think something in I think you talk about this in the introduction, or the first chapter, where you mention a bunch of like recognized black geniuses, Kanye West, Lauryn Hill, Dave Chappelle, who all sort of have these very well known and public flame outs. And it got me to thinking, when it comes to black geniuses, do we only recognize them? We being, I guess, white America, so not we, but like, are, do they only get the recognition that they deserve for their genius after a public flame out, or after their death, or, like, after a very long time?

Tre Johnson 13:18

I feel like my like, punt answer to that is like, I think all that's true. I think I do think what you are pointing out, though, is that it usually requires some element of our downfall, of Demise to because then I feel like you're rendered a lot more vulnerable, helpless, like you're not an active voice in the conversation anymore. You become an artifact for people to prop up, often, as a way of other people flexing their own intellect by me, by being able to unpack and engage with whatever thing that these black folks have done. And so I don't know, I think, yeah, I mean, I mean, at the same, to be fair, too. I mean, we talked about Kanye Lauren, or even, like MJ and stuff like, these people were celebrated at the height of their less problematic periods. I also think there is some Glee and some like, like, you know, Disgust around people who have, like, strayed away from or cheated or robbed us of their genius by being human, a lot of times just being deeply flawed humans.

Traci Thomas 14:23

Okay, I think you're right that they were celebrated in their time before, but I don't think they were, like, considered geniuses before. Like, I think Lauryn Hill was considered more of a fluke in her moment, like this. Like, she made this one great album, and, like, yeah, she was part of the Fugees, and it wasn't until she started to, sort of like show all that goes into creating great art, that she became like a tortured genius. I think Michael Jackson is interesting because he was obviously celebrated in everybody's favorite but part of his story was having been sort of an abused child star, like he always had that torture. Piece to his story. And similarly, with Kanye like, I think Kanye really explodes when he becomes sort of a toxic cultural figure, or at least when he starts to have controversy. We love him, right? Like people come to Him, they listen to him, but Kanye becoming like con he used to be Kanye West. Now he's Kanye, you know, like, and that comes to me after at least some of the ick starts to show up.

Tre Johnson 15:29

Mmmhmm.

Traci Thomas 15:29

I don't know, it's just something, I mean, that was something that I was thinking about as I was reading your book, which is not really in your book, but just like this idea of genius. Because I remember I went to art school, and I remember people always talking about, like, like kids in college being like, Oh, I'm gonna get off my meds. Because, like, that's how I can be my most creative self, like, this sort of, really unhealthy sort of relationship to genius that I think I always think about, because, you know who Van Gogh cut off his ear, right? Like, it's like, you have these, like, tortured mentally, you know, people who are, like, going through mental health crises, who become celebrated artists. And I think that really stuck with me. And so I was, I was thinking about that in the context of your book.

Tre Johnson 16:14

Yeah, I again, a big I was seeing this at a I did my book launch was last week, and it was July 29 and so we had a big book launch down downtown. Here. I live in Philly. It's at Barnes and Noble, and there's a packed room of people. And I was saying there that's like, you know, books are just such a long fucking process that, like I did, I had no interest. I am in awe of black writers who can spend years working on a long form project that is delving in black pain in the community. I just couldn't do that. I could not do that. I just like this. This shit is so long, it's it's already so disruptive to life and it takes a lot out of you. The last thing I wanted to do additively to that is like, talk about the toxic elements of black cultural life, or black genius.

Traci Thomas 17:07

Okay, how is it disruptive to life?

Tre Johnson 17:10

Oh, my God. How much time do we have plenty, plenty. You know, I mean, my agent, Sabrina, she's amazing. WME, she's she's often like, kind of telling me, like, she's like, don't, don't tell people all the sauce behind like, like, the book process, whatever. But I think it's really important for people to understand and appreciate like, what it takes to create art.

Traci Thomas 17:30

Literally, that's why people are here at this podcast. It might not be what you do on like, NPR or whatever. I don't know, right? Like, this is a podcast about books, people who read them, people who write them, people who love them. So like we want, we do want to know Sabrina. This is the exact place to send your authors to vent.

