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By: Contributing Bloguistas:,
on 11/21/2014
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La Bloga
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My author name, Rudy Ch. Garcia, contains the middle initial Ch., as if it were an abbreviation. It's not. I adopted it to focus Internet searches around me, instead of on the millions of latinos on the planet who also have my given name. Besides to "market" myself, the Ch. emphasizes both my bilingual elementary teacher career and my bilingualism. The Ch. Draws questions and remarks, but hasn't propelled my fame. People can imagine it stands for the famous Che--an association I don't mind--or Chicano, which is also bien.
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| not the prisoner's, but similar |
I recently received three handwritten letters and one story, in the mail, from a man who's in prison for a non-violent crime. So few people write lettrs anymore. His intimidated me, which surprised me. Theoretically, I now had the obligation to answer, not necessarily with a pencil, but with a letter I'd have to send through the mail. I haven't gotten over that and neither have I responded. The story that the incarcerated Chicano wrote is at the bottom of this post. I think it's surprisingly good, detailing his last day before beginning his sentence.
His letters reminded me of some of mine, my half of an exchange of correspondence that went on for about a decade, between me and an English teacher from my junior and high school. In the mid-70s she presented me with a velo-bound, Xeroxed copy, what's called a self-published book, today, containing almost two hundred pages of our letters. To some extent, seeing my words in print influenced my writing mania.
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| what my teacher gave me |
I still have the book but am leery of reading it again. Hearing your teenaged-to-20s self can be unnerving. What immaturity! What self-centeredness! What impassioned introspection about one little life. I intended to give excerpts from the introduction, but I can't do it. If I did, I'd be blushing, nearly shamefully, from what I feel was an over-kind assessment of my "vision, drive, sensitivities, and intellect," among other things. I haven't heard from my co-author teacher in decades. She may no longer be alive. But she left something--there's other copies!?--of herself, and me. The handwriting is gone, but the words between us are here.
Make up our own genres?
I'm going to borrow an artists' word and invent a new, genre term for my written works--fabulist mextasy. There, it's done. I might have to stop using it if the originator(s) feel it's counter to the intended meaning.
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| Hammond's new book, not fabulist mextasy |
Why invent a new genre? At the end of this piece, are Warren Hammond's thoughts that initiated this. I've heard the same idea from Chicano authors. Would Mario Acevedo's books do better as Chicano thriller or paranormal vampire stories? Are Manuel Ramos's books crime or detective or Chicano or all of that or other combinations? Genre is what literary agents, publishers, and readers want. It can make or break.
From this point on, I consider much ofmy writing to be fabulist mextasy. The original definitions are below. I do write somewhat in a fable tradition. I believe the term mextasy applies to much of contemporary, Chicano stories, whether they are speculative or not. And its play on fantasy seems descriptive of some works.
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| where mextasy began? |
From weekly posts, news and diatribes that I read, I've had it up to here (5'7.5") with exclusionary attitudes in the "American" publishing and writing world. It's a mostly white, mostly male, mostly oldsters dominated business. Getting our patasin the door, getting their conventions and organizations to include and welcome us is somebody else's lifetime task. Not mine.
So, I'd rather my unpublished works be true to themselves and my art--I call it--rather than be pigeonholed for the sake of marketability. If an agent or publisher insists on different, established genres, okay, I'll concede. Until then, welcome to the first author of fabulist mextasy. You have my unneeded permission to borrow, use, alter or propogate it, if you want.
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| my 1st fabulist mextasy, in Revista Iguana |
Definition of fabulist: “For two decades, a small group of innovative writers rooted in the genres of science fiction, fantasy, and horror have been simultaneously exploring and erasing the boundaries of those genres by creating fiction of remarkable depth and power”, thus extending the definition of “Fabulist,” which generally does not include fantasy, science fiction or horror. Fabulist, is generally taken to mean magic realism without geographical boundaries, in other words, not necessarily Latin American. New wave fabulist simply stretches that definition to include other more non-realistic forms." Why mextasy: "Mextasy is more than a representation of ecstasy about or for Mexico; it is about the sensuous tracings Mexican culture leaves both sides of the border. More existential state than archive, Mextasy speaks to the living organism of Mexicanicity as it moves between the bodies of Mexico and the United States--an overt and covert delicious miasma that arouses as it excites, excites as it provokes. ¡Que viva Mexico!, within and without its borders . . . the image of Mexico in the United States."
"The human mind wants to categorize. When people go shopping, they want to be able to find things that they know they like. Categorization can be a double-edged sword. If you say, 'I am this,' and there's a whole audience out there that likes this, then it's good. But I think we as genre writers sometimes run the risk of categorizing ourselves too much.
"For instance, as I was writing my KOPbooks, I was thinking, this is great. Mystery readers will read them and science-fiction readers will read them. I'll appeal to two audiences.' What tend[ed] to happen instead, as I learned, was that mystery readers say, 'I don't read science fiction,' and science-fiction readers say, 'I don't read mystery.' So sometimes you actually end up marginalizing yourself. We geek ourselves out too much, and we become a little insular." I was excited that I won [the Colorado Book Award], and I do think KOP Killer is noir mystery first and science fiction second. I was pleased the science-fiction elements weren't held against me."
The letter from the prisoner
I left this story largely unedited. What I found intriguing was how it reveals the thoughts of a man on his way to prison. The minutiae somehow seem appropriate, however mundanely trivial the content might usually be. It's no literary masterpiece, but it made me wonder what I would write if I were on the bus. Or, what about if it was the day before my execution?
The Bus to Nowhere
On this particular morning I woke up early. I knew I would be taking the Metro to my court appointment. My intention was to meet a reporter outside the courthouse. Today I would turn myself in to do a ten-moth stretch in the state jail.
I showered and dressed in clothes I had preselected the evening before. I proceeded to prepare breakfast for my wife, as I normally did. By 6:00am she was in the shower. Her radiance made up for the sun yet to rise. I finished my morning tasks, then entered the bathroom. I handed her my wedding ring and asked her to hold it for me until my return. We kissed goodbye. I exited the back door. I drew the gate open and walked down the alley, six blocks to the bus stop.
Almost immediately, the bus approached. I sat my able body in a handicapped seat. Four older women occupied the seats behind and across from me. They were either on their way to work or returning. Either direction didn't matter. The years of domestic labor was recorded by the callous texture of their motherly hands. Housekeepers, maids, janitors, that mattered, neither. Their American dreams long ago swept away and disposed of.
A stop forward, another woman entered and took a seat. It must have been here that the importance of me and my day exited.
As one of the four departed, another waved gently, saying goodbye. "Until tomorrow." The exiter replied, "Si Diós quiere," meaning, "If God wills it."
The newest rider thumbed through her purse. She withdrew a few dollars--fifteen would be my estimate. Unnoticed, she passed it to the woman behind her. Obscured by the roar of the moving bus, she thanked the other woman. In response, the loaner said it wasn't necessary that she pay her all of it. The borrower looked up, commenting, "No, no, money only brings trouble." In her purse were a couple of other bundles with paper notes attached, as she had sorted these out the night before, her pending debts
Onward rode these women with lives as routine as the bus they rode. So, too, of the other six or eight passengers. A bunch of nobodies? For, after all, everyone knows--on these seats, unreserved, no one rides the bus. --fin--
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG., man of letters, and cartas, and spec stories, and author with the Spanish ch in his name
Years ago at my first writing conference (99%+ Anglo), I read the opening of my still-unpublished, SW dragon epic to a literary agent and some writers, all Anglo. Those who read before me received same-ole questions or comments about their stories. After reading mine, instead I heard, "Did you write that?"
That made as much sense as, "Are you really an earthling?" It was a writers' workshop, not a read-your-favorite-author workshop! For reading your own, not someone else's MS. Plus, all educated, responsible adults know about plagiarism, thus I assumed my integrity wasn't in question, maybe. So, why was I asked the question? Because my opening flowed like A Hundred Years of Solitude? No, since several publishers, agents rejected that novel; they would've recognized that, right? Take your own guess.
I don't know that my prose approached greatness, but I do believe my Anglo audience's underlying doubt amounted to: "How is it possible for a Chicano to write so well?" (If you have another interpretation, share it.) I had encountered a Closed Con of the Third--Anglo--Kind. Where we're expected to be the Con's janitors, cooks and waitresses, not its writers.
Last week I headed for LoneStarCon3 (this year's WorldCon in San Anto), one of the three largest sci-fi/fantasy (SF/F) conventions in the world. It was my first big one and first WorldCon. I didn't know what to expect--a neophyte, Chicano novelist prowling in the shadows of veteran, award-winning authors, famous and godlike residents of the speculative lit world.
Would this brown author survive or "make bad show?" How "white" would the meals and environment be? (Luckily, I took serrano chiles from my garden.) Would I find an agent or editor for my new MSS? And because the Con was also a possible first for SF/F by including a "Spanish strand," how would that turn out for "us?"
This column is intended for Anglos who want to know more about why some Latinos get so "sensitive and uppity"about U.S. publishing. From knowledge can come affinity.
It also provides non-SF/F readers and writers with material for promoting their art. Esas y eses, we need mucho más, to educate others.
I can't cover all the panel topics relevant to other genres: Anglos writing about Chicanos, bilinguals writing for monolinguals, a list of Chicano sci-fi, magic realism, how hard it is for Chicanos to be published and political messages in fiction. And due to length, this must appear in two installments. The links and information here verify points raised, or books and authors mentioned. Sections begin with descriptions of some of my panels, taken from the Con program.
Panel – Latino Characters by Mainstream Authors, Diversity or Cultural Appropriation? "Non-Latino authors have been more successful publishing Latino SF than Latino writers. What role have agents and publishers played in this and why? When do non-Latino authors go too far--cultural misappropriation--assuming we can define too far? The panel will explore these issues from a variety of perspectives."
Fellow authors warned me to keep my bronze nalgasout of this. Before the Con, two panelists did. I was advised, "Anglos don't like hearing about white privilege or cultural appropriation; they get defensive." But if I didn't raise those questions, maybe no one would. I should be ashamed, scared or avoid discussing the fact that I was born brown, the prejudice we face, or the privilege-myopia that Anglo writers and publishers need to overcome to create better American literature? Ni. Modo.
First, a "proof" that Anglo writers do better in publishing than Latinos.Here's data about two mid-list publishers whose goals include finding and publishing more Latino authors. The slogan of the Tu Books' imprint (Lee & Low Books) is: "Fantasy/SciFi Diversity for Children and YA." Books they released in the last 3 years include Summer of the Mariposas by Guadalupe Garcia McCall (as well as her new Under the Mesquite). The other authors are Karen Sandler, Shana Mlawski, Kimberly Pauley,Bryce Moore, Joseph Bruchac, Greg R. Fishbone, whom I'm assuming are not Latinos. You do the math about who's more successful.
The 11 latest books published by Cinco Puntos Press ("With roots on the U.S./Mexico border")start with author Don Henry Ford Jr., the remaining are Larry Goodell, Gene Frumkin, Pat Carr, J.L. Powers, Lisa Sandlin, Douglas Gunn, Shirley Reva Vernick, Ambar Past (who did co-author with Xalik Guzmán Bakbolom and Xpetra Ernandes) and finish with Revenge of the Saguaroby my good gringo friend Tom Miller. There's only one Latino name, Joseph Somoza. They also published Maximilian & the Mystery of the Guardian Angel by Xavier Garza and Six Kinds of Sky by Luis Alberto Urrea, which, to my knowledge, aren't SF/F.
Tu Books and Cinco Puntos have told La Bloga they'd love to receive more submissions from Latinos. The reasons they don't have historical and economic roots I won't go into here. But what's true for Latinos with these two receptivepublishers is worse elsewhere for SciFi/Fantasy. When I asked the audience to hold up fingers for SF/F Latino authors they had read, a handful raised one or a few fingers.
Prior to the Con, I asked a few published, Latino novelists about their difficulties getting published:
"All of my novels and book proposals for the last couple of decades were rejected because they were 'not commercial enough.' They didn't go into details. Reminds me of when I first sold the novel Cortez on Jupiter. I was told how brave I was, writing about minorities, because 'They get offended, you know.' They even suggested I use a 'slightly Hispanic' pseudonym. I kept saying I was a Chicano. When word got around that I was one, they started treating me like an illegal alien. Maybe I should have tried to 'pass for white' and told them the novel was the result of research trips into the barrio. Ay! That's so absurd! Good luck at the con. I'm not sure if a lot of these Anglo-Americano sci-fi folks are ready for you, but el futuro beckons." - Ernest Hogan, Chicano author with a New Mexico Irish/Mexican immigrant father and mexicanamother
"All publishers my agent submitted to, except the one Latina, complimented the writing in my novel, but still said no. They used the word marketability, a catch-all term indicating that, while individual editors might like the book, the sales and marketing teams didn't know how to classify it. I pressured my agent to dig deeper and the response could be summed up like this: 'Santa Fe, New Mexico . . . is that in Mexico?' or 'The Mexican-American War? Is this about drug cartels?'
