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2 4 SXS W O R L D | M A R C H 8 , 2 0 1 8 | SXSW.COM There's a duality inherent in Ta-Nehisi Coates's career. He's a journalist, but rather than seek out a pretense of objectivity, his most famous work has been his deeply personal, passionate arguments on issues surrounding race in America. He is perhaps the leading public intellectual in the country, but he splits his time writing a monthly Marvel superhero comic. And while he is on the verge of accomplishing everything any writer could want in their career — publishing books of essays, writing fiction and Black Panther comics, being attached to television projects with The Wire's David Simon and film projects with Creed and Black Panther director Ryan Coogler — he's not sure he's ready for it all. "You have to be very careful, and make sure that you're inter- rogating yourself over why you're doing what, because you better not take all of them," Coates says. "It's important to not take things just because they're being offered." Coates started his career with the Washington City Paper, then continued freelancing with Time, Village Voice, and Philadelphia Weekly. He began writing for The Atlantic in 2008, and found a home there as a blogger and senior editor. His work there has continually been challenging, thoughtful, progressive stuff that deals with race. He had a cover story in 2012 on the thorny issue of how President Obama addressed, or didn't address, the issue of race, and unleashed a blockbuster in 2014 with "The Case for Reparations," which argued persuasively that the country had failed to honor its promises to black Americans since the abo- lition of slavery and owed a larger form of correction than just promises. The following year, he published the National Book Award-winning Between the World and Me, a 176-page letter to his teenage son about the role race played in his own life, and the role it tends to play in others. He followed that by winning a MacArthur Genius grant, and then, at the height of his intellectual and academic fame, pur- sued his lifelong enjoyment of superhero comics by accepting an offer to write Marvel's Black Panther. It was an opportu- nity that came with unique challenges beyond just "what if this interferes with my reputation as an intellectual." Namely, comics are a different medium than journalism and essays, and one that he was going to be learning in public. Ta-Nehisi Coates. Photo by Gabriella Demczuk Ta-Nehisi Coates Balances Wealth of Opportunities By Dan Solomon "For me, being good is extremely important, and the way you get good is to focus on a particular thing..."

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