Tre Johnson 17:50

Thank you. Fully validated, though. Sabrina is great. I love Sabrina. One of my shout out. Yeah, she's, she's one of my favorite humans, but to the point of disruption. You know, I was like very so I started working on the book, spring 2021 and I wrapped it up. Basically, I think we put the final copy edit bow and tie on it, probably December 2024 and so during that time, though, like, you know, I grew up poor in Trent New Jersey, single mom home me and my mom and my younger sister, pretty hard scrabble, but like decent life. But I, you know, by the time I got the book deal, I was an executive, basically as a VP doing equity work for this nonprofit called cattle, said that's focused on supporting public sector work. And when I got my book deal, which I was fortunate, I got a substantial sized book deal, I was not convinced that I could leave work and focus on writing one one. It felt too whimsical and irresponsible to like. You know, I think you when you grow up the way I have, and some of the other people have you are constantly waiting for the other financial shoe to drop. So I'm like, I'm like, there's, there's no way that I can let go of one thing to in particular, to essentially choose myself and to choose this thing that I want to do. And so, you know, for the first two years, probably I was working full time, and then probably, like, nights, morning, nights, weekends, working on the book. I was like, you know, and that's a remote worker. It's like, on my computer, around the fucking clock, and yeah, and it was just, you know, you it's hard to have, it's, it's hard to be anything but a ghost in your own life and in other people's lives around you when you are, when you're scared to go all in on yourself, or on and or a book in the way that I could have and wanted to. So there was that. There was just like, there was. The pain of like, you know, I had, like, such bags and dark circles under my eyes. I had so much stress. Yeah, I often say that was such a weird double edged sword to work on a book called Black genius, because everyone loved the title. But also, at the same time, I felt such a burden around getting a significant book deal, and working on a title called Black genius, you always still get this thing, like, If I mess this up, I messed this up for us, yeah, and it was very hard to let go of. And so I think a lot of that, like, just factored into just how I doggedly approach working on the book. And then on top of that too, you know, it's all the typical things you see. I think Toni Cade bombard talked about this, about like, when you're away from when you're indulging in the craft of your work, you do all the things that you don't intend to do. You miss birthdays, you miss holidays. You miss like, you cancel and you reschedule 20 times over with everyone around you, you are gone for extended periods of time that makes sense to you, that don't make sense to other people. And so, um, you know, I am, I am somebody who is largely had 10 toes down in a conventional nine to five world as soon as I started, you know, tweaking and disrupting that I started kind of moving to the outside of that experience, which meant I was moving to the outside and a lot of the community around me, because people weren't living and moving like the way I was. And so there's a lot of that, a lot of that.

Traci Thomas 21:37

Do you still have the nine to five job? Or did you leave it?

Tre Johnson 21:41

No, I left it. I left it.

Traci Thomas 21:44

How long process did you leave it? Oh, shit.

Tre Johnson 21:47

So I took this September 2022, I had kind of hit an emotional and mental rock bottom, and I went to Bali on kind of somewhat last minute.

Traci Thomas 22:03

An Eat, Pray, Love moment.

Tre Johnson 22:04

Oh, my God, yes. He's like, it's like, I am no longer going to going to mock these basic white girls to do these trips. I get it now.

Traci Thomas 22:14

It's honestly, Eat, Pray, Love trips? They don't see they don't see color, okay? They don't see gender. I don't see anything. All they see is, I need a fucking break. They see capital, oh, that's it.

Tre Johnson 22:25

My God, yes.

Tre Johnson 22:27

Like, cliche way I was like, literally, I did a morning hike with my friend Kim. We did this. We were on a tour guide hike where we went to the top of a mountain. It took us, like, I think, literally, three hours to get to the top. We got there at sunrise. I was standing there at the top. It's like, seven in the morning at that point now, and I watched the sun come up, and I was like, I gotta leave my job. I gotta leave my job. Man.

Traci Thomas 22:50

I did the same hike you did. I think so the, like, big, the big one in Bali. I mean, I did. I did a big one in Bali.

Tre Johnson 22:58

It probably is the same. And it's, I am not a religious person, but I'm like, I get so much about so many things being so much bigger than me. And I think it's that kind of frame that just gave me a perspective, like, life in the universe is so big, the smallest, biggest thing I can do is choose something that I want for my life. And so I came back down from the mountain, and like when I got back to the States, I told my boss, October 2022 I told my boss, I gotta step away. I gotta focus on this thing.

