Newark Keeps Cranking Out Geniuses; Writer Nabs MacArthur Grant

NEWARK, NJ — Newark keeps cranking out the geniuses.

This week, John Keene, a fiction writer and professor at Rutgers University, became Newark’s latest MacArthur “Genius Grant” winner. This year’s list of 25 high-achievers – otherwise known as MacArthur Fellows, also includes two teachers at Princeton University.

Each 2018 fellow will receive a $625,000 "no strings attached" award from the MacArthur Foundation to help them pursue their creative, intellectual and professional inclinations. The unique awards – given directly to the recipients instead of institutions and not monitored for results – are not earmarked for a specific project, meaning the winners will be free to spend the cash as they see fit.

Last year, two other Newark natives captured genius grants: Tyshawn Sorey and Damon Rich.

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According to the MacArthur Foundation, Keene – the author of “Annoations” and “Counternarratives” – is a fiction writer who "explores the ways in which historical narratives shape contemporary lives while simultaneously re-envisioning these narratives from the perspectives of those whose voices have been suppressed."

Keene, 53, is a professor and chair of African American and African Studies at Rutgers University in Newark. Rutgers University posted the following message of congratulations on Thursday:

"Congratulations to Professor John Keene who is the first ever #Rutgers#Newark faculty to receive a MacArthur Foundation Genius Grant while at RU-N!"

The foundation writes of Keene:

“In his fiction and in a number of other projects spanning translation, poetry, and cultural criticism, Keene is correcting and enlarging our distorted, partial views of American history and culture, and challenging his readers to question received understandings of our past.”

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Photo: YouTube / MacArthur Foundation