Challenging Historical Narratives

How important is complexity? At The Gray Area, we value understanding the details. We revel in complexity. But does our desire to understand that complexity sometimes over-complicate an issue?

Journalist and bestselling author Ta-Nehisi Coates thinks so.

This week on The Gray Area, Sean talks to Coates about his new book The Message, a collection of essays about storytelling, moral clarity, and the dangers of hiding behind complexity.

The Message covers a lot of ground, but the largest section of the book — and the focus of this week’s conversation — is about Coates’s trip to the Middle East and the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Coates argues that the situation is not as complicated as most of us believe.

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