Traci Thomas 23:29

Okay, can I keep asking you about this? Yeah, of course. I will go back to the book. And I do want to ask you about audience, I promise. But I just so many authors don't talk about this, but I'm just so curious about so you quit your job, which I'm assuming you had a salary, and I did. Now, how do you put together a living and how does that change how you write, or, like, how you think about writing? Because before you had the stress of having to write and also having to have a job, but now you sort of flip the stress, which is that your writing has to become your job, which makes it a lot less. I think I would imagine, at least it changes your relationship to it. So I'm curious how you then make ends meet, if you're used to having a salary and all of a sudden you don't, and then also how that changed your relationship to writing?

Tre Johnson 24:23

If, oh, my God, it did. It did in all the right way. So, uh, I make my living now, um, couple of ways. I've done some, like, gig facilitation work. There's this amazing group called pahara where I've done, I've been a moderator doing, um, race based, like affinity, type of seminar work. So I've been doing that. I still get hit up for I've been so lucky. Like Black Star Film Festival, they have their organization here in Philadelphia, who has a cultural journal called scene. I've written for scene a couple of times. I've written for a couple of other outlets, like you kind of patchwork. Like, you save money, you cut back on some things. I the thing that I remind a lot of people, or give the perspective a lot of people who at least are sitting at what I perceive to be my peer class status is that a lot of us have more fat to give in our lives than we realize. I've just been smarter and leaner about, like, some things I just don't need to do as much anymore. I spent a year not buying new clothes and just focusing on the closet that I had, which was plenty. And I think that's the thing, it's like, I think what writing has taught me, which is much more about, like, again, choosing myself, which is that I actually do have enough, and when I don't have enough, I have community. And when I have community around me, community can, literally and figuratively beat me in so many types of ways. And so I think there was that. There was just some of this. I think particularly as a man, it was just like, how do I extend myself out on the limb of vulnerability and know that even when the branch breaks, because branches do break from time to time, some something and someone's gonna catch you.

Traci Thomas 26:07

Yeah, I feel like not. I mean, I'm not ready to go back to the book, but I will be in a moment. But I do feel like some of that is like the thesis of the book in its own way. Of like that black people, through our everyday lives and experiences have found ways to build trees and branches that can weather any storm, and that to do that is inherently genius, like to have figured out the like mechanics of how to build communities through the Good they like through a heavy fruit bearing season, or, you know, a hurricane like that, the tree will remain and that there's like, room enough. It's not the best analogy, but I do feel like, you know, you're vibing, you're going, you're going, but I do feel like that is ultimately what this book is about.

Tre Johnson 26:56

Yeah, I'm so glad you said that, because, I mean, I found myself eventually, you know, the book set out in one direction, and then I think life kept informing the direction. And I don't think I even consciously knew that that's what I was crafting as I crafted the book. And, you know, I've been saying to people like, you know, you know, I think two things are true about the book. One is that it builds towards that case, making that case towards the end. I also think it is true that is a book that you could if you chose to do so. I'm not this type of reader, but if you chose to read it in a non linear fashion, you'd be okay.

Traci Thomas 27:30

I'm that kind of reader either, and I don't understand how those people exist. I'm just like, it's presented to you in an order. You're just gonna go and, like, whenever a book says, like, you could read this in any order. I'm like, Okay, I could, but like, why would I do that? Didn't you write a book? Or aren't you in charge? Tell me what to do?

Tre Johnson 27:49

Yes, fully agree. This is so funny. I just got done my editor, Lashonda Dutton, she's amazing. I love working with her. She was just asking me about new music and a playlist, and playlists, and so I've been curating playlists for the last couple of days. And one of the things that to the point around this, like book stuff, you know, one of the things that I always tell people when I send them a playlist is like, hey, look like, I want you to listen to this in the order that I put it in.

Traci Thomas 28:14

Oh, you're that I don't listen to a playlist on shuffle, but generally I only listen to playlists that I make that are vibes based, not narrative based. If that makes sense. I used to teach fitness when I used to teach spin and yeah, and I my those playlists I do not listen to in on shuffle because I am building a narrative, which is like an insane thing to say about a spin class, but like, it like, it's like, there's a hill. We can't just I've got, I've got a plan. I want you to do this. I want to get to this section. I want to have a vibe right here. Then I want to build to the end, and I want to go out on a bang. That's not a shuffle playlist. But I like, if I'm on Spotify and it's like, 2000s barbecue, that's a shuffle because I know that's just a bunch of songs I've listened to that you're putting together.

Tre Johnson 29:03

100%, 100% like their theme, yes, playlist.

