Liam Callanan

I'm Jeff Oloizia.

Each week, I sit down with writers from and connected to my home state for candid, sometimes messy conversations about craft, identity, and what it means to build a writing life away from the traditional centers of the literary world.

My guest today is Sadiya Hasan.

Sadiya is a Madison-based poet and essayist and a former fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing.

Yeah, it gave me a sense of grounding and a sense of like it's the first place, you know, I lived on my own, was a writer.

I was, like, doing my thing, had a library.

And so very much felt like I was coming into myself here and was able to, yeah, be in community with other writers and, like, put all of my other identities down for a little bit.

Like, I'm not the daughter who's running everyone to the doctor or the grocery store.