WEBVTT NOTE Created by CaptionSync from Automatic Sync Technologies www.automaticsync.com 00:00:00.076 --> 00:00:03.606 align:middle >> So if you want to get up and leave, do so. 00:00:04.966 --> 00:00:11.546 align:middle I'd like to take a few minutes for comments, questions, anything. 00:00:14.526 --> 00:00:15.596 align:middle Somebody in the back. 00:00:16.516 --> 00:00:22.636 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:00:23.136 --> 00:00:23.956 align:middle The what poem? 00:00:24.471 --> 00:00:26.471 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:00:26.926 --> 00:00:27.786 align:middle Mujer cacto. 00:00:28.636 --> 00:00:29.526 align:middle Cactus woman? 00:00:30.516 --> 00:00:38.556 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:00:39.056 --> 00:00:39.976 align:middle Yes. 00:00:40.516 --> 00:01:01.076 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:01:01.576 --> 00:01:07.166 align:middle I think that there's various registers that I write in and there's some, 00:01:07.166 --> 00:01:15.226 align:middle some Spanish that is very working class rural Spanish with a lot of -- Of what I call -- 00:01:15.226 --> 00:01:21.216 align:middle What people call pochismos and also pachuco talk, slang talