Joseph Rathgeber

Joseph Rathgeber is the recipient of two New Jersey State Council on the Arts Fellowships for his poetry (2014, 2023) and a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship for his prose (2016). He is the author of a novel (Mixedbloods, 2019), two stories collections (The Abridged Autobiography of Yousef R., 2014, and Bad Days on the Batsto, 2020), and two poetry collections (MJ, 2015, and Soft Money, 2021). He wrote music criticism for Tiny Mix Tapes in the aughts, and he has written, photocopied, and distributed the Caltrops underground hip-hop zine since 2020. He has most recently written the two-volume definitive biography and critical analysis of anticon, the underground hip-hop collective (Catch Us Before We Fall Off: a [ch]oral history of anticon, 2026). He was born, raised, and proudly remains in New Jersey.