Traci Thomas 29:07

Yeah, that's why. But if you, if you're like going through and like making a playlist, I do think you should listen to that in order. I just assume I the only thing I'll do out of order is like a serialized television comedy. So, like, I'll watch random episodes of The Office, but I did watch the office in order the first time. Now I'll go back and goof off, yes, but I wouldn't watch a show for the first time out of order. No, of course, not. Right, exactly. It's, it's crazy behavior. And I know there are people listening who are like, I totally read books out of order. And you know what I'm telling you, it's crazy behavior, babe, you're not, yes, you're you're not interested. You're probably a Pisces, and it's scary.

Tre Johnson 29:49

Okay, we don't feel safe. What is your sign? Since we're here, I do get to ask you that of Aquarius.

Traci Thomas 29:57

Okay, that's my moon and my rising. Oh. Oh, love it. I love this for us. Okay, the question, we're gonna take a break, and then I'm gonna ask the question everyone's been waiting for.

Traci Thomas 30:12

We are back the question everyone's been waiting for, but only because I started talking about this 25 minutes ago, is who is your audience? How were you thinking about audience, and how has that shifted, if at all, since the book has been in the world and you started to hear from readers.

Tre Johnson 30:31

So I think my audience is black people, and then I think it's people who love black people. And honestly, at first, when I first was writing this book, I was thinking about white people, and I think that's much more a reflection of the systems the publishing industry. This also, like I feel like, in this weird way for me, and probably, I'm sure I'm assuming I'm not alone in this is that sometimes the invisible gaze that you're most aware of, particularly if it feels like it's going to be punitive, is a white gaze. And so I think for me, some of it was just like, oh, how like am I writing? Do I need to be writing this in a way that, like, one appeases white audiences, but two, like also brings them in, so to speak, you know, not turning them off, you know, you start, at least for me, because I'd never done a book before, I started thinking more expansively about, like, Oh my God, I don't want to turn off book clubs. I don't want to turn off the urban white lady who walks into Barnes and Noble and snatches this book off the shelf, you know? And they were just, they were just stupid narratives were holding my head. They were absolutely stupid narratives holding my head because they're they were actually all these emotional detours to not write the book that I wanted to write.

Traci Thomas 31:52

So what claims for you to get back to the thing you wanted to make?

Tre Johnson 31:56

I give credit all the time to Sabrina and Lashonda again. Sabrina, my agent, lashaunda, my editor. I turned my first manuscript for black genius. I turned in, I think, full manuscript. I turned in, like around February 2023, and it was 450 some odd pages.

Traci Thomas 32:16

Oh, yeah, you wouldn't have been on this podcast with that.

Tre Johnson 32:19

Let me tell you, I don't think I would have been on Dutton advanced payroll, but, you know, it was, it was from such a place of insecurity and so much fear. And so they wrote, you know, Lashonda. Lashonda took the lead first, and she says, Look, you don't need all this. We got into collaboration with you because we want your voice and your thought and your story around how your you, Trey Johnson, are exploring genius, and so that was the big editorial thematic shift. Was that much to my discomfort. Lashonda was like, You need to be you, and your story needs to be a through line through these chapters. You need to be the guide that takes people through each one of these otherwise abstract, somewhat disparate experiences. And so that was the big shift. And when I started making that shift, you know, I started the way I kind of made it smaller for myself, is I just started thinking about all my friends like, that's who I was writing to. I was writing to a love letter of appreciation to my family and my friends who play a big part in not just the background of this book, but inside the pages of the book too.

Traci Thomas 33:32

I love that. Did you always have the title?

Tre Johnson 33:35

Always the title came before everything else? It did.

Traci Thomas 33:39

What was the first seed of this book, then, like you had a title, but you had to have a title for a book. So what did you think that the thing was going to be? Or is this what you thought?

Tre Johnson 33:51

It's not. It's not. I did this Kima Jones, who had Chuck Jones, she I was part of a cultural writing fellowship in Savannah, Georgia that she convened back in 2019 and we all had to have kind of like a manifesto essay that we have to share from our respective genre. I was in the pop culture genre, and my first draft around what ultimately became the book was this, like kind of mixed narrative Ode to My grandfather, Robert Murphy, who was he passed away a dozen or so years ago, but he was a black man of a generation, far earlier than ours. But like I often watched how he one created the life that he had for himself and our family, but then also to how he continued to introduce different elements of black pop culture in particular into his life, and what did his diet look like and not look like? And I was just fascinated by him. He remains my favorite human being, next to my mom, and I was just fascinated about how he digested the world. Around him, particularly pop culture, through his blackness and I wanted to explore like, just yeah, this was a guy who grew up in small town Georgia, in like the 30s. His family migrated to the North. He got into Temple University here in Philadelphia, but turned it down because he needed to work and support his family, and as a result, like worked in the garage of a local auto dealership. But over the course of his career, he before he retired, he was in the C suite as an executive handling Billings and credit and stuff like that, for auto financials and all along the way, I just learned how to watch the different ways he professionally, culturally, historically. Just moved through different parts of life and made sense of things. And I just, I was like, there's probably even more to this. Right into his life and to us that could be looked at through that lens.

Traci Thomas 36:04

Yeah, this sort of story reminds me of your chapter on education, the stream all chapter, yeah, which is, I think it's my favorite. It's my favorite. Oh, it's really good.

Tre Johnson 36:15

I love that.

Traci Thomas 36:16

I love that chapter.

Tre Johnson 36:18

Thank you.

Traci Thomas 36:18

Because, well, we could tell people, I think we can. It's not a spoiler to tell people what stream all is, No, there's not real spoilers in this one, no, but it's about your uncle who comes up with this phrase, or this term, stream all when it comes which is like street plus formal education. And I just was really captivated by him. But also what I liked about the chapter is that you brought in your own experiences in education, and sort of the like the official education expert tray, right? Like it's like you carry, like an authority about the education system, because, like, you were at TFA, Teach for America, for people. I almost, I almost took a job at TFA before I started this podcast.

Tre Johnson 37:07

No shit! Doing what?

Traci Thomas 37:11

Teaching. I wanted to go going into and then I was like, I don't want to do it. I went to, like, I like, got in, and then I like, went to one of the like thing, like trainings Institute. And I was like, I hate it. And I was like, I just really want to talk about books, maybe, like, literally, these things were happening, like, concurrently, or write about concurrently anyways, that's amazing. But in this chapter, you're talking about, like your relationship to education as a person who is working as an education provider on the provider side. And then you're talking about your uncle and his experiences in education and sort of, you know, being this, like extremely street smart guy who also could pivot easily into formal education systems, but without code switching, which I thought was really interesting, that stream all is not a is not a substitute for code switching. It's its own unique thing, which is, like holding on to the street and the formal in one. That's sort of how I understood it is. Did I do okay?

Tre Johnson 38:19

I think yeah. That's perfect. That's perfect. Yeah, I would say it was such my LaShawn and I went back and forth on trying to, like, distill stream over for people, you did a bit of beautiful job of it. And the way I talked about is, like, it is the thing that I think all of us strive to do as black and other type of marginalized people, which is also just be wholly integrated, right? Like the thing around code switch, which I think has remained entrenched as a popular method to navigate the world, is that code switching require, it implicitly requires you to trade off aspects of yourself, right, in order to appease an outside audience. And I think streamal is very comfortably disavows that. It says, No, I am going to showcase you the full integrity of my body and my personality and my intellect by not trading off these components to essentially make you feel better or make you understand me better on your terms. And I think that was the beautiful thing about it. And I my uncle, who doesn't live too far from here in Philly, he remains one of the most fascinating people to me to this day. He's so fucking smart, and again, he presents it in a way that like would rankle people.

Traci Thomas 39:33

Right. Is he the son of your grandfather?

Tre Johnson 39:36

He's this, he's so or the grandfather I mentioned before he's the other side. He's on my dad's side of the family.

Traci Thomas 39:44

Got it? I shouldn't have said I see the son of your grandfather, because obviously he is a son of one of your grandfather this wasn't sure if they were connected. I feel like Code switching is also really interesting to me, because it has an inherently negative sort of undertone to it. And. So as a person who obviously has code switched a lot in my life, I also feel like it is I don't think of it as an inherently bad thing. I think of it as a cousin to stream all in a lot of ways of like you understand the situation and so you do what needs to be done. But I understand also the idea of like making oneself smaller or different, to like, fit in, or to be seen or heard, is like, not great. And then I think about like, I guess, like, the only people who don't really do it are, like, straight cis white men who are wealthy. But like, I think they do it too. Like, I just feel like I think so too, not as much and not and maybe as obvious ways, but I do feel like either they do it or they totally flame out in social situations, right? They like, go sit in the corner if it's like, a group of women, or like, like, they like, Don't or they like, try to, like, be really cool. Like, it's like, they can't hang there's no equilibrium for them if they're unable to do it. So I don't know. I think of it as like a skill to me, but maybe that's more like, like, the the fully realized version of Code switching is like, to be streamable, right? It's like, if you're like, on like, if you can really not fully code switch and like, lean into the two parts of yourself, you've reached like, streamal enlightenment or something.