"Mine wasn't an immigrant story, nor did it concern the American Revolution or Civil War, the historical periods most Americans are familiar.After my book got published, one reviewer dinged me for 'too much Spanish.' My thinking at this juncture is that genre is important when dealing with Latina/o characters. Chick Lit will work, as will categories of immigrant story, mystery, thrillers and humor. But I hate following the rules. - Sandra Ramos O'Briant
"Spanish-language publishing is almost devoted to books by and about celebrities, and translations of a book published in English. If a book falls outside this, it almost always has to prove itself marketable beforehand--not by its own merits--but by a great sales record on a previous book or of the same book in English. Options have shrunk considerably." - name withheld by request
"When I was trying to sell my first book, I submitted it for a first-page critique by an agent from a major, NY publishing house. After the first page, she took a deep breath and said a loud 'Woow!' I thought it was a good sign until she said she liked it, but it was not marketable for her publisher. She recommended I submit to a small publisher. "The manuscript was accepted by Arte Publico Press and became my first picture book. I discovered small publishers were more open to my manuscripts, and I was fortunate to publish many picture books with Arte Publico, Children Book Press and Luna Rising. Now with the help of my agent, I am publishing books with major publishers." - René Colato Laínez
"My agent and editor liked that I included cultural references germane to the story or characters. They appreciated learning about la Llorona, la Malinche and el cucui. The former head of the now-extinct Rayo HarperCollins told me that US-based Spanish language publishing didn't pan out. US readers would only read books in Spanish from overseas. Books in Spanish from US authors didn't sell." - Mario Acevedo
Sci-fi buff Junot Díaz--despite his characters' mujeriego failings--blew the frackin' lid off the marketability coffin of white privilege. But, the glass ceiling--more like a brick techo--won't disappear. I felt lucky to panel with Guadalupe Garcia Mccall, whose books have earned 25 literary recognitions. Has one macho NY publisher ever shown interest in her work? No, the big-publisher bar is raised higher for some. Lower, if you're not Spanish-surnamed.
Others, like black novelist Samuel Delany in his famous essay Racism and Science Fiction [that mentions Robert Silverberg, Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein] () have faced the same, even when successful. Delaney talks about a short story rejected by a famous (and notoriously bigoted) editor because his protagonist is black. "As long as there are only one, two, or a handful of us, prejudice will remain a force—until, say, black writers start to number twenty percent of the total. When he submitted his novel Nova for serialization to the famous SF editor of Analog magazine, John W. Campbell, Jr., Campbell rejected it with a note and phone call to my agent explaining that he didn’t feel his readership would be able to relate to a black main character."
Those serious about literature should read N.K Jemison's Continuum GoH Speech. An intelligent voice for progress and diversity that I might quote from next week. Check her writing, too.
The panel could have focused just on one aspect of cultural appropriation. It's hard reality in our supposedly advanced culture. Clothing company Urban Outfitters "willfully and bald-facedly swiping the iconic and pride-inducing United Farm Workers Union eagle logo to transform it into crap denim shirt fodder for their slave-made clothing." [They dropped that.] Disney Corp attempted to trademark Día de los Muertos for a movie title. [They were forced to drop that idea.] Gary Jennings of Aztec novel fame spent years researching our heritage and raked it in. After he died, his notes were turned over to Robert Gleason to continue the series. Piers Anthony's novel Tatham Moundalso fits where our heritage is commodified, but without "our" having equitable access.
I can't not mention one of the worst historical examples. In 1984 the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters awarded one of its distinguished fiction prizes to a new and presumably young Chicano writer named Danny Santiago, for his first novel, Famous All Over Town, actually written by Danny James who pretended to be a Chicano. It's still in print under the same name! (See Manuel Ramos's post below for more.)
During this panel, Mexica author Norm Spinrad said something like: "I’ve used Latino characters in Little Heroes [1987], and there’s more. I will throw out one thought: Turn this around and ask this rhetorical question: Is it OK and not politically incorrect for a non-American [I believe he meant U.S. Latino] writer to use American characters? ‘Nuff said!"
Here's an appropriate response from indio Sherman Alexie (told to Bill Moyers this year), “I know a lot more about being white than you know about being Indian.” http://billmoyers.com/segment/sherman-alexie-on-living-outside-borders/ Chicanos are in that same boat. We're surrounded by an Anglo majority at the workplace, in the hood--almost anywhere we go in the U.S. And we're told to write about what we know. However, not every Anglo author lives in a corresponding Latino environment. Which maybe means they research. How have non-Anglos responded to that?
From Latino Junot Diaz comes this: "We're in a country where white is considered normative; it's a country where white writers are simply writers, and writers of Latino descent are Latino writers. This is an issue whose roots are deeper than just the publishing community or how an artist wants to self-designate. It's about the way the U.S. wants to view itself and how it engineers otherness in people of color and, by doing so, props up white privilege. I try to battle the forces that seek to "other" people of color and that promote white supremacy. But I also have no interest in being a "writer," either, shorn from all my connections and communities. I'm a Dominican writer, a writer of African descent, and whether or not anyone else wants to admit it, I know also that Stephen King and Jonathan Franzen are white writers. The problem isn't in labeling writers by their color or their ethnic group; the problem is that one group organizes things so that everyone else gets these labels but not it. No, not it."
Poet Dr. Ricardo Sánchez's rules that "Chicano literature can only be written by Chicanos" and that "only Chicanos understand the nuance of the Chicano way of life" is somewhat similar to Alexie's. It's a matter of verisimilitude, no?
From La Bloga novelist Manuel Ramos: "My own view is that anyone can write anything he or she wants. Go ahead and include ethnic characters in your book so that it has the feel of authenticity. Throw in Spanish swear words. Make your protagonist a single, Latina female because your agent assures you that is what the NY editors are looking for, but be ready for heat if you get it wrong. Stereotypes, subtle racism, paternalism, and naiveté are products of bad writing. Call the bad writing cultural appropriation or exploitation or simply another rip off artist passing himself as brown and trying to be just as greasy as us regular meskins."
Again from Sherman Alexie: "Yes, there are white folks who write well about Indians. . . But let me draw a parallel: When white South Africans write about black South Africans, it is called colonial literature, right? It can be incredible, centuries-lasting, genius colonial literature, but it's still colonial. Hmmmm. Here's my official statement on the matter: White folks, I don't care if you write about Indians. You don't need my approval, advice or opinion. Do your thing. Put that wise old grandfather in it. And maybe some talking animals and a very concerned white person who wants to save the Indians. Just don't expect me to read it." Read more here. Frackin' Alexie's funny.
At the panel, I proposed that opposite cultural appropriation, on the spectrum's other end lies diversity. "Movies Independence Day, Armageddonand Deep Impact are offensive in their exclusion of diversity. In these films the American military is depicted with no Latino characters. Indeed, Latinos depicted in Independence Day and Deep Impact are Mexican farm workers (one of three Latino stereotypes in TV and Hollywood, like the gang-banger and "illegal alien"). In L.A. where the majority of America's motion pictures and TV programs are produced, the population is 44%+ Latino, almost every other person in So. California!" (info from here.)
If the span between appropriation and diversifying equals that of a rock and hard place, blame whoever made slaves of Blacks, stole half of Mexico, invaded Cuba and Puerto Rico (bastardizing their path to independence) and continues depriving us darks of voting rights, subjects them to stop-n-frisk and keeps access to publishing, a privileged path. If you think it's tough being Anglo, try Mexican, but just for a day.
At the end, I suggested that the Spanish dicho, Amor de lejos, amor de pendejos, applied to Anglo writers wanting to honestly portray minority characters. The saying translates as, love at a distance is the love of fools. If you'd loveto include a Chicano, puertoriqueño, dominicana or mexicana character, don't depend on Google and Wikipedia. Let your daughter marry one, get boracho with your gardener, invite the family across the alley, who have no papers, to your next barbecue. Or, díos mío, ignore an author's Spanish surname and read or consider publishing the writing on its own merits. Marketability? How about literary worth, period?
Whatever was or wasn't resolved and answered at this panel, I sensed the dialogue can be taken to a higher level by us and others, not by "respecting" all opinions (especially "wrong" ones), but by grounding ourselves in history, facts, logic and persuasion. How well I did, I leave to others. For more from La Bloga on appropriation, see a Manuel Ramos post, a gonzo journalism post, one by Greg Barrios, and also see director/writer Jesus Treviño's interview at Latinopia.
I meet but never get to talk long enough to Chris N. Brown (who edited the must-read Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic), Darlene Marshall, Derek Kunsken, Jim Fiscus (my incredible guide), Guadalupe Garcia McCall (whom I hope to interview), Gay Haldeman, Stina Leicht (who maybe fears I'm caustic, unsocialized; see Warren Hammond about that), Ben Olguin (UTSA), Harry Turtledove (when I was too frazzled to seem interesting), drink and charla with poeta Reyes Cárdenas and Juan Tejeda (sí,vatos, the gringo at our bar table beat us fair and square), and muchosothers. I never got to talk at length with Helen Umberger who laid groundwork for the Con's Spanish strand, found Gardner Dozois and was greatly disappointed John Phillip Santos couldn't attend.
Vignettes:
• I get up from my computer and ask the dude next to me to watch my computer while I take a break. I come back and check his nametag--SF/F demigod David Brin! I ask his advice about how I should work my panel with Con special guest, novelist Norman Spinard, who's reputed to have opinions. He advises me, well.
• A white-haired guy and his wife stop me in the hall, and he says he liked what I said on a panel. "Which panel, what did I say, and why did you like it?" It's another demigod, Ben Bova, Ernest Hogan's discoverer. I shop for a button with, "BB likes some things RChG says" on it.
• I do autographs, seated next to author Gail Carriger. She makes me feel I time-transported to a previous century where strange attire and weird personalities are the norm. Worse, her line's a hundred times longer than mine. But she didn't make fun of me.
• I read a passage from my new, teen fantasy MS to a small audience. I think they loved(?) it!
My suggestions about the "Spanish strand." The concept was great and could use adjusting for any event seeking to increase Chicano, mexicanoor Latino participation. (I failed to seek out avenues to share this at the Con.) Come to think of it, Latino strandmight make more sentido; it's inherently associated with Spanish.
• Longer lead times for inviting Latinoamericanosare necessary. Homeland security is to blame for excluding our continental brethren, as well as the visa process of their country.
• Economic reality means we are privileged to have Con spending-money. Those peoples lowly paid by us for our gardens and restaurant kitchens, for cleaning our hotel rooms, growing our produce, and suffering violence in their countries to ship us our illegal drugs, have no such funds, except for narcos. To include the previously excluded, someone has to pay. Guess which end often doesn't have such resources.
• If high school and college Latinos are desirable at such strands and cons, more day passes need to be made available to nearby communities. Attendance could turn significant and be a good investment where it is normally not available. Con organizers did what they could; perhaps the Latino community, as well, could jump sooner at the opportunity.
• All leading con organizers should allow for one very famous gringo author on everyone of these panels, to attract sufficient, Anglo attendees. Small audiences for such big questions can be interpreted as belittlement. By now, you might guess why.
Two other notes: SciFiLatino.com, a wonderful and vast resource. "SciFiLatino covers English and Spanish language media (books, movies, TV and more) from the U.S. and abroad. By Sophia Flores, whom I believe is puertoriqueña.
Al final, feedback received for this column will be used next week to give opposing or simply, other views an opportunity for input. Even on our websites, us Chicanos enjoy the mi-casa-es-su paradigm.
The second parte of this will cover panels on Magic Realism, Chicano Science Fiction, and SF/F as Covert Commentary on Current Social Issues. Promise: you'll hear things you never realized, as I did.
Pero es todo, hoy,
Here we are, the year 2013. Are we futuristic yet? What’s a Chicano writer to do in this new spacetime configuration?
I began and ended Chicanonautica last year with the whole Mayanoid apocalypse bruhaha. Glad it’s over. Unfortunately, part of the fallout is that a lot ignorant pendjos are dismissing the Maya as stupid people who predicted the end of the world when it didn’t happen. Actually, the Maya never predicted the end of the world . . . I’ve said it before. Why do I have this feeling that we’re going to need some genuine ancient Mayan wisdom to get through Baktún 14?
I reviewed a lot of books that were of interest to La Bloga readers. I will keep doing that. Despite Junot Díaz getting a MacArthur Foundation genius grant, the traditional, New York-based publishing world is not presenting a lot of Latino writers to the world. Who knows what they’ll be hawking in this post-Harry Potter, post-Twilight, 50 Shades world? And their days as the center of the publishing universe are numbered.
What would global culture be like without the Hollywood/New York axis?
