liz gonzalez con sus perritos |
I came to know the Los Angeles Chicano/a literary scene back in the 1990's when it was bustling with some pretty incredible artists. I still have a clear image of seeing Luis Alfaro on stage for the first time. He was roller skating in a circle while reciting poems about his father and about growing up in Pico Union. I was mesmerized by Alfaro and his work, as I was by other local artists. Marisela Norte and Gloria Alvarez were two of the first poetas I ever saw read live in LA. Seeing these strong, brown mujeres at a mic, soltando sus poemas was (and still is) empowering, and it fueled my own desire to delve into and develop my own poetic voice. Another significant artistic influence of that time was a literary group called ¿Y Qué Más? This group was my first exposure to a Chicana/Latina women's literary collective, and it was the first time I ever heard la liz gonzalez read her poetry.
What I have always appreciated about liz' work is that it does not fit neatly into boxes. As a fourth generation Chicana who was born and raised in San Bernardino County, she brings into her poetry and prose the complexities of her identity, challenging assumptions of what it means to be Chicana. For example, in her poem, "The Four Food Groups in Grandma's Summer lunches," gonzalez describes some of the meals made by her maternal abuelita. gonzalez' words paint immediate pictures--thick slabs of spam fried in lard, canned spinach, and powered leche mixed with good old tap water.
My assumption upon first hearing and later reading this humorous poem was that perhaps la poor liz didn't grow up eating a lot of traditional Mexican food. However, this was just me jumping to quick conclusions, putting la liz into a box. Those quick lunches (that her grandmother made to avoid cooking in the summer heat) are only a glimpse of liz' cultural/culinary history. liz shares that actually she was raised eating tamales from scratch, "not the masa, but everything else was made from scratch. And I was also raised eating mole and drinking chocolate de la olla...My maternal grandmother cooked Mexican food for us on a regular basis when I was growing up." liz has another poem where she describes that same spam-frying abuelita getting down making buñuelos.
Even the label "fourth generation" has layers. liz' maternal great-grandparents both have roots in Mexico, but they grew up in San Bernardino. Her father, however, was a more recent immigrant who was raised on the Texas/Mexico border. "At seven, he picked cotton. At fourteen, he lived and worked with his family on a strawberry ranch in New Mexico. From what I understand, he did not go to school past ninth grade. When he died, he was a laborer at Kaiser Steel. I was three."
Language is another stratum. On the surface, liz hablar poco Espanish. Her attitude about this is complex. "If someone says I'm a coconut or not Chicana or not Mexi enough because I don't speak Spanish, I have an ¿y qué? attitude, but for the most part, I'm sorry I'm not fluent." Like many Mexicanos/Chicanos of their generation, liz' grandparents witnessed and experienced the discrimination that came with speaking Spanish in the U.S. "My grandparents advised my mother not to teach us Spanish because of segregation. It had recently been stopped, but they were still concerned. And when I tried to practice Spanish with Grandma, she told me she wanted to learn 'educated English'--the way I was being taught to speak in school--because she had to quit school so young, and having to leave school had broken her heart."
For the past 20 years, liz gonzalez has been sharing her poems and stories with audiences in California (and beyond). Last week I had the opportunity to interview liz about her writing, her teaching, her perceptions of Chican@ lit, and her current novel in progress. Here is a transcript of our online conversation and an excerpt from her novel at the end.
Shortly after I graduated from CSULA with a BA in 1993, I found myself longing for a Chicana/Latina arts community, a community I automatically had when I was a student. I contacted fellow alum Martin Hernandez and asked him if he knew of any Chicana or Latina art groups that were looking for members. Within a few months, Martin called and told me that some Chicanas he knew were starting a poetry collective. I had never written poetry, but I tore a couple of entries that looked like poems out of my journal and took them to the first meeting. Maria Cabildo, Adela Carrasco, Frankie Hernandez, Cathy Loya, Evangeline Ordaz, Michele Serros, and I became the Chicana poetry collective ¿Y Qué Más? That’s when the writing seed inside me sprouted. We workshopped and performed our poems, and the group introduced me to Lorna Dee Cervantes’s and Sandra Cisneros’s poetry. Before that, I hadn’t read any literature written by Chicanas or Latinas; it was powerful to learn that these Chicanas were expressing truths and validating their and our—Chicanas, women’s, Latinos…--voice, existence, and experiences. Michele Serros and Maria Cabildo told us they were participating in Michele T. Clinton’s Multicultural Feminist Workshop at Beyond Baroque Literary / Arts Center in Venice, near my studio apartment in Mar Vista. I started attending the workshop, and Beyond Baroque became my creative writing home.
You shared with me that you have been teaching writing for most of the years that you've been writing. How do you balance teaching writing and actually writing? Do these two things feed off each other or is there a burn-out effect?
Balancing teaching and writing hasn’t been easy for me. Before I went to grad school, when I was a receptionist at a 9-6, Monday through Friday job and mainly wrote poetry, I didn’t face any challenges with writing. For many of my teaching years, though, I suffered from frequent migraines, and would be woken by a severe headache most every morning. In addition, I’m a slow reader and writer. I love the composition students, but the energy it takes to teach in front of a classroom, grade papers, and lesson plan were taxing. I rarely had a day without schoolwork. After looking at text all day, I longed to go outside, take in some art or music, and not bury my face in more text, even though it was my own writing.
In recent years, I have lightened my teaching load, teaching only at two schools: composition at a community college and creative writing online through UCLA Extension Writers’ Program.
I really appreciated the posting you shared on FB by Daniel Peña, "Is Chicana/o Literature Dead? (A: No, not really): A Teacher's Ramblings" where the author discusses the complexities of defining Chicana/o literature today. Peña states, "Contemporary Chicana/o literature is simply the act of the Mexican diaspora writing ourselves into dignity. Not only in literary fiction or non-fiction but in Science Fiction too and Slam poetry and screenplays made for television--pretty much any genre or medium you can think of. Contemporary Chicana/o literature is not so much crystalized in a set canon as an ongoing vision under constant revision." Your thoughts in response to this as it pertains to you, the way you identify yourself, and your work?
Peña states that he asked his “academic and writer buddies” questions about what is Contemporary Chicano/a literature and that, “their responses were radically different, but if anything tied all of their answers together, it would be that definition.”
I agree with the conclusion Peña came to and am not surprised that his “buddies’” responses were so different because our experiences and tastes are so varied. While some will think a specific piece of Contemporary Chicano/a literature achieves “writing ourselves into dignity,” others might think that same piece degrades or stereotypes us. Because we are so diverse, some contemporary Chicano/a literature isn’t going to represent us or speak to us as individuals, and I think that’s okay as long as the work is well-intended and well crafted. Not all the work that’s out there speaks to me, but what’s important to me is that our wide range of voices and stories are read and seen.
You are currently working on a novel. How did you begin to make that transition from poetry to novel writing? How does one type of writing inform the other for you?
So is that your novel in progress, the one about your grandmother?
I put down what I call “Grandma’s novel” in 2007 because I didn’t have the energy to conduct and digest the research I wanted to incorporate into the book and to weave a well-crafted work that does Grandma’s stories and the history justice. At the time, I was teaching composition, literature, and creative writing courses at three schools and suffering from frequent migraines. I decided to write another novel as my first novel, one that would be easier to write and that would help me hone my craft. Fate happened again during my writing residency at Macondo Foundation’s Casa Azul in San Antonio the same year. Every night before I went to bed, I reviewed a file filled with drafts of poems and short stories that I brought with me to inspire a novel idea. After reviewing the file, I put a wish out in the universe: “Tell me what to write when I wake up tomorrow morning.” The third or fourth morning, a bad-baby-poet-poem I had written when I was in ¿Y Qué Más? started developing itself into a story. I had to jump out of bed and onto the laptop to catch what was being dictated to me. My new novel was born.