Tre Johnson 41:21

It's the Bali mountain.

Traci Thomas 41:24

It's the sunrise of--

Tre Johnson 41:26

That's right, yeah, the only thing I would say, I mean this, you know, that's what was so great about working on that chapter, is that, you know, so for people who haven't read it yet, I essentially make that chapter three different characters. It's my uncle Alan, it's my friend Jamil, and then ultimately, in some respects, as myself and I actually kind of, I think what really helped me about delving into those two, into Alan Jamil stories, is that it really helped me understand the limitation of sustained code switching at a high altitude, and kind of put my as a result, I kind of put myself, and, you know, people will read, what I don't want to spoil is a story about how I come to realize it for myself, yeah, but, uh, but I think what was I was hoping to do over the course of that chapter is like, look at how These two gentlemen did stream contextual to their lives, and look at the cost that it did for me to ignore it, yeah, and to maintain, you know, I and I think to your earlier points around, like the Kanye is and the Laurens and stuff like that, I would argue that some of the fracturing that happened to them is Around to sustain code switch, like this idea that you have to appease these other systems to the expense of your true self, yeah? And what happens if something breaks?

Traci Thomas 42:50

And I think that is especially damaging for people who consider themselves to be creative, yeah? Like, I think Code switching is particularly harmful to people who rely on, I mean, everybody's creative, but some people don't consider themselves creative, or, like, don't lean into that in that way, I would argue that you should, but, you know, don't listen to me. I'm a creative What the fuck do I know? But I do think it's like extreme. I think sustained code switching to your point is, is more can be more damaging to people who have to rely on their own creative instincts in order to, like, not just make money, but like to be a human I feel like people who are truly creative, it's like being creative is like, integral to who you are. Like you can't survive without creative outlets, or like you can't be a good version of yourself, and when it gets stifled, or like that, that kind of like messaging from your creative higher power. I don't know, I don't believe in higher powers, but like for me, when I'm being creative, there is like, something inputting, and then my brain is like, thinking, thinking, thinking, and then I'm like throwing outputting options. And when that mechanism for me gets cloudy, whether it's because I'm thinking of audience in the wrong way or at the wrong time in the process, or whatever, which I think is what code switching does. It fucks up your audience metric. Yes, that's when the thing for me can break. And I'm sure it's different for everyone. But I think, to your point, like I can understand how a person like Lauren Hill or like a person who's extremely creative and creating on such a high level, if they start to worry about that code switching element, could just fuck up the whole thing.

Tre Johnson 44:27

You just lose sense of yourself. Yeah, I think, in a less drastic way, like I think so I have friends who come to me nowadays about, like, writing or wanting to be writers, and there are often people who are steeped in their nine to five work, and you can see they're so And these tend to be black and brown people. You can see that they're so enmeshed in the thing they don't know how to talk away from the jargon and the stilted voice of like LinkedIn post sounding, you know, like that's totally and that's the problem with code switching. Is that. At a sustained level, and when you feel like you've been incentivized to operate this way, I think you lose the beat on like, What the fuck do I actually sound who am I? Right?

Traci Thomas 45:09

You can't trust you don't trust yourself. Yeah, like you don't trust the instinct. And again, I think that instinct is the thing that makes a creative person go like only you can have your own instinct, and like only you can trust that your ideas are good or bad or worthy of time or whatever. And like, if something's getting in the way of that mechanism, it can be really damaging what's not in the book that you wish was or could have been.