Then there was the Spic vs Spec thing that Rudy Ch. Garcia started. I still say that Chicano is a sci-fi state of being. That goes for various forms of Latino and Hispanic. Did you know that according to U.S. Marshals, “Hispanic” is a skin tone? Welcome to dystopia. Se habla Spanglish.
Funky aspects of La Cultura continue to be my obsession. I will write about Mexican comic books, luchadores, narcocorridos, spaghetti westerns, Spanish-language UFO literature, and other glorious manifestations of Latin creativity. I probably should do more about music and food, which will probably conquer the world eventually.
2012 was another nonstop political firestorm with a lot of flaming caca aimed at La Gente. 2013 promises more of the same. Here in Arizona, Joe Arpaio is still the Sheriff of Maricopa County (where I live!), and we have a lot folks who are hysterical over Barack Obama’s re-election. Just going about my business here is going to present me with a lot material for fiction and nonfiction, and it’s going to be so strange that it’ll be hard to sort out the science fiction from the journalism.
Someday I may have to dedicate a book to the politicians of my home state.
One thing I’d like to do more of are Aztlán travelogues. If I can find any excuse for my wife and me to go off wandering these deserts and mountains, and to report back about the weirdness we find, I’m going to take it. It would be nice to be able to retire and do that kind of stuff full time . . .
And of course that will require funding, so expect more shameless self-promotion. Buy Cortez on Jupiter and Smoking Mirror Blues! High Aztech is coming! Support the Ernest Hogan Defense Fund!
And of course, I’m starting the year with a stack of unfinished business, and new projects that all are stark, raving Chicanoid, because I am who I am. I’m working on novels, a collection of my short stories, new short stories -- and no doubt the unexpected will come crashing in, sending me off in some new direction.
The Maya considered 13 to be a lucky number. We’ll see . . .
Ernest Hogan lives in Arizona. He is a Chicano with an Irish name. His writing is considered science fiction even when he is describing the world around him.
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
I followed Ramos' advice from yesterday: "Let it all go. Sit back. Allow your mind to drift. Enjoy the slow passing of time. Breathe deeply. Follow the breath with your mind through your lungs, heart, gut. Chase it from your body, slowly. To help with the contemplation." Below is what resulted. Ergo, blame him, not me.
It's the end of 2012 and apparently not of the world. The clowns and uneducated "scholars" who used Nostradamus or the Maya calendar to misinterpret "el fin del mundo" scored a zero. Federal and financial-world "experts" predicting where the economic, so-called recovery is headed act like tea leaves and entrails hold the truth. And the needle gauging your retirement portfolio's prospects acts like you're running toward and then away from the Fukushima power plant. So what?
So, as my last post for 2012, I'll throw in my dos centavos and ten predictions of what the future holds, at least for La Bloga. I won't consult my deceased bruja abuela about what ths, since it doesn't work for others less wise than me. But I'll go for a more positive take and list what I, and possibly others, would like to see happen. To keep one foot in reality, I'll also acknowledge what may not develop as positively.
Uno. The first wide-screen film of Rudy Anaya's Bless Me, Última will win at least one Academy Award. AridZona Sheriff Arpaio will have his militia raid the Phoenix premier showing, arrest half the audience and provide U.S. born, Spanish speakers with vacations, south of the border. Obama will miss the premier.
Dos. Bloguero Manuel Ramos' next novel, Desperado: A Mile High Noir, will receive critical acclaim and garner more female followers than any latino since Pancho Villa.
Sheriff Arpaio will try to have it banned, but given his I.Q., will get confused and wind up banning the Roberto Rodriguez movie, instead. Obama will watch that movie.
Tres. My first novel, the break-through Chicano fantasy, The Closet of Discarded Dreams, will win two 2012 awards.
Following that, critics will brand it as "literarily deficient" and Sheriff Arpaio will have it banned in AridZona. Out of curiosity, readers will make it a belated best-seller. Obama will try reading the first chapter.
Cuatro. Sci-fi bloguero Ernest Hogan and vampiristo novelist Mario Acevedo will co-author the first gay-vampire space-opera, featuring aliens who look like celery stalks.
With its bisexual antagonist, Constable Apio, it will win no awards, but will produce several writing clubs devoted to obscure chicanada humor.
Sheriff Arpaio will take personal offense, and be arrested for shoplifting hundreds of WalMart copies for his book burnings. Obama will watch the YouTube trailer of that.
It will receive a XXXX-rating, and the royalties will allow the authors to hire publicists, secretaries, and hunky, personal-massage therapists.
They will establish a literary commune in the Taos Mts. where Sheriff Arpaio will be arrested on the grounds as a peeping Tom and stalker. Obama will give him a pardon.
Seis. Bloguero René Colato Laínez's fame in children's literature will lead to his being declared school-board Emperor of the LAISD, where he will institute massive reforms outlawing standardized tests and empowering teachers' unions.
L.A. will surpass China and India's academic standards, resulting in the adoption of thousands of latino orphans who relocate to Asia. Colato will use his book royalties to establish a psychiatric clinic for impeached sheriffs, and Obama will donate two cents to its funding.
Siete. Bloguero Dan Olivas will retire from the law profession and become a full-time writer. He'll readopt a dream he relegated to Garcia's Closet-of-Discarded-Dreams world and be nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature. Sheriff Apaio will put out a wanted-poster on Olivas, and Obama will send him a letter of support, promising to read something Olivas wrote.
Ocho. Bloguero Michael Sedano will open a chicken stud-farm and devote his acumen to producing his first book. It will win more awards than any other bloguero.
He will belatedly enjoy belated acclaim at the side of Tezcatlipoca, who will give it his five-demons endorsement. The god's night-soil collector, Sheriff Arpaio, will spill a bucket upon hearing this and be banished to gringo Hades to smoke cigarettes with Obama.
Nueve. Rudy Ch. Garcia's second novel, the dark YA prequel to The Closet of Discarded Dreams will incite a bidding war between corporate publishers, but the author will instead opt for a latino-friendly mid-list publisher.
It will win the 2013 Newbery Award, and every Anglo child in AridZona will keep it by their bedside. This will inflict Sheriff Arpaio with apoplexy, and Obama will text him his condolences.
Diez. Lastly, the Chicano literary website La Blogawill win no awards, but it will expand to a 12-day week to accommodate more authors to its ranks. It will adopt a logo depicting an AridZona sheriff and a dark U.S. President engaged in some disreputable coupling. La Bloga will be sued by the U.S. gov't and its $40 of assets will be seized. Los blogueros and the blogueras too will go underground to continue publication. Sheriff Arpaio will never locate them. Obama won't bother looking.
Merry, and happy, and feliz and próspero to my colleagues who work to make me more literary than I am. And to La Bloga's readers, our dear, tolerant supporters.
by RudyG, aka author Rudy Ch. Garcia of the upcoming 2013 YA prequel to The Closet of Discarded Dreams that everyone prays will be funnier than his posts.
by RudyG
You've only got 3 shopping days left and it's almost too late to do anything except run out to the corner Walgreen's and buy something that fulfills your obligation, but will be so lame that everyone will know you ran out to Walgreen's at the last minute. Here's what you can do to make it look like you at least tried and you also get to blame something else (like the post office) for not having a physical present for unwrapping.
1. The Closet of Discarded Dreams, a Chicano fantasy novel in paperback
If you're in the Denver Metro area, the first offering is a copy of my book delivered either to you or the recipient. Bargain price of $15 and I'll pay for deliver, autographed. It also comes with a set of Closet drink coasters and a bookmark. Order quick and you can have it by Xmas.
Outside the Denver area, I will pay postage, but it won't get there until after Xmas. In the meantime, you could print out the book cover, stick it in an envelope with a nice note and blame its late arrival on the post office. For all locations, I'll throw in some minimal gift-wrapping. I'll add a personalized note on the title page at no cost.
Nov.-Dec. 2012 issue, with my story El Viaje de Clarisa
If you need a present for an elementary school-aged kid who's bilingual, order a copy of my children's fable in Spanish about a little girl ant whose life is one struggle after another.
About $5 with postage. Contact them for details. It won't arrive in time for Xmas, but you can print out a copy of this cover and claim that it was just released, which is why it's late.
3. The Closet of Discarded Dreams, a Chicano fantasy novel, the EBook format
This one you can get in time for Xmas, if your recipient has or will receive an electronic reader. Plus, it's 25% off, or cheap at $4.47. It will make you look hi-tech savvy and trendy a la chicanada at the same time.
Go here, and at check out, enter coupon code 12PE9NGO4MDS for 25% off your ebook order. Formats available: epub (Nook compatible), pdf, mobi (Kindle compatible), lit (Microsoft Reader), and pdb (Palm).
The code is good until 12-31-2012.
4. Crossing the Path of Tellers anthology, with my SW fantasy story Memorabilia
Been looking for that perfect cheap book from Romania? This is it! It's $7.90, eligible for free shipping from Amazon. I haven't read the other stories, but Memorabilia tells the story of a mexicano shaman whose springcleaning of his cabin ends up in a battle with a Navajo water monster and an almost clean adobe. Print out this cover, stick it in the envelope, etc.
Obviously, you could also order other works by La Bloga's authors, of which there are many worthy as presents. In each case, order something, print out the cover, and look a little sheepish--when the envelope is torn open around the Xmas tree--because there's just paper inside. Or you could hold yourself proud that you're better than your brother who's giving everybody something from Walgreen's.
Support the Chicano classic Bless Me, Última
If you haven't read Manuel Ramos's article on the upcoming film version of Rudy Anaya's classic novel, go here. As Ramos says, we need to support Chicano lit in all its forms, especially when it's about to hit the Big Screen!
I can't find info on a release date, so anyone with info, please add that to Comments below.
Tomando / tokeando any holiday season
This is probably your last worry this time of year, but it might be the first thing--besides avoiding Walgreen's--Not to get a DUI, a contemporary American hysteria that Chicanos too suffer from. Below are excerpts from a Lewis Lapham article, Why the War on Drugs Is a War on Human Nature that's worth a read.
Since I'm of the belief that DUI-paranoia is greatly responsible for the death of affordable live music that once blared in our neighborhoods, I present this for informational purposes only. Celebrating American-style historically has not been tea-drinking time. So, if Walgreen's doesn't have everything you need, there's still time to make another stop. Take these words as you will.
"Martin Luther, early father of the Protestant Reformation, in 1530 exhorts the faithful to 'drink, and right freely,' because it is the devil who tells them not to. 'One must always do what Satan forbids. What other cause do you think that I have for drinking so much strong drink, talking so freely, and making merry so often, except that I wish to mock and harass the devil who is wont to mock and harass me.' ”
"The French poet Charles Baudelaire, prodigal son of the Industrial Revolution, is less careful with his time. 'One should always be drunk. That’s the great thing, the only question. Drunk with what? With wine, with poetry, or with virtue, as you please.' ”
"The founders of the republic in Philadelphia in 1787 were in the habit of consuming prodigious quantities of liquor as an expression of their faith in their fellow men--pots of ale or cider at midday, two or more bottles of claret at dinner followed by an amiable passing around the table of the Madeira."
"The lyrics of the Star-Spangled Banner were fitted to the melody of an eighteenth-century British tavern song."
"Alcohol’s job is to replace creation with an illusion that is barren. 'The words a man speaks in the night of drunkenness fade like the darkness itself at the coming of day.' ”
"The policies of zero tolerance equip local and federal law-enforcement with increasingly autocratic powers of coercion and surveillance (the right to invade anybody’s privacy, bend the rules of evidence, search barns, stop motorists, inspect bank records, tap phones) and spread the stain of moral pestilence to ever larger numbers of people assumed to be infected with reefer madness -- anarchists and cheap Chinese labor at the turn of the twentieth century, known homosexuals and suspected Communists in the 1920s, hippies and anti-Vietnam War protestors in the 1960s, nowadays young black men sentenced to long-term imprisonment for possession of a few grams of short-term disembodiment."
Feliz, Merry, Próspero, Happy, y Suerte,
RudyG (sent from my IPhone, camped out in front of Walgreen's waiting for it to open
By: Contributing Bloguistas:,
on 12/7/2012
Blog:
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by RudyG
gentry - the qualities appropriate to a person of gentle birth; upper or ruling class.
gentrification - the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often replaces earlier usually poorer residents. [definitions: Webster's Dictionary]
So, some gentry "of gentle birth" are renewing, rebuilding and replacing all over your barrio. Should you let the coraje get to you and start making bilingual picket signs and petitions?
One common belief is--Simón, ese! The price of local pizza will go up, tamales-by-the-dozen will become rarer than a Chicano jogger, your favorite cantina will be remodeled into a vegiburger or starbucked bistro where one item can cost more than a dozen tamales, and your neighborhood school will be turned into a more exclusive charter factory that features maybe a dozen chicanitos. But that's such a shortsighted, narrow and "poorer" view, it might be better to take a longer, broader and "richer" perspective on the phenomena.
Based on decades of scattered, sometimes sober, observations of Northside Denver's gentrification, as well as hundreds of hours drinking Negras on Friday afternoons out in my front yard with my untrained perro Manchas, I've discovered undiscovered value to these invasions. It's not all floating caca under the bridge, but our "usually poorer residents" can benefit from this "influx of middle class or affluent people" and even climb the economic-advantage ladder to almost becoming "upper or ruling class." Here's how I see it:
Signs when a barrio gets gentrified | Benefits for barrio gente |
1. When the forecast calls for "surf's up" on the beach or mountain snow, gentry's trash & recycle bins hit the curbside days before scheduled pick-up, encouraging burglaries. | Since gentry obviously aren't home, this gives you time to search their bins for aluminum cans and junk to sell at your biannual yard sale, if you simultaneously watch your casa. |
2. Yards that never had gardens are suddenly filled with lush plants, tall green trees and expert landscaping, making yours look like a monte with a barber-college haircut. | You won't have to nag your esposa to cut the lawn or weed the garden anymore because there's no way yours can ever look as suave or verde as theirs. |
3. On the other hand, that deceased viejita's rosebeds are pulled up and replaced by formulaic gentry-landscapes that produce a few small flowers with little maintenance. | Your d-i-y landscaping is the most unique around, and scrawny roses you transplanted when everybody was at the viejita's funeral make gentry think you got a green thumb. |
4. Newspapers on gentry's front yards pile up because they all have wireless IPods & IPads and don't read print--or went skiing--but have too much disposable income and don't cancel their subscriptions. | You don't waste money anymore on subscriptions; you just take your dog on his customary, new, morning walk, nonchalantly pick up your free copy and your esposa compliments you for getting up off your fat nalgas. |
5. The viejitos who struggled along with their walkers don't come by anymore to help improve your pocho Spanish, and the young, fit güera/güero joggers never stop, unless they need a translator. | Young, fit, güeras (or güeros, if that's how you jog), jogging--paint your own picture and also see #6. |
6. New, monolingual neighbors have replaced the fluent Spanish-speakers who stopped by on Fridays to chat and help you improve your pocho bilingualism, so now you always converse in English-only. | Your status rises when your pocho Spanish makes you El Primo Translator of the block, and you now translate for landscaping, drywall and roofing vatos redoing the barrio, and they envy your English fluency. |
7. Your neighbors' pure-breds are fully trained, bark less and live inside more than your mongrel, targeting you for nuisance-dog complaints. | When robbers check out your block, they stay away from your casita and its unsocialized, barking mongrel, making you look smart to la esposa. |
8. New, shining, MPG & GPS-equipped silver cars sit in gentry driveways, increasing local car thefts and making your old troca look like it belongs to one of the roofers. | There's more neighbors with working cars who you can ask to boost your worthless troca's battery on sub-zero mornings, if they're not skiing. Plus, see #7 above. |
9. Gentry breweries and cafes have replaced your dive bars and cheap taco joints, forcing you to drive miles on Fridays for tus traguitos and some refritos con green chile picoso. | You save chingos by buying six-packs and bags of chicharrones, while spending more time training your mongrel out in your front yard, waiting for translation requests and Benefit #5. |
Of course, this list is incomplete and La Bloga readers are encouraged to add to it. There could be thousands and thousands of ways for our "usually poorer residents" to benefit from the "upper or ruling class" takeovers of their neighborhoods. Qué no, gente?
Es todo, hoy,
por RudyG
A message from Claudia D. Hernandez
Dear Friends,
I am launching my very first Indiegogo effort to fund my latest project: TODAY'S REVOLUTIONARY WOMEN OF COLOR Book and Photography Exhibit
I NEED YOUR SUPPORT to cover costs such as book editor, art designer, exhibit costs and book publication which will be given as a GIFT to every young girl who attends the exhibit
The deadline to back this project is December 9th!Please, watch my video and then click on the pink button that says "Contribute now" and donate $1
Share the video with your friends and family to help spread the word. Please forward this email to your friends and organizations that you know might help. Thank you for supporting education and community through the arts!
Please visit
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/258398?a=1644733The Closet of Discarded Dreams
Texas Book Tour
Oct. 25-31, 2012
Bloguero Rudy Ch. Garcia will be visiting Texas. Come and discover the Closet of Discarded Dreams.
HOUSTON
River Oaks Bookstore
Friday Oct. 26, 2012 5:00 – 7:00pm
3270 Westheimer
Live on-air interview on Tony Diaz’s Nuestra Palabra –
Latino Writers Having Their Say, KPFT 90.1fm, Tue. Oct 23, 7:30pm CST
SAN ANTONIO
Southwest Workers Union
Sun. Oct. 28 3:00
1416 E. Commerce
The Twig Book Shop
Sun. Oct 28 5:00
@ The Pearl Brewery
Palo Alto College Guadalupe Hall #119
Tuesday Oct. 30 12:50
1400 W. Villaret Blvd.
Great Day SA interview
on daytime TV program, KENS5 in San Anto
Sun. Oct. 28 beginning at 12:00 noon.
October 6th, 2012
featuring best-selling authors and music performances, including Denver Sound’s
Slim Cessna’s Auto Club
concert with Rocky Mountain PBS Channel 6
In anticipation of the new 2013 Americas Latino Festival to take place in Boulder, October, 2013, a preview event will be launched today, October 6th, 2012 on the University of Colorado Boulder campus.
The preview event features a presentation by festival director Irene Vilar, a Guggenheim Fellow and Latino Book Award winner, and a talk by best-selling author Luis J. Rodriguez, author of Always Running: La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A., recognized as a major figure in contemporary Chicano literature.
The program includes a piano recital of Music across the Americas, a musical intermezzo of the Colombian folkloric group Tucandirá, and a performance of Denver Sound band Slim Cessna’s Auto Club. All events take place inside the Black Box theater of the ATLAS Institute building on campus. Events are free and open to the public, with the exception of the Slim Cessna’s Auto Club concert, which will be recorded for Rocky Mountain PBS Channel 6 as part of the newly released Boulder Box Set series. Tickets for that event can be purchased at $20/$50 through www.americaslatinofestival.org.
The America for the Arts festival will take place October 3-6, 2013 at the University of Colorado Boulder. Over 75 speakers in the areas of human rights and justice, conservation, science, literature, music, visual arts, and film will participate in this event committed to promoting a panamerican consciousness and cross cultural understanding. The 2013 region: Mexico & the Caribbean. Theme: The Exhaustion of the Earth.
Among those confirming attendance for the 2013 event are: Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Junot Diaz, best-selling authors Isabel Allende, Mayra Santos Febres, and Cristina Garcia,
Nicaraguan poet Ernesto Cardenal, Guggenheim Fellow and International Literature Award Winner Daniel Alarcon, author and film director Lucia Puenzo, Babelfilm director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, The Future of Food producer Deborah Garcia, actor and film producer Benicio del Toro, Guggenheim Fellow Laura Restrepo, Pulitzer Prize winner playwright Nilo Cruz, Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award and NPR Latino USA anchor Maria Hinojosa, Latin Grammy Award winner Nestor Torres, PBS NewsHour anchor Ray Suarez, and McArthur Genius Grant fellows: installation artist Pepe Osorio, percussionist Dafnis Prieto, jazz saxophonist and composer Miguel Zenon, photographers Camilo Jose Vergara and Susan Meiseles, and Nobel Laureates Derek Walcott and Mario Vargas Llosa. Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Mirta Ojitowill cover the event for the national press.
---------------
Bloguero authors in L.A.
Rudy Ch. Garcia will be joining fellow Blogueros Daniel Olivas, author of The Book of Want and children's books author René Colato Laínez (his latest,
Let's Play Football / Juguemos al futból
) at the Latino Book & Family Festival, next Saturday, Oct. 13, 2012, on the Calif. State University campus, Dominguez Hills.
Olivas' panels: Writing in Multiple Genres (10:00am) and How To Get Published (1:00, Garcia, too!). Laínez' panels: Using Multicultural Literature in the Home & Classroom (10:00am) and What's New in Children's Picture Books (1:00). Garcia will also be on the Great Young Adult Fiction panel (3:00). This year the event is being held in conjunction with La Feria Es El Momento - Edúcalos, presented by KMEX Univision. Check the program at the event for readings or signings.
After that, Garcia heads to San Anto, Austin & Houston, Oct. 25-31 on his book tour: River Oaks Bookstore, Fri. Oct. 26 in Houston; and Southwest Workers Union, Sun. Oct. 28 and Palo Alto College, Tue. Oct. 30 in San Anto.
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
The San Patricios Brigade is one of my favorite topics in bars and classrooms. On St. Patrick's Days I've asked bar patrons who were celebrating St. Pat's with beers if they knew about La Brigada; in all of my years of polling, only one red-haired American ever did. The majority of the others didn't look pleased nor thank me for filling out their historical ignorance about a period of their homeland's shameful past.
And each Sept. in my primary classrooms I've introduced the history of the Irish immigrants who fought on the side of Mexico in the War to Steal the SW from Underdeveloped Mexico. It quickly made my students more historically aware than most Anglo American adults. About their own country's history. The children were always greatly affected, by the brutality perpetrated against those white immigrants and by their solidarity with their Mexican ancestors.
It doesn't seem ironic to me that Hispanic Hispanic Heritage Month in this country, officially celebrated from Sept 15-Oct.15. doesn'tcoincide with Mexico's annual recognition of The San Patricio Brigade earlier in Sept. It seems in keeping with typical American denial of dismal historical crimes.
After my reading/singing of my fantasy novel at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque* will follow a special event. La Bloga has written before about this event that is greatly celebrated in Mexico and Ireland. In this past post two significant books were reviewed, Irish Soldiers of Mexico and Molly Malone and the San Patricios, that describe the events leading to the torture, beatings, brandings and hangings of those Irish-American heroes. You can read additional background info from The Society for Irish Latin American.Studies, among others.
As important to read about and contemplate as Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, it's something every American should know, not just those of us of Spanish-speaking heritage or seven-year-old Mexican immirgrant children, or those in Ireland or Mexico. Below is the information from NHCC on the Albuquerque commemoration:
El Día de los San Patricios
Saturday, September 29th at 4:00 pm
Wells Fargo Auditorium
National Hispanic Cultural Center
Free Admission
For the third year, the NHCC commemorates the courage of the St. Patrick’s Battalion whose soldiers fought for Mexico, forging strong ties between Ireland and Mexico that continue to this day. During the U.S.-Mexican War of 1846-48, more than five hundred immigrant soldiers, mostly Irish, deserted the U.S. Army and joined forces with Mexico. These men became known as the San Patricios. Every year this event is commemorated in Mexico and in Ireland at the highest levels of government.
A lecture by UNM Professor Caleb Richardson, live music by Gerry Muissener and Chuy Martinez and a screening of The San Patricios: the Tragic Story of the St. Patrick’s Battalion, a video documentary by Mark Day will be offered to the public free of charge by the National Hispanic Cultural Center in the Wells Fargo Auditorium on Saturday Sept. 29th at 4 PM.
Dr. Caleb Richardson is an expert on Irish, British, and European history and will give his perspective on the reasons for the formation of the St. Patrick’s Battalion during the U.S.-Mexican War. Gerry Muissener of the Irish American Society will perform live music as will Chuy Martinez of Los Trinos.
Commenting on the Mark Day film, historian Howard Zinn said, “Absolutely enthralling. Dynamite material. It is a perfect example of historical amnesia in America that this story is virtually unknown to every American. A superb job.” Howard Zinn author of A People’s History of the United States. For more information, call Greta Pullen at 505-724-4752 or Laura Bonar at 505-352-1236.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
* LaBloga-ero Rudy Ch. Garcia will do a reading & signing of his Chicano fantasy novel tomorrow Sat. Sept. 29th at 2:00pm in the National Hispanic Cultural Center, 1701 4th St. SW, in Albuquerque. Please inform anyone in that area that you think might be interested. The Closet of Discarded Dreams on sale for $16. (NHCC contact Greta Pullen 505-724-4752)
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
Three Chicanos who live and practice their arts in Denver: a retired factory worker, now artist and music aficionado; a former practicing lawyer turned novelist; a formerly employed bilingual teacher who sculpts his gardens and fiction.
Thursday night we walked the blocks of what natives call the Northside. The gentry, developers and transplants have taken out much of its culture, much as they take out weeds from their yards and the characteristic architecture of the neighborhood homes to replace them with foo-foo plants and minimalist houses. So, we walk the blocks, commenting on our loss and deriding the substitutions.
The second floor apartments on 32nd & Zuni where mexicano families once could afford to live and send their niños to neighborhood schools to learn to read and write in their native language are now hundred thou condos where Spanish is much less heard, if at all. The former residents relocated to outlying areas where rent is cheaper and instruction their kids receive now all in English.
The flat-roofed buildings that once housed bars where one of our fathers and a father-in-laws drank themselves into alcoholism and exchanged stories of cómo era when they grew up in the San Luis Valley or crossed over looking for more than just cantinas with cold beer and pool tables.
The old tequila bar that served the best chorizo con huevos breakfast and where you could order obscure tequilas for less than half the price of the yuppie establishments that sit there now with no Spanish speakers to speak of and food prices that make you wish you weren't hungry. The former bar owned by relatives of a Jalisco distillery family who succumbed to a lavish purchase offer that ousted one of the best places to compose fiction on a Saturday morning.
The Anglos passing by us, wondering quien sabe qué about us, some not daring to look up from the dog they're walking nor respond to a hello, no matter that the only difference between the three of us and gringo drunks who'll later pepper the sidewalks are our physical features.
A plethora of restaurants/bars overloaded with customers with too much discretionary funds, too much searching for identity and culture in an area they helped strip of the same.
Multi-stored structures marring the skies with the bareness of concrete and glass where once stood brick homes with families, children who were sent to public, not charter or private schools, where the music of quinceañeras and birthdays formerly rang out on weekends, and now thousand dollar bikes and BMWs mutely sit on patios or out front.
The old, Chicano bar-Italian restaurant still open. Still serving cheap drinks and its neo juke box blaring oldies. A kitchen fire and fire alarm end a brief stay.
We walk the sidewalks, the three of us. Admitting some benefits of progress, though much of that is limited to one day being in a position to sell our houses for much more than we paid and then being in the position of leaving what once was.
We talk of places and times and remember-whens; we drink more, but not enough. Celebrating recent individual accomplishments; wishing each other well and future luck. We can't do the same for the old Denver Northside. The name itself has been taken from us, regurgitated as a string of truncated labels more descriptive of the money entering the area, the overpopulation of drinking places, the higher income levels of the encroaching gentry.
We had a good time anyway. Because we know more andnot simply about the history of this area. We experienced things here that stay with us, in our artwork and literary works. We still feel it. Live it. Lamenting the changes doesn't change that.
Es todo, hoy
RudyG
Don't ever get your first book published; skip straight to the second.
My life's such a torrent with duties around publicizing
The Closet of Discarded Dreams that eating, bathing, cutting my nails or hair, and sometimes even breathing have nearly become lost habits.
So, when I get an Email that
Reyna Grande, who was flying in to read from her third novel, is about to land in Denver and maybe has no place to stay and could I help, it's almost a relief to have new, different priorities. My responsibilities turned out to be merely putting her and hubby up for the night–híjole!
If you've never heard Reyna speak and do a reading, you've missed demasiado. Yanked out of my own tiny first-book tasks, I sat with others at Tattered Cover Bookstore as she told of her childhood, growing up, her life, her family relationships and trials that epitomize what every young mexicanito who crosses al Otro Lado undergoes. Her reading widened my self-centeredness some, deflated my overindulgence in my first novel being published. It was good for me. She the pocha and me the chicano connected for just one moment at the reading, when I realized how much we shared in common when we'd been young brown kids in this intolerant society.
The Distance Between Us, A Memoir is her book. Read it, but better yet, go hear it. Reyna headed off for another read at Whittier Public Library, but you can
go here to see where else you might be lucky enough to catch her.
Back to self-promotion – Albuquerque and a TV interviewKASA 2 Fox TV has a weekday morning show called
Santa Fe Style Show and interviewed me about
The Closet of Discarded Dreams as their featured book of the month! If you want to see how a Chicano pitches to an audience in the land of the Hispanic,
go here.
Author doesn't do good phone – Denver WESTWORD.com interviewOur biggest alternative-newspaper's website features an interview by Cory Cascciato today. It taught me how different phone interviews are from live ones on TV. You can
go here to read my ramblings.
Chingaus – The Closet arrives!
My first reading is this Sunday. I've never seen the book, though the Ebook's been available online since Sept. 1. I'm sitting on the front patio, drinking Negras, wishing I could down a half a bottle of Knob Creek, looking up the street every time I hear a vehicle, hoping it's FedEx, wondering how I'm going to tell my audience Sunday that they can't buy the book because it didn't get here in time. Other than that, I'm fine. Mi amá is here for the reading, but she's enjoying Reyna's book because MINE HASN'T ARRIVED and might not. One day left for deliveries.
A FedEx truck stops down the street. Then leaves our block. Cagada! A UPS truck stops next door, delivers and gets back to head off, again. Puchísima! Then he pulls up ten feet like to deliberately tease me that he was leaving. And brings us 2 boxes he sets on the porch. The book. The books. I'm not exhilarated. I'm not tirando somersaults. I don't believe it. It's as surreal as some of
The Closet.
My wife Carmen takes a pic, but it shows nothing of relief, because there is none. It's just here. And Sunday I won't have to disappoint at least those wanting a copy. To see whether my reading is anywhere as suave as Reyna's, you'll have to be there:
Debut reading & signing of
The Closet of Discarded Dreams
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
Su Teatro's Denver Civic Theater
721 Santa Fe Dr. 5:00pm
Door prizes galore.
Oh, yeah, and you'll even be able to purchase a copy! De verdad.
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG
by Rudy Ch. GarciaEver have one of those mornings when you realize--what? That you shouldn't have done something last night. That you don't remember what you did. That you don't know where the chingaus you are or how you got wherever the chingada you are. And maybe you're even scared to turn around? Well, that's how my fantasy novel The Closet of Discarded Dreams begins. Then everything gets worse.
Today I'll probably receive the first copies of the book. It might be like all the Xmases ever, all combined into the opening of one gift, from a publisher, but nevertheless as latent with emotion as anything I probably ever received from Santa.
In a week, on Sept. 16th at Su Teatro's Denver Civic Theater I will do the premier reading and wonder and wonder how it will be received. In preparation for that and to commemorate holding a copy in my hands in a few hours, below is part of the first chapter, the opening to the novel. In the Denver Metro area, I'd encourage people to request the book from Tattered Cover Bookstore, since it only became available to stores in the last couple of days.
If you like what you read here and want to read more, spread the word, twitter and friend and like away to your networks, family and co-workers. Given logistical problems of not getting the book earlier, I assume it won't make the Colorado bestseller list. We'll just have to see.
When I opened my eyes I immediately realized I wasn’t in my bedroom, or in anyone else’s for that matter. From about twenty feet up, a seemingly endless ceiling overshadowed me, sparkling all star-like. It reminded me of a colossal version of an old Westside San Anto bowling-alley-turned-Mexican-dance hall, except no salsa blared here, nor did any banda play. Drunk like a borracho on a titanic waterbed, I floundered atop a never-ending loose collection of gear, goods, and possessions amassed in all directions.
My muscles not responding well, I must’ve looked like a stupid action figure in some messy kid’s closet. The ocean of stuff glutted my vision, overwhelming my mind. These sensations and images flashed through me like a dream—no, a nightmare—yet I felt conscious. In which case, what was all this chingadera and where in Gringolandia had I landed?
As I struggled to sit up, on my left I toppled over the heavy gold pieces of a nine-foot-square chessboard—of ebony and ivory? On the other side I squished an opened box of chocolates that reeked of liqueur. I wiped my hand on the mink coat lying there and smelled my palm—definitely Amaretto and Kahlua. Strange since I’d never had a sense of smell in a dream. I wiped the stuff off on my jeans and shook my head to try to get straight. Then I gave myself a cachetada hard enough to sting my cheek, and rubbed and stretched it. Nada of the surroundings changed. No, this felt nothing like a dream.
Facing me, as well as to my right, the distant horizon shimmered. I’d somehow awoken in a humongously long box, unfathomable miles across in two directions. Everywhere between me and the distance, piles of goods rose like a consumer society’s ultimate graveyard, leaving but ten feet of suffocating space overhead.
Now I felt like a forsaken knick-knack in some hoarding giant’s garage, stacked almost ceiling-high. In my mind, the stunted headroom choked off the horizontal boundlessness, threatened to crush me with claustrophobia. I wanted to puke, heave hard and bad, but forced it back down and swallowed. The nausea went away.
I followed the twinkling, pale ceiling to where it ran into a more exposed, orange wall behind me and a yellow one to the left. My eyes and brain couldn’t accept that the planes met at right angles, like this enclosure might be hexagonal or something. I shook my head again and squinted but the angles fluctuated worse. To boot, the disorientation wasn’t only in my head. My skin, my bare feet, my gut, didn’t feel normal. A hangover from an exotic drug I should never have tried? I couldn’t remember doing such a thing.
Fact was I couldn’t remember anything I’d recently done—last night, yesterday, the past week and for much longer. Maybe I’d been drugged with something that had wiped out my memory. So besides being lost, I had some kind of amnesia? And where the chingaus had my socks and shoes gone to? Had I gotten rolled? I checked for a wallet and found nothing, or anything in the other pockets.
Worried that if I stood I’d lose my footing on the stuff, I stayed crouched, scanning for someone or something familiar. I made out a third wall miles away but just barely, like this hazy place was gargantuan enough to have several climates, with fog in front of me and what looked to be a mirage to the far right. Between me and those distant walls, perpendicular shafts of darkness regularly sundered the background, pillars of black light rising out of the ground as if to keep the flat canopy from collapsing. I could have used a pillar myself, to keep my balance.
I shook off the vertigo and inspected the Flooring, as I’d learn they called it. It was impossible to believe. No wood floor, carpet, tile or linoleum anywhere. No ground, no dirt. Just thousands—no, it must have been tens of thousands of…things sat on I couldn’t imagine how many millions of others. In that sense, the place resembled a humongous junkyard, but most items appeared to be whole, useable, many even new. Any man-made object of value seemed like it would be here somewhere. I tore my eyes from staring too long because it confused me—like speeding through a liquidation sale of valuables from mankind’s every era. Besides, I was in no shopping mood for anything, except information, something to get my bearings or understand what had happened and where the chingada in Aztlán I could be.
Subdued noises came at me from every direction, like my ears were partially plugged…but I didn’t think my hearing was the problem.
From fifty yards in front echoed the steady clicking of roller coaster wheels. The contraption hadn’t been there a minute before, I felt certain of that. It stretched for possibly miles on prairie-like slopes of goods, bearing but one screamer riding with his arms raised. Further back stood a short oil derrick with its gushes splashing the ceiling or gurgling oil that seeped into the underlying goods. A couple of men in black-drenched overalls whooped it up. At least those people acted like they knew where they were. Yet, I hesitated running to seek their help.
Sprinkled throughout as far as I could see, larger groups were involved in different activities. There looked to be parties, a tamalada, a videogame tournament or quieter mundane events, like some kind of business meeting and a wedding ceremony. Plus more—a courtroom trial, a monster truck rally, a team of fresco painters frenziedly at work, and further out a score of naked people obviously involved in an orgy. At the limits of my vision, the eclectic mix of goings-on melded into grayed blurs.
 |
| publicity photo |
More odd than all these oddities, was that the participants seemed totally involved in their own special thing, paying no attention to groups near them. As if they didn’t know they had neighbors. It was like I’d Google-mapped in real-time and max-zoomed on a world of suburban barbecues. A place where each backyard gathering pretended it existed in its own private mini world, despite the nearby competing commotion. Except, these people needed no eight-foot fences to aid the illusion and suburbia had never looked this loco. . .
Rudy Ch. Garcia will autograph and sign The Closet of Discarded Dreams at
Su Teatro's Denver Civic Theater
on Sunday, Sept. 16th
at 5:00pm, 721 Santa Fe Drive
A free event with refreshments and suavísimo door prizes.
[Amelia Montes is off today.]
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
As many of you 60s and 70s activists know, back in those days there were certain cosas that were not talked about in public places, things that La Raza had no tolerance for listening to. Criticism. Questioning of leadership. Talking about the jefes and jefas. It extended into the written word, as well. I remember a fairy tale I wrote that received physical threats as part of my audience review, on me, not on the tale. We seemed to be a gente allergic to the airing of laundry or anything that questioned the sanctity of our celebrities.
I don't know how much times have changed, but I found it refreshing to read a writer, new to me, detailing the type of discussion and views that those of us here at La Bloga have likely deliberately avoided presenting on our pages. Anyone involved in the Chicano lit world has heard unsavory to critical comments about some ChicanA writers. Yes, ChicanO, too. History and gente will decide whether our choices to not publicize or debate such was a journalistic weakness on our part. Likewise our tendency, sometimes, to find few weaknesses in literary works. I'll leave it at that.
