CLIFFORD THOMPSON is a recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award for nonfiction whose essays and reviews have appeared in the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Best American Essays, Times Literary Supplement, the 2024 Pushcart Prize Anthology, and more. His books include What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man's Blues, which Time magazine called one of the "most anticipated" books of the season, and the graphic novel Big Man and the Little Men, which he wrote and illustrated. Thompson teaches creative nonfiction writing at Sarah Lawrence College and the Vermont College of Fine Arts. A painter, he is a member of Blue Mountain Gallery in New York City.