Episode 244 with Annie Liontas, Dedicated Educator and Master Chronicler of the Micro, Macro, and Personal in Their Varied and Resonant Memoir, Sex with a Brain Injury: On Concussion and Recovery

Notes and Links to Annie Liontas’ Work

 

 

   For Episode 244, Pete welcomes Annie Liontas, and the two discuss, among other topics, their childhood love of books after early years of learning English as a second language, their teaching life, formative and transformative books and writers, the hot literary scene in Philly, and salient themes and issues in their memoir like writing emotionally-charged material, “invisible disability,” traumatic brain injuries and their personal history, as well as larger narratives about TBI in the carceral system, NFL, and beyond.

 

   Annie Liontas is the genderqueer author of the memoir Sex with a Brain Injury: On Concussion and Recovery, which was featured on NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross and selected as SELF Magazine’s Book of the Month. Their debut novel, Let Me Explain You, was selected as New York Times Editors Choice. They co-edited the anthology A Manner of Being: Writers on their Mentors, and their work has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, Gay Magazine, NPR, Electric Literature, BOMB, Lithub, The Believer, Guernica, McSweeney’s, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. A graduate of Syracuse University’s MFA program, they are a professor of writing at George Washington University. Annie has served as a mentor for Pen City’s incarcerated writers and helped secure a Mellon Foundation grant on Disability Justice to bring storytelling to communities in the criminal justice system. They co-host the literary podcast LitFriends and live in Philadelphia.

 

Buy Sex with a Brain Injury

 

Annie's George Washington University Bio

 

NPR's Fresh Air Interview with Annie

 

Emma Copley Eisenberg Writes about Sex with a Brain Injury for Electric Lit

 

LitFriends Podcast with Annie and Lito Velazquez

 

At about 1:40, Annie talks about their experience with the legendary Terri Gross

At about 3:45, Annie talks about their upbringing and Greek family lineage

At about 5:20, Annie homes in on their early days in frustration in transmitting ideas in English 

At about 6:20, Annie responds to Pete’s questions about how Greek affects their English writing and reading 

At about 8:30, Annie discusses their early love of reading

At about 11:30, Annie and Pete discuss pleasurable reading and the idea of “favorite books”

At about 12:15, Annie and Pete nerd out over Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Pete recommends “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World”

At about 13:40, Annie speaks to ideas of representation in what they have read 

At about 15:20, Annie talks about “wonderful” professors in their time at Syracuse

At about 16:20, Annie highlights Justin Torres, Yiyun Li, and other writers whose work is favorited by their students

At about 17:50, Annie highlights Philadelphia’s huge amount of talent-writers like Marie Helene Bertino, Emma Eisenberg, and Liz Moore

At about 20:15, Pete and Annie talks about Annie’s memoir’s exposition and opening lines; Annie expounds upon seeds for the book

At about 23:00, Pete shouts out Ingrid Rojas Contreras’ The Man Who Could Move Clouds

At about 23:50, The two discuss the ways in which Annie uses second person and tropes about concussions in the memoir

At about 26:40, Pete wonders about Annie’s decisions in summarizing three main injuries and compliments the draw of the structure; Annie talks about suspense and withholding and shares a resonant quote from George Saunders

At about 29:30, Annie discusses “the longitudinal experience” that goes into “I will have my life” that ends the second chapter

At about 31:05, Annie responds to Pete’s questions about writing emotionally-charged material about beloved people

At about 33:05, Annie talks about people doubting the severity of their injuries and a “five-year plan”

At about 36:10, Annie shares interesting history about the rail industry and its “bonkers” track record-pun intended-in connection to injuries and “faking”

At about 38:30, Pete asks Annie about effects of the brain injury

At about 41:05, Pete’s got jokes! and Annie talks about the physical effects of their brain injuries

At about 42:25, Henry VIII’s possible brain traumas are discussed, as are Harriet Tubman’s

At about 45:15, “Lying as a social act” is discussed in context of Annie’s injury and subsequent ill effects

At about 48:20, Annie discusses their mother’s life and connections between addiction and brain trauma, including Marchell Taylor’s moving fight for better care for TBI victims in the carceral system 

At about 54:00, Pete highlights a resonant excerpt from the book, Page 67, revolving around queerness

At about 57:15, Pete and Annie cite examples from the sporting world and the ways in which women’s health concerns are not treated equally 

At about 58:30, the NFL and concussions are discussed 

At about 1:01:55, Pete and Annie discuss Q&A’s with Annie’s wife, and Pete wonders about the choice to use redacted parts 

At about 1:04:30, Annie juxtaposes the different ways in which Tig Notaro and Ernest Shackleton dealt with trauma

At about 1:08:50, Annie highlights the greatness of and beautiful relationship with Ursula von Ridingsvard

At about 1:12:00, Annie shouts out their publisher and places to buy the book, as well as how to contact them and find them online; they give background information on her podcast

 

 

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    Please tune in for Episode 245 with Shannon Sanders, who is a Black writer, attorney, and author of the linked story collection Company, which was winner of the 2023 LA Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction. Additionally, her short fiction was the recipient of a 2020 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. 

   The episode will go live on July 31. 

   Lastly, please go to https://ceasefiretoday.com/, which features 10+ actions to help bring about Ceasefire in Gaza.