Below is the beginning of a lengthy and journalistically responsible (in my opinion) article by Roberto Ontiveros. The title alone says much about its contents and the sometimes heated comments it produced:
Sandra Cisneros's defenders and detractors debate what the celebrated author has meant to San Antonio and Latino literature
[By Roberto Ontiveros, published Feb. 15, 2012 in the Current, "San Antonio’s free, award-winning, alternative newsweekly, featuring local writers and critics covering politics, arts, music, food & drink, and every other crucial Alamo City topic." – Website's "About Us"]
"As nearly everyone now knows, Sandra Cisneros — the oft-times indigenously attired author who founded the Macondo Writers' Workshop here in 1998 and the Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Foundation two years later — is done with San Antonio. Judging from the comments strung to the news articles announcing her impending exit, people here feel mournfully mosaic about her departure. She is done with Texas as well, and heading for... who knows where really?
.....
"As longtime friend and absolute fan Bill Sanchez told me, Cisneros's reasons for leaving are as simple as the fact that, at 57, she feels compelled to reevaluate her life and the work she still wants to accomplish. It is time to focus on herself, she tells me. So, Cisneros is done with this state and done with the state she found herself in. To be blunt, it sounds like she is done with a lot of you, too."
RudyG: One of the commenters wrote:
"Roberto [Ontiveros], what have you done? As Latinos we haven't the
luxury of destroying one another. The profound irresponsibility of ethics and knowledge in this piece is
heartbreaking."
What the commenter termed Latinos not having the luxury of destroying one another, I call responsible journalism. The accusation of "irresponsibility of ethics" sounds to me like charges from the old Movimiento caudillismo some of us tolerated more than others.
I leave further interpretation of this article to La Bloga readers to decide for themselves. Go here to read the full article.
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG
Denver debut book signing and reading of
The Closet of Discarded Dreams
Su Teatro's Denver Civic Theater
721 Santa Fe Dr.
Sunday, Sept. 16th, 5:00pm
by Rudy Ch. Garcia, the unfolding author
One week. Siete días. It's almost here. Like my unnamed protagonist would say, Qué chingaus! People at the readings might ask: What did you think about after you heard you'd be published? What did you feel? How was it, holding your first novel in your hands? So, anticipating that, here's this week's installment of what it's like having your first novel published, at least how I experience it.
The Closet of Discarded Dreams will release Sept. 1 and the process will begin. Then I'll wait. I've gotten past anxiety and some nervousness, and now a bit of excitement seems to be entering the picture. But it will take more time for me to hold something physical in my hand, turn the pages, find the typos, thrill in the fact that my first one reached print.
First though, it will not reach print. A few days after Release, ITunes and Amazon will have it in E-book and pdf formats. Then I'll be hustling to get digital review copies to the press, bloggers and whoever else I promised such. But I won't read it; maybe just scan it. I'm waiting for the paper.
Maybe a week after Release, it will be available as a paperback, but I still won't have it in my sweaty palms, though maybe I can get my first copy by paying for overnight delivery. As an immediate-gratification baby boomer, the process will no doubt take fokkin' forrrrrevvvverrrrr.
At least that could take my mind of all the pre-Release work I'm drowning in. Make up posters, business cards, bookmarks, drink coasters; make sure all the info is included, that there's no typos; design it and beg my daughter to get the files ready for the printers. Do a shoot with the same photographer daughter Marika, check proofs, decide on and send for stills. Etc. Here's what we came up with for a publicity photo. Comments appreciated.
Then daughter says, "You need Facebook and Twitter." "What for? I don't do that stuff."
"Everybody else does. Like your potential readers." Okay, so now I face and tweet, or at least my author self and the book do.
Then at the last minute somebody say, "Where's the QR code?" "What's that?" After a couple of hours of online googling, reading, navigating and back and forth questions to daughter, I don't completely understand, except that I know it's something the kids (under 50) do with their digital toys that I don't have because I can't afford the service they pay for as a "necessity." So I add the QR code, even though I doubt I'll ever use one, otherwise.
Here's what I'll likely send out today for a beer coaster. The idea that I heard about from another author is to take them to college bars, ask Mr. Nice Bartender if it would be alright to leave some around, and then hope the college boys--before they get too
borachos--will notice the graphic while they're waiting for their fourth beer, read it, and maybe scan the QR or head over to the book website.
The Closet of Discarded Dreams is filled with clones of celebrities and historical figures, Marilyn and Che included. So the graphic is a fit. In fact, in the book the two homestead one of the 9/11 monuments, debating, flirting and generally acting unlike anything you might imagine would happen if they'd met in their past real lives. I could be reading a passage from my protagonist's first encounter with the famous twosome, at Su Teatro or in Albu. If you can make it, I think you'll find that, among other things, more than entertaining. It's one part of the novel that I relish reading to myself.
Okay, one more week. In the meantime, you can check out the work my daughter and I have been taking care of, at the sites below. I'm not sure how it's all said but, tweet me, make me your friend, or friend me, like me, face me (or is it give me face?). And when you're done with that, send or connect or link or QR it to all your digital worlds. I love what we've created on the website and more is coming that your friends will probably like. Much more. Just not soon enuf for me.
book website: discarded-dreams.com FB: rudy.ch.garcia Twitter: DiscardedDreams
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG
A reading and book-signing of Rudy Ch. Garcia's
The Closet of Discarded Dreams
Saturday, Sept. 29, 2012, 2:00 p.m.
at the
National Hispanic Cultural Center
1701 4th Street SW
Albuquerque, Nuevo Mexico
For info: 505-246-2261
Some of my promotion efforts for my new book, like the above, have born fruit. I'm honored at the opportunity, but a little nervous at the prospect of the Hispanic Center's membership cringing when I utter the word Chicano. Hopefully the literary experience will be good for both of us. Their September events will be listed here soon.
By coincidence, I'm in the same publishing stage as Melinda Palacio who posted yesterday on La Bloga about turning in her final manuscript for her upcoming book of poetry, entitled How Fire Is a Story Waiting. I too just turned in the final for my upcoming novel, The Closet of Discarded Dreams. Dos frijoles in a pod?
By an even greater coincidence, Melinda graced our patio in Denver this past week at a small gathering of writers, artists and familia. In her post Melinda wrote how she preferred live readings and we were treated to a sampling of both her work and her voice. It wasn't the sing-song rendition that some poets perform, it was more hearing descriptions of thought and feeling from the poetess' own mouth. Four poems representing the book's four sections gave us a great experience of the literary lyrics in her book. I highly recommend not only buying it, but seeing and hearing her in person. Melinda was a delight.
With all the work preparatory to my book being released in September, my head and days seem to be filled with book business, if not the literary. And with little prospects for employment this next school year, my life seems to be transforming into something like the writer's life, albeit with little to no income to support it.
Last week on my front patio the Friday evening, end-of-week cervezas turned into a discussion about the of starting one's own publishing company to distribute one's novels. Manuel Ramos, Pocho Joe of KUVO La Raza Rocks fame (that you can stream on-line here), myself and a neighbor who's completed a novel batted around this idea, ending with an agreement to agree that every novelist should decide his own path. Goes to show you how deeply cervezas can uncover the ultimate truth.
And one morning this week, an aspiring author and I traded our entries for Esquire Magazine's 79-word story contest. (No entry fee, great prize and only a couple of weeks left to enter.) This was no reading out loud experience, but instead a process of reading each other's work to ourselves several times. Some authors prefer not to undertake this sharing, but I sometimes find it beneficial, as happened that day.
My initial promotion was a great success. The first 25 autographed, monogrammed and numbered copies of my novel have been spoken for. I now know I'll sell at least that many the first week it's out. About mid-September or earlier when it's available, I'll have to aim for 26. Possibly even more.
Over on The Closet of Discarded Dreams website, it's obvious that it's not easy to give away an autographed copy of a new book from a debut novelist. Maybe I made the rules too difficult, so I decided to change them to make it simpler. Below are the new ways to win, so I encourage La Bloga readers to enter.
Winning an autographed copy – now made easier!
Beginning Sept. 1st, readers can enter to win an autographed copy of The Closet of Discarded Dreams (continental U.S., only; an unsigned E-book or pdf for others), following its release in Sept., each week I’ll randomly pick one lucky person.
Here’s how: This novel is filled with dreams, nightmares, aspirations and passions that people have abandoned. DON’T send me one of yours. Instead just send 5 words or more that pertain to your dream or whatever. If you don’t have one, make it up; I won’t know the diff. Example: bicycle, monster, nighttime, my BFF, eating nachos. Simple, huh?
Fill out the “Contact the Author” form on the homepage, put “My dream” or nightmare, etc. in the Subject line. Send me your words in the Message box. I’ll blindly draw one winner. I’ll only announce the winner, not their words, unless you prefer to.
Feel free to pass this info along. And hurry before the Closet’s Door slams shut!
This week Facebook and Twitter sites should be ready for the book. Hope you "like" them.
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
You're at a writers' conference and you finally get to ask your question--what was it like working with your first editor?--and the panelists give you some minutes and maybe a good story or joke and then they go on because there's lots of others like you and lots more questions. Below I relate more of the details you wish others had given.
I just finished four days on the first round of editor's mark-ups of my debut novel The Closet of Discarded Dreams. First came the dread, the dread of neophyte novelist anxious about what the editor will find! My description would be belied by Neil Gaiman, so I'll let him talk:
"The first problem of any kind of even limited success [RG-like first novels] is the unshakable conviction that you are getting away with something, and that any moment now they will discover you. It's Imposter Syndrome, something my wife Amanda christened the Fraud Police.
 |
| Neil Gaiman |
Imposter Syndrome induced by the Fraud Police, in my case, my first editor, who maybe carries her own titanium clipboard, razor-edged. Would she bust me for mediocre prose, cardboard characters and MIA plot points? Would she run to the BIG editor and threaten to resign if I wasn't reassigned to someone younger who hadn't earned their clipboard, yet?
In the real world, you
can get busted by your story's editor. Earlier this year, one of my short stories came back ALL marked up, changed, critiqued, and probably had clipboard indentations that I didn't notice. At the end was a long note that described how many of the editor's hours and hours my weak writing had cost. I followed each of his notations and spent my hours and hours on rewrites, and to this date don't know if it will be published. So there.
Back to this editor-experience. I'm a fairly thick-skinned writer, given that it's gotten wrinkly, desiccated and flab-
uloso, so the editor's comments, suggestions and questions don't bother much. There's chingos of them, but, really, I expected more, and worse. Like something the Fraud Police might say, like "This book sucks." But not this time.
When I was less experienced, and thinner-skinned, so many ideas from someone else about MY writing would probably have raised the hairs on the back of my neck, gotten me to pull my feet up onto the chair in dread, or maybe made me rise off the chair to pace the whole patio, exclaiming, "That's not how I wrote it!" But I have more experience now--especially the experience of countless form-rejection letters that didn't provide opportunities to improve my prose.
That's exactly the point of editing, no? I didn't write it that way and somebody else who's providing a different perspective is telling me maybe I should have written it differently. They're also giving me one last chance to change, improve it.
So I spent hours in four days running my editor's gauntlet. Could I make it? I went thru and took care of the easy stuff, mostly punctuation and realizing things like, "Oh, that's not what that word means, exactly?"
In the next round I dealt with more significant edit remarks in the realm of, "Think about changing this word/phrase/sentence/paragraph because . . ." I've heard other authors talk about having a good editor, or their editor catching errors that the author didn't. I get to realize what that means and I go with the flow. Mostly.
Then I'm done, but only with my editor's eagle-eye catches. I have one saving round yet to tackle: what did the editor, and me before that, miss that somebody should have caught? To salvage my POWER, CONTROL, PERSONAL WORTH and prove to the world that this is MY stuff. This sounds somewhat like a passage from
The Closet of Discarded Dreams hero's suffering. It actually wasn't that melodramatic, but a bit of that sensation was there. And of course I do find stuff. And work into the late night, patio lights fixated on me, but my vision blurring from the moonlight, my wizard-brain and writer-soul in the flow 'cause this is what writers do, until it's . . . all . . . fixed. I gotta quit my day job! Oh, that's right--I don't have one!
Al final, I sent off the revisions yesterday. Await her final verdict. Hope it's close. Close to perfect is what some might wish for. I just want close to finished. Not because it's too boring or tiresome or demanding of a process. Because it's no different than raising a son or daughter, or a lot like putting the last layer of shellac on a carpentry project. I need to say
Finis and let the work stand on its own two or four legs, as the case may be. A writer's passion is to write--not linger and lounge and homestead a work--and then move on to new writing.
At this point, initial reaction from the editor is very positive. I'll get finals back from her tomorrow. Then, in some days, BIG editor will go over it. And the last round will begin. That's what I get for writing a novel, no? For wanting
el mundo to see it.
Qué no? Plus, at least so far, it was a much less agonizing experience than I would have imagined.
Then I'll be ready for: What new thing should I start writing? So I can get edited, again.
Esperamos. . .
Es todo, hoy,RudyG
Rudy Ch. Garcia's alternate-world epic recounts a Chicano's experience going through worse than his first editor, but maybe not as
bruto as your own as a
latino in
Gringolandia. The Closet of Discarded Dreams will be released Sept. 1 But
read this before you buy it.
rambling update on debut novel by Rudy Ch. Garcia
My head's spinning, there's not enough time, I don't know where to look next. Welcome to the wonderful world of first-time published novelist getting ready for the BIG day.