Tre Johnson 45:41

Oh my gosh, there's somebody asked me this the other day. There's so many things. So my friend crystal Brandt, who is old college friend, she's a professor at St Mary's College in Maryland, she gave me this book, this little hymnal book that I actually make reference to in the book in black genius proper, but I had this longer thing about how she gave me this book that is a minstrel hymn book, that is that was created by a white female composer back in the early 20th century, that's really intended for white choir audiences to basically do singing black face. And I had a much longer thing about the book about shows like Mad Men and pop culture references like Golden Girls, a couple other Designing Women, all of whom had done different things around blackface and blackface and performance that we ended ended up cutting out. I also, yeah, it was, it was very indulgent, but like, but it was me writing to the clarity that I needed. Yeah, there's also this great show from the 70s called soul that I had during my or in the chapter that's on surveillance, I had a long Ode to Seoul, which was like 70s, like public broadcasting late night show done by this black queer male who, I cannot think of his name right now is killing me, but he used it as kind of like this late night show format that was almost like a salon, and it brought through, like A cross section, of people like Harry, Belafonte, Nikki Giovanni, Sidney, Poitier, lots of performers and stuff. And people come in talking about the craft of the thing that they would do, but that they would but then they would also talk about the social context in which they were asked to do this craft that they were doing. And so I had a long passage about that. And then the last thing I'll quickly say too is like that my editor also quickly cut out too was that I really wanted to do something exploring in my performance chapter, I was trying to explore, what does it mean for black adult film stars to do the work that they do in such A racialized context, and to what and the research I found around physically black women who were enduring so much humiliation and disrespect through the venue of that work was something I just wanted to elevate a little bit more and look at like what is the enjambment of those types of tensions and some of the most intimate encounters you can have with people, done for an invisible audience, and yet still operating in the systemically horrible American context too.

Traci Thomas 48:30

Sounds like you have three really good books or essays to write for me to turn into my class.

Tre Johnson 48:37

I want to do nothing but keep writing. I love writing so much, so much.

Traci Thomas 48:41

Okay, let's talk about how you write. And I'd love to know how it changed from when you had the job, when you were saying you're writing on weekends and late night, to when you became a full time, not, not that full time piecer together of jobs and writing. Yeah, so like, Where were you? How often music or No, snacks and beverages.

Tre Johnson 49:05

I love this line. This is my favorite part of your interviews. Often--

Traci Thomas 49:09

It's my favorite part too. I have to do all the other stuff to just be like, What are you eating? And I should just start a show called What are you eating. And then I wouldn't have to read all these books, and I could stop pretending to be interested in literature. Like, what a, what a, what a hack.

Tre Johnson 49:26

So when I left a job, you know, I did, I did the thing to your point, around instinct as a creative, the biggest thing that that became clear to me is like, I gotta be away. So I live here in Philadelphia, but I periodically, I basically did my own sabbaticals from for sabbatical slash residencies from time to time. So I spent about three different times. I spent upwards of two months in Montreal. I went to New Orleans. I was in CO. I Hawaii. I was in Napa Valley area. I was in DC. I just constantly felt that like, and this is some of this is like mental health stuff. Some of this is like the scope and expansiveness of doing a book for the first time. But I just need to find places and areas to turn down the volume of my brain and distractions and just winnow in more on this book. So I did that a lot. I and whenever I was in these places, I stuck to what I call my Compassionate routine, which is like i No matter what, I started no later than 10, and then I usually stopped around 7pm each day.

Traci Thomas 50:43

That's compassionate. That feels like a long day. Trey, holy shit.

Tre Johnson 50:48

Well, I want to be clear too, if that includes snacking and eating, that includes naps and also, like, I mean, like, like many writers will tell you, like it sometimes my most productive day was thinking about the book often, and--

Traci Thomas 51:02

So that's not so 10 to seven at the computer.

Tre Johnson 51:06

No, but you know, it is the thing of my nuanced answer is, like it is a 10 to seven of what it means to be a writer.

Traci Thomas 51:13

Sure.

Tre Johnson 51:13

Which is-

Traci Thomas 51:14

Sure, yeah, totally, totally, totally. I just was thinking you were like sitting down at 10am writing all day, and maybe shopping for lunch. No, it was like 10 to seven, focus on the book, focus on this. And then the other time was like, focus on whatever you wanted. Got it, yeah. Okay, that makes sense, yeah. And what were you eating?

Tre Johnson 51:37

I was so nervous about this strand of your questioning.

Traci Thomas 51:39

My questiing has gotten really toxic. I always tell people I don't ask gotcha questions. But honestly, this is the gotcha question, what were you eating? We need to know.

Tre Johnson 51:50

So I one thing I did. I like limited like my alcohol consumption in general, when I was in the most heaviest parts of the book, like I just did not want to have that dynamic with me in writing. And then two, I would say, like, my biggest snacks, I love peanut M, M's. I would eat those a lot. I love cashews. I would eat that a lot. I know M&Ms.