I love that a "bad-baby-poet-poem" was the seed to your current novel. Can you give us a synopsis?
It’s 1974 in San Bernardino, California. Fifteen-year-old Rachel Quintero’s father disappeared with his pregnant girlfriend, leaving Mama, Rachel’s mother, with all the bills and no child support for Rachel and her younger sister Natalie. Mama has to sell Rachel’s beloved childhood home in San Bernardino and move the family to a cramped townhouse in nearby Muscat (a fictional town). Natalie finds comfort and stability with her Grandmother and best friend; both live in the old neighborhood. Rachel and Mama are like loose helium filled balloons caught in a breeze, flying aimlessly. Rachel struggles to find her grounding as she starts high school where she doesn’t know anyone, and she longs to be close to Mama again. Adjusting to being an abandoned wife and newly single mother, Mama reacts by drinking and going to happy hour after work and a nightclub on Friday nights. Rachel is the protagonist, but the novel follows Rachel and Mama on their journey. For me, it’s a like a Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Dazed and Confused, and Thirteen with people of color and funk and R&B added to the rock soundtrack.
la liz was cool enough to share a short excerpt from that working novel with us at La Bloga. Many thanks liz gonzalez for taking the time to share some of your insights on writing with our readers. Best wishes to you estimada escritora, and we look forward to seeing and reading both of your upcoming novels.
“You mean wonder-why-it-doesn’t-kill-you bread?” Minerva holds her sandwich up in the air. “This bread will save your life. Nutrients, man. Nutrients.”
Photo by Eliot Sekular, Lummis Day 2014 |
You're so right, April. Allowing ourselves to believe in our possibilities is what brings them into being. Affirmations bring the future into the now.
I went to the fabulous LA conference twice a long time ago, and now that I'm bringing writing back into my life, I'd like very much to go again. Next year, I hope!
Maybe one of my affirmations should be: I AM ATTENDING THE SCBWI NATIONAL CONFERENCE. :-)
What an inspiring post, April. Thank you! My writing hope is much the same as yours was years ago, and I am going to take your suggestion, write it down, and say it to myself. Happy Poetry Friday! Next year I attend SCBWI in California too.
A.
Thanks for recommending the 39th annual SCBWI International Summer Conference in LA, April!
I know first-hand: the experience is Life-changing IF you are someone who wants to create children's books.
For those lucky enough to be attending the conference, especially for the first time, my Networking Tips will soon be available on SCBWI's website. Just click on the LA Conference link.
Thank you, too, April, for sharing your affirmations and encouraging us to create our own.
For anyone attending a conference, it helps to carry a piece of paper that bears the following words: "I am a writer - a person who writes."
We sometimes forget that wonderful Truth about ourselves during understandably overwhelming and thus sometimes doubt-filled Conference Moments.
Thanks, April. I had heard that before about goals, but had forgotten it. You have inspired me to go back and do this again with new goals related to writing for children.
Laura Evans
all things poetry
Yes, yes, I tried to link to Esther's wonderfully helpful "CONFESSIONS AND SECRETS OF A VETERAN SCBWI CONFERENCE-GOER
(Or, Do As I Say, Not As I Did" with the help of the SCBWI staff, but they did not get it up in time for this post. I recommend it!
And my affirmation about being less mess (wait...let's make that a positive: about being ORGANIZED and TIDY)has also been powerful. And it's all connected to writing, isn't it?
Thanks for deciding to post this piece today. I'm off to take your wise advice. Generating affirmations - right now!
Thanks for affirming the affirmations, Toby! And yes, Carmela--that is an EXCELLENT affirmation--for you and maybe for others ~
And yay for creating your affirmations right now, Amy, Laura and Elaine!
Affirmations--something I can really use to get me through those low moments or when I'm really tired after a day at work and the couch looks more inviting than my laptop. Thanks, April!
Go, Ann--affirm away!
Go, Ann--affirm away!