You can read about my debut novel
here and about some of my prep work
here.
Like I said, my head's spinning. I want everything to be perfect, timely, on time, and as much of a success as it can be. At the same time, not everything is in my control. Luckily, I have friends, acquaintances and contacts who know more than me.
Manuel Ramos, author of several novels, authors and poetesses Lisa Alvarado and Melinda Palacio are just some helping me navigate this episode in my lit life that comes only once. First novel. Debut. Book signings with audiences who will read the bared revelations of this writer. Scary? Nerve-wracking? No, I've got too much prep work that's muscling in on all my time and not allowing for that much true feelings.
Again, luckily, I've also got supporters and friends and family who're helping me with setting up a book tour, speaking, interviewing engagements. I couldn't do it alone, otherwise.
For those of you who anticipate your first book-length MS getting published, I can't tell you how it will affect you. For me, it's mostly a blur.
When I tell someone new about the book, they go, "I bet you're feeling great." It goes in una oreja and out the other. I know I should be feeling that, maybe I will be when I stand in front of my first audience to conduct a reading. Vamos a ver.
I've had to research the Internet, blogs, publications, and contacts and found surprising things. For instance, I'm going to attempt to focus people's buying the book. For the first month of Sept., I'm aiming for the Denver bestseller list. Why?
Because bookstores in other parts of the country, book reviewers of major publications and media gente look at such numbers. If The Closet of Discarded Dreams can make the Top 5 for one week in Denver, it will get noticed, possibly, nationally. It might get reviewed. I might be interviewed. Etc. You can help me accomplish this.
So, that's why I entitled this post the way I did. Don't buy, don't pre-order, don't go for it until you hear where and when. It's a small window, making a bestseller list. Even harder with a first novel.
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by Rudy Ch. Garcia
For varied reasons, when I was growing up in San Anto, one thing set our home off from the others--we read science fiction. My father--the cabrón--assumedly was the precursor of this, though I can't say about my abuelos. The reading of sci-fi (yeah, I know some authors hate the term) continued long after we kicked el cabrón bruto's ass out of the house and began a semi-nomadic life through shanties and the projects. I kept the tradition alive.
I remember when and how I acquired the bug, the one time our sire read us a short story called The Rag Thing. Me and the others were all curled up in the bed with him and listening to this crazy dishrag that turned into a monster and ate the whole town. Actually, the cabrón stopped before the ending and never finished it for us. But we wanted to know how it turned out, so I became the reader from my siblings. Among other genres, I continue reading sci-fi to this day.
At some point in the past I decided to try mi pluma at getting something published. It finally happened this year when cyberpunk founder Rudy Rucker, Sr. accepted the story Last Call for Ice Cream on his personal webzine at Flurb.net.
Here's how Rucker described it:
"Rudy Garcia’s Last Call for Ice Cream is a hypnotic stew of spanglo slanguage, wry and funny, with a special surprise in every sentence, and a renegade view of life in these United States."
Now, when Rudy Rucker likes one of your stories, in the sci-fi world that's a gigantic plus. When your story is rife with "spanglo slanguage," it's a bigger deal because we know how hard it is for the mainstream lit world to accept "latino lit."
El cabrón is dead and can't read the story and there's no doubt some Freudian slivers to this whole thing in my life and this post, but let's set that aside.
When I read the following review of my story, I got surprised, and, sure, offended somewhat:
"The issue ends with Last Call for Ice Cream by Rudy Ch. Garcia, a rambling piece about a guy trying to write a vidscript. It has so much slang that it becomes tiresome very quickly." [by Sam Tomaino]
I guess Tomaino didn't like it much, though I don't know if the slang he refers to is the spanglo slanguage or the English terms I invented. Not to accuse him of monolinguistic prejudice, I put the vato's critique into the realm of no le cai, because to some people maybe the story is "tiresome."
The incident got my brain clicking, wanting to explore some old questions in new ways.
Do Chicanos/latinos read sci-fi? How much, how many? Why don't more? How many are writing sci-fi? Should more latinos be writing it? Why don't we have a bronce version of the Black Science Fiction Society or afroamerican sci-fi mags? Is there some significance to the answer of any of these?
Consider this only the beginning of a series to explore these and other questions that I haven't imagined. I welcome input from anyone--writers, readers, non-latinos, aliens--to see what new directions we might give the topic.
And if you want to add the either side of the critique of my first accepted sci-fi story, make certain you mention Garcia or Rucker, depending on which Rudy you're referring to.
Es todo, hoy
RudyG
I'm an unemployed elementary bilingual teacher in Denver and have gone through three interviews in as many weeks. No hay mucho trabajo. You know--the U.S. economy, cutbacks, educators not highly valued, yet highly criticized.
I've gotten the usual questions in those interviews, some about teaching, some about problematic situations. But I've always wondered why I'm never asked what is it that I like about teaching 6-7 year-olds. Should an interview committee ever ask, I don't know that I'd use the following as the answer.
I miss being a child. My brain misses the environment where it can properly best function--the age of 6. My mind waxes nostalgic for the times when wonderment about the world took priority over possession of material things. Teaching six-year-olds is as close as I can get to re-experiencing that.
Today material needs will hog my time: getting the outside of the house painted, instructing the electrician on details, buying this and that to prevent the house from going into some entropic sinkhole.
As I head to those duties, below I share with you a piece I wrote trying to put my head into that of a child's, attempting to understand how he might see our disciplinary attitudes from his imaginary world. The conversations herein, I hear all the time--parents giving their child innocuous instructions that make me wonder what makes the child persist. Hope you enjoy it.
A Grain of Life
As the four-year-old spread two gnarled fingernails to drop bits of gravel, one after another--their release precisely aimed and timed such that each wouldn't hinder the coming to rest of the last grain he'd deposited--in fact, he reenacted what he considered his favorite-est act of creation: conceiving a planet, a single granule at a time. This Creator was content to labor as long as necessary forming his new world, even though it might take several thousand years. At the least.
"Now, what are you doing?"
"Nuttin," he said, using his hand to wipe sweat from his upper lip.
"You should try to appreciate this more, 'specially 'cause I had to ask for the day off."
He'd learned it rarely paid to attempt placating her with an intelligible or even partial explanation of the unfathomable; this wasn't the first time she'd interrupted his constructions. He'd begun other worlds, occasionally some boasting their own moon. All had entailed intricate manipulations in the microcosm, incredibly so. But nothing deterred his creating. After all, it was as deeply rooted in him as was, seemingly, her propensity to impede his work.
"You just put on the expensive Easter outfit Grandma gave you this morning, and you'll just get it dirty. How do you think that's gonna make her feel?"
The Creator couldn't respond because none of her concerns fit his realities. He'd played a minor role in donning the outfit; it had been selected for and put on him, as usual, accompanied by orders to stand there like a mannequin. Plus, clothes got dirty, something out of his control, inevitable, entropic. And, it was beyond even his powers to grasp how someone twenty times his age might feel about anything.
But her remark did remind him of this morning when the idea for a different type of world had occurred to him. It had come to him as he'd played with his cereal.
"Don't play with your cereal. Think of all the starving children who never play with their food."
The non sequitur hadn't disturbed him, as he'd grown inured to them. But his cereal-play had transported his mind to a place he'd never imagined. What about making a really different kind of world?--one where she might rememb
Posted on 12/12/2009
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What's all below doesn't directly reflect the above title, but it came to mind as I composed this.
"They don't want Us here."
The phrase comes up whenever racists, xenophobes, English-onlys and Limbaughers rear their little minds to fill the Internet, town halls or periodicals with opinions inevitably blaming immigrants (legal or otherwise), Spanish-speakers or just plain old U.S.-born, English speaking Chicanos for a laundry list of economic, social or educational failings in this country. On the surface, yes, it sounds, looks and smells like "They don't want Us."
I don't buy the argument, nor the victim-mentality it encourages, because it's a simple reaction to an immediate, specific situation, and no matter how accurate it may be, it fails to include the larger, more complex picture.
They problem lies in the signification They. Without proposing a new conspiracy theory or resurrecting a new one, we tend to throw They around to refer to distinct groups, when we might be better off always thinking of it as the distinct whole--U.S. society, meaning to include the predominant (and some fringe) groups, segments of the population, agencies, governmental bodies, body of law, philosophy and discourse.
When we include all that as They, I'd argue They do want Us here. Someone has to maintain the U.S. hotel toilets, motel bedrooms, Calif. gardens, housing developments and restaurant kitchens at a low enough wage and without drawing down on their tax contributions or good-old-Americans will go without. The food won't get harvested and delivered to those restaurant tables without Us. Manipulating the politics and repressing the economies of Latin America has kept that flow of all types of labor immigrants at an economically profitable level for most of our history.
And after we're here, They still want Us here. The racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric should be interpreted to mean, They want Us here as less-educated scapegoats, the kind that will suffer inhuman abuse in all the verbal, physical and psychological ways that America is so adept at devising. Our norms here are that it's okay to cut off funds to immigrant children, accuse their parents of being members of an ignorant race (sic), while at the same time employing Us at substandard wages without benefits, and even recruiting Us to fight the Iraq-Afghan-Pakistan War.
Homeland Security should erect a monstrous billboard on the border, facing northward, stating:
"Don't leave us. We need your labor and sweat and without you we might realize we're all fokked because we'd have to find new scapegoats and there are enough Muslims around to take all the abuse."
So, the next time your Chicano or mexicano friend says, "They don't want Us here," please try to educate them.
For a good exposure and a set of some real moronic responses, go to "Most Oregon schools slow to get English learners proficient" to see how the Oregon government thinks "punishing" school districts for under serving English language learners can be best implemented by providing even less money for that.
To read about a state notorious for never having understood how to educate Us (Chicano and mexicano kids), and where for years teachers have fought against the myopic standards-based CSAP exam, go to Colorado's new educational standards stress strategic thinking. Dumping the old one doesn't mean a new one will be any better, but th
[Third installment of what I call a quasi-vision quest. Read first installment here and the previous one here.]
Except for Manchas's taking a crap on the way back down to the trailhead, our descent's uneventful. I wonder how he managed to take one, since he'd barfed up a stomach-full earlier. At least whatever he might have gotten from the pump water hasn't plugged him up. I assume he's tougher than me and certainly don't want our adventure cut short because of my dog's possibly daintier constitution; friends might say I used him as an excuse.
Repeatedly, as we retraced our steps down the trail, in the back and sometimes the front of my mind is one thing: bears. I'd been told they and the rarer cougar had been sighted in the area, but some of that might have been tourist-luring hearsay. Yes, bears make it even into Denver suburbs, and every few years a cougar wanders down our I-70 greenbelt, but we're to blame for pushing them out of their native habitat, which is where Manchas and I now walk. So, they probably won't be mauling us cause they've left to go malling.
I don't know if others "suffer" similarly, if it's just "racial memory" homo sapiens carries that surfaces in our bear-dreams, but over the years bear dreams always disturb my sleep more than my falling-dreams, no matter I've never seen one outside a zoo or circus, the kinds of places I no longer frequent. In any event, as we enter a heavily canopied trail sector, I find myself looking into the forest depths for bear. During the remainder of the trip, I'll continue doing this.
Park literature and my readings swear that bears are not aggressive unless provoked or accompanied by cubs, I assure myself, so I only need worry about the latter case, right? But in fact what worries me is that I keep reassuring myself. Where's that come from? As a sapient--and a relatively emotionally stable one--I should be capable of setting worry aside, given I've at least read considerable amounts about bear. I'm not ignorant. However, my head fails to function accordingly.
When I'm not searching forest shadow for momma and baby bear, I scan for scat, even though I can't differentiate between bear, cougar or velociraptor poop, other than possibly by size. More "racial memory" from millions of years prior to evolving into the sapiens species? Or do bears from past dreams represent more than introspection about my emotions, my personality? These cute questions keep entering my head, keep pushing other thoughts aside, making me question whether I can guide my thinking toward revelations that will indeed lead to, if not a real vision, at least considerable relief from my muddled, too familiar ways of thinking. When I ask Manchas if he's afraid of bears, I realize I ask the ridiculous; bears normally fear and avoid his type.
On the other hand, cougars don't; Manchas's type is traditional cougar cuisine. They're known to lure a dog away from others to where they ambush them. A friend of mine from Boulder raises Australian cattle dogs, and earlier this year the rest of his hounds brought him all that was left of one a cougar had cornered: its rolling head came to a stop at his feet. This is why I keep Manchas leashed all our time here. Despite his high intelligence--for a dog--he would run off after a big cat, thinking nothing about the difference in size from our pet felines back home. And I don't want him winding up like my friend's dog. After all, it was Manchas's mom.