Traci Thomas 52:14

I know, you got me. I'm allergic to tree nuts. So, so peanuts I can have. Peanut butter I can have, but once people start talking about nuts, I'm just like, so, nuts, I'm just like, sorry, can't. I'm sorry.

Tre Johnson 52:24

I'm sorry for you. That's right. And then, like, every once a while, like, I'm a big sucker for a warm chocolate chip cookie, and so especially on the days where I felt like I hit a particular milestone, that's how I treated myself.

Traci Thomas 52:39

A reward, a cookie reward. I love this. That's right. I love a cookie. That's right. Old teacher me, when you were still at the job, were there rituals that you did to transition from I'm at the job all day to late night writing or like, how did that look?

Tre Johnson 52:58

Yeah, I, regardless of what vocation I have going on in life. My big thing is that I don't do anything on the computer until I've taken a walk in the morning, and then, like, I try not to do any screen stuff first thing in the morning. And then, then to those that job writing transition, same thing I often found, like, the best way to reset myself was to step away go for a walk. No, I would not listen to podcasts. Would not listen to music. I do listen to music a lot when I when I was working on the book. I'm a big music being in general, but those periods of just like quiet and just resetting my brain through walks was my biggest thing.

Traci Thomas 53:35

I love that we're at the very end. I just have to ask you a few more quick questions. One is that, what's the word you can never spell correctly on the first try? Ambiguous. Ooh, good one, hard. Okay, for people who love black genius, what are some other books you might recommend that are in conversation with Black Genius?

Tre Johnson 53:54

Ooh, good question. Um, I would say Kiese is heavy, sure.

Traci Thomas 54:01

Um, collection.

Tre Johnson 54:03

Oh, my God, and his essay. I mean, yeah, he as a living being, I like to think it's like conversation with aspects of this good question. I'm trying to think of what I love this book, black women writing, writers at work. Women writers, yeah, I love that book. I think it's seminal. I think everyone should be reading it. I would say that too, in some respects, because of the craft around writing and holding multiple identities, I can't think of what else off the top of my head, right.

Traci Thomas 54:33

Okay. Last question, if you could have one person dead or alive read this book? Who would you want it to be?

Tre Johnson 54:40

Timely, emotional question for me, my dad, my dad, who passed in February this year. Thank you. Thank you. We had an estranged relationship, and I, you know, I talked about this in therapy that I really was hoping this book would represent an. Opportunity for us to reconnect. It'd be something for us to celebrate together. So I wish he was here to read it.

Traci Thomas 55:05

That's very beautiful. Okay, I don't want to cry, so let me just move off this. Okay, no easy transition, but everyone okay, you can build a bridge to Trey by getting his book Black genius. It's out now. Wherever you get books, I listen to some of it on audio. It's great. It's a great audio it's such a great time you read it, and it's fun. And yeah, so get it on audio. Get it on the page however you like. And Trey, thank you so much for being here.

Tre Johnson 55:38

Traci, thank you. I mean, I'm sure you've heard this before, but, I mean, you're so humble about this, but what you're doing really is a gift to writers and readers out there.

Traci Thomas 55:47

Ah, thank you everyone. Go get your copy of Black Genius. Tre. Thank you for being part of the Stacks and everyone else we will see you in the Stacks. All right, y'all that does it for us today. Thank you so much for listening, and thank you again to Tre Johnson for joining the podcast. I'd also like to say a huge thank you to Lauren Morrow for helping to make this episode possible. Reminder the Stacks book club pick for August is Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, which we will discuss on Wednesday, August 27 with Alexis Madrigal. If you love the show and you want inside access to it, head to patreon.com/thestacks to join the Stacks Pack community, and you can check out my newsletter at tracithomas.substack.com. Make sure you're subscribed to the Stacks wherever you listen to your podcasts, and if you're listening through Apple podcasts or Spotify, leave us a rating and a review for more from the stacks. Follow us on social media @thestackspod on Instagram, threads and Tiktok, and check out our website at thestackspodcast.com Today's episode of the stacks was edited by Christian Duenas with production assistance from Wy'Kia Frelot low our graphic designer is Robin Robin McCreight, and our theme music is by Tagirijus. The Stacks was created and produced by me, Traci Thomas.

Wy'Kia Frelot
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