Blogger Alice left a comment on my first installment of this venture: "Make sure your location is known." I take her advice and write a note I leave on the truck floorboard concerning where we're headed. I can't help leaving a potential last joke, though not my best ever: "If anything happens to me, I assume the dog will drag back my remains."
As prepared as we can get, the two of us veer off the trail, making our way up. Passersby below, peer up, possibly wondering what the hell we're doing. I try not to think the same. Despite not being as steep as a direct climb, the hill's pitch promises to be a challenge. The backpack's relatively light, the heaviest contents, the quart and a half of water. Crackers don't weigh much. Manchas's food does, which reminds me of La Bloga readers who advised not to put him on restricted intake; they're not here to carry it. It's mostly soil underfoot here and pine needles galore, but navigable, nevertheless. At least for the first few hundred feet and first half hour. Until it steepens.
We're not quite alone yet. Chatter from the trail below fades, with an occasional barking dog or revving truck motor dimly reaching us. Manchas's paws point uphill, and he manages it easily. I have to switch to stepping diagonally to keep solid footing and not slide from loose soil and ground rock underfoot.
Perhaps an hour later we've got into a rhythm, if you want to call twenty-minute stretches of climb separated by five-minute rests a rhythm. Real climbers, nonsmokers and fit, young people could do it better, but we don't care because they're not here. Our hearts beat strong, or maybe are being beaten, and I nearly forget the bears. I do forget about the lower level of oxygen we're taking in.
Manchas's tongue hangs low enough to lap at the pine needles, so we stop for a drink; he wipes his up, I take a swallow, which will be my regular portion throughout. The word stamina pops into my head, something to get us to the top, I think. I assume the dog's got it, and I need to somehow magically find it in myself. It's there, it's what always gets me through my day, my job, larger home-maintenance I take on. I will not forget that word.
Another hour later our goal appears no closer than when we began. We've been in the midst of thin forest. My walking stick serves like someone stronger alongside to assist old me through trickier parts of the path. Actually, the paths I expected we'd follow never appear. Nothing large like deer have left markings about, at least that I can see. No matter we're only a few hundred feet from where thousands of tourists tread, the dog and I are the disturbers of nature here, the space between the pines untrammeled until we mar its pristineness.
One other evidence of disruption is a cave-niche where fires charred three large rocks to warm the rare visitor. The soot makes me realize we've passed many blackened trees bare of leaves. Lightening, I finally realize. We're high up the type of terrain where Colorado's electrical storms leave loving evidence of their might. Might they while we're here? Right now it's cloudless above. Wind's constant, though never howling or rocking us.
In our third hour, a different word pops up: deprivation, though I don't know why. The climb hasn't been so demanding as to consider quitting. And I don't feel "deprived." So whence the thought? We don't deprive ourselves of rest; if anything, we stop more frequently and longer each time. I'm not tempted to crack open the crackers; going without food for even twenty-four hours is no biggie. Workaholics, of which I am one, do it often, simply out of negligence. Deprivation. Will have to think about that more.
We're high enough that we begin to see the tops of other mountains, even though the pinnacle of ours still lies distant. Breathtaking--at least when I can manage to draw one. Panoramic--though Manchas might be unimpressed. Solitude--turns out there are no cabins or homes visible from here. A great quiet--what I least expect--no sound of teeming wildlife, except for one or two small birds at a time.
I don't know if it's the fourth hour or what. Have no watch. Wife Carmen "made me" bring her cell, to keep her apprised of our safety. I'd tried it below, but no service. I'll use it at the top because she "made me" promise. She didn't realize how the out-of-touch factor heightens one's sense of . . . danger? Word doesn't fit. But something like that. Anyway, the phone likely can tell me the time, but I don't want to know; would mar the "primitiveness" of our walkabout.
Trees thin even more. Now they make their hold between large and larger rocks that increase in numbers, sometimes blocking our way. Ten feet, fifteen in size, they become obstructions that make travel harder and harder. Again, unexpected. Our pace slackens, sometimes having to backtrack to find better route.
Manchas's short four legs no longer rate superior to my longer two. And where before he helped pull me, I now lead, although it's futile to tow him. Eighty pounds of him don't come up easily, especially where a step of rock measures a couple of feet. He's starting to enjoy this less, I can see.
No hawks, though one soars in the distance, few flying insects, just some really big ants that I'll need to make sure don't nest under our spot come nightfall. Gotta keep away from ticks as well, for his sake.
Whatever time it is, however long we've gone, the boulders wear at my stamina. They're almost all we walk on and over; dirt, gravel and needles have become more dangerous, when we do cross them. Manchas likes this even less. A couple of times he resists following or jumps when I'm not ready, and I barely save myself from falling by ramming my forearms against or over a rock. Both are soon well scratched and painful, though not enough to matter. Pain is our word here. Muscles ache, head's throbbing somewhat. Maybe it's the altitude, too.
My brain's superior to his in finding passable trail. His vision seeks paths within a few feet in front of him. Mine peers further, anticipating, calculating, better planning which to take. We two have been this for tens of thousands of years. I do better at it; it's one reason I don't wear the leash.
Twice, Manchas gives me a "no" look, determined. He will not attempt to climb this rock or that path I'm trying to convince him is the best available. I'm tempted to give in to picking him up, but know he does too well at learning new routines. If I do it once, I'm dead; he will make me do it even when not required. Both times I'm forced to invent a totally different path or tweak one into finer and finer increments that he'll accept.
When we reach the edge of a rise that's drained us for I don't know how long, the relief from seeing there's only one mountain above us--ours--feels as if we've emerged from hours in a lightless cavern. We're beat. The top of our mt. is almost in sight, just a few more hundred feet. But the boulders in front of us will definitely not let Manchas pass. The two of us have come as far as we'll get, today or any day, unless I carry him, somehow. Fat chance.
There's service here, so I call the wife to let her know we're here, and exclude any negative information, like about my forearms. We probably have a couple of hours to prepare for nightfall.
The dog eats, wipes out the water I give him. A good swallow for me; the larger canteen's half empty. Maybe we don't have enough. But at least stamina's no longer required; we simply have to sit. Danger seems irrelevant; nothing about. Deprivation remains a possibility.
The crags we came for aren't visible unless we reach the top. That may have to wait for another time. Their majesty below almost frightened, and I admit relief at not having to learn if I can stand watch with them for an entire night. That might test more than a vision suddenly facing me.
We gaze, we stare, and breathe. The opposing mountain's nearly covered with pine. Essentially, we stand above tree line. It's too quiet to believe. Questing for a vision will start in a while, I suppose. For now, some rest, a smoke, a break.
RudyG
such a packed-with-stuff-to-talk-about column! spinrad sounds like one of those deliberately obtuse tipos whose reductio ad absurdum needed to be juxtaposed with alexie's explanation. my friend magu (qepd) used to ask "can anglos do chicano art?" and the answer was, "why not? we've been doing anglo art our whole lives!" as i say, lots of stuff but that enough.
mvs
Great reporting there, Rudy. I shoulda been there, if only Yacatecuhtli could have provided funding. Maybe a blood sacrifice would have been necessary. I think the "Spanish strand" has had an effect -- Anglo scifiistas have been chattering about "diversity" in the social media for the past week! And for the record, my father was New Mexico Irish/Mexican, not a German immigrant. It's so hard to keep my family history straight . . . it keeps turning into weird legend and myth . . .
Thx, Sedano y Nesto. Your lineage correct, now.
RudyG
I absolutely do not fear you are 'caustic and unsocialized.' As I percieve it, you are jusifiably frustrated and angry. Please do not assign motivations to my behavior without consulting me first. I would do the same for you because I'm terrible at mind-reading. I suspect others are too. This is exactly the kind of thing that takes things in bad directions. I hear that you are frustrated. I hear that you feel you are not being heard. Those are very valid concerns.
My goal is to be an ally. My experiences of writing about Ireland's Troubles were an amazing education in how to do that. I'm learning more as I go, and while I can't promise I won't make mistakes--mistakes are how human beings learn best--I will promise to try my best not to repeat the same mistakes.
Now. The Magical Realism panel. I was uncomfortable because I felt the moderator's opening remarks as well as a number of her questions bordered on the inapropriate and were sometimes flat out insulting, and I was struggling with a way to respond to that without making an even bigger mess than it already was. As it turned out, I didn't say anything at all and I apologize for that. No excuses. I should've said something.
Excellent post, Rudy. I learned a lot on our two panels and also from this post. Thank you!
Derek
Thanks for the correction, Rudy.
If I may add to the reference to Cinco Punto Press "With roots on the U.S./Mexico border."
I eventually contacted a representative after having made several long distance calls in that effort. I was hoping to get my novel published in print. The representative answered the telephone with “Seen-ko Poon-toe Press.” I knew I was in trouble. She has not even bothered to pronounce the name of her outfit correctly.
Anyway, I began to tell her about my great Chicano novel with natural references to Méjico. She immediately interrupted the pitch of my synopsis with “no chance,” y “no chance.” y otro “no chance.” I did not get to finish by twenty-five-odd-word presentation. She ended the conversation by rudely telling me that I should mail her the first 10 pages, even though, she again added, “there is no chance.”
I then merely affirmed her instructions by stating, “First ten pages my mail?” Her response: “YES, WITH 45 CENT POSTAGE IN AN ENVELOPE!”
Why is this outfit called Cinco Punto Press? Heck, one book it promotes is a White-Black buddy story. Gee, this must be the one millionth time this plot has been used, ifn’ you count movies, TV, and books. And, as pointed out in the article, most of this outfit’s books are by Euro-Americans.
That’s why I won’t shed a tear for the end of the elitist publishing business as it now exists. E-Book publishing is hastening the demise.
Frankly, I found the representative at Seen-ko Poon-toe Press obnoxious and exceptionally discouraging.
And I ain’t sending her nothin’.
Correction: "YES, WITH 45 CENT POSTAGE ON AN ENVELOPE."
Un pasito at a time, that is how change will come...Here's an interesting article on a writer who took a huge leap and crossed that huge chasm... a Person of Color writing about another culture!
Interesting read http://www.policymic.com/articles/61987/the-one-thing-white-writers-get-away-with-but-authors-of-color-don-t
Rudy, thanks for sharing your blog, which I found very interesting. I well understand that your struggles and endeavors can be frustrating and that ethnic considerations may be adding to the usual torment of starting up (and maintaining) a writing career. I admire your steady perseverance!
Do try to keep it in perspective, though. Don't forget that Robert Silverberg entered publishing in an era of discrimination against Jews. And Jack Williamson was diagnosed as mentally ill for liking sci fi. And the women... I need only mention Alice Sheldon who had to publish as Jame Tiptree. And Delany and the gays. The most successful of these were the ones who learned to shrug a lot, to thicken the skin and to overwhelm others with the quality of their ideas and their stories and their prose.
I do not say this to minimize but to encourage! Science fiction has always been at the edge, exploring and tweaking assumptions. It is a source of solace to know that you WILL win. In some fields, quality overcomes preconceptions and SF is one of those. Alas, you never can predict how efficiently it will happen and sometimes bad luck or fashion can be harsh friction. But SF means well and has a conscience.
Tell great stories. Good luck and persevere! And glad to meet you.
With cordial regards,
David Brin
http://www.davidbrin.com
blog: http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/
twitter: https://twitter.com/DavidBrin
Thanks for the interesting post, Rudy.
You've done an excellent job showing there's a problem in the publishing industry.
What's the solution?
On a more personal level, as an author I think about this issue a lot. Authors are told to 'write what we know' and I live in Colorado and do a lot of work with folks from 'under-represented groups.' So, my fiction has a lot of educated, brilliant, talented people of many different backgrounds. Are my Chicanos 'Chicano' enough? I don't know. Am I misappropriating? I don't know.
But what's the alternative? White female middle-aged authors can only write about white female middle-aged characters?
I have to believe we're all essentially the same on the inside: we want to live and love and make a positive impact on the world...
Good luck with your quest.
Great issue!--Francisco
Rudy,your enthusiasm for writing and writers is inspiring, not jaded and totally youthful. Never lose that! Correction: the Latina editor said nothing about my writing, but said literary fiction was a hard sell and advised me to include more romance, which was her sense of what Latinas want to read. Like Ernest Hogan, my dad brought the O'Briant to the nuptials w/my Mexican mom. I suffered for that last name and threw in the Ramos to make my heritage clear w/o fear of bruising.
Thank you for taking the time to share your experiences and perspective. Made me feel a little downcast at the difficulties, but those obstacles aren't new to me or other Chicano/as. We press on.
Anon: I laughed about Cinco Puntos press in the comments, and scratched that place off my list.
Terrific experience, Rudy. I attended my first con, and my first WorldCon, in Denver in the 1970s. I received registration as a first place prize for a science fiction story I wrote, "Midnight at the Lariat Lounge."
As with every other aquarium, you have to look for inspiration where you can find it. I will write more after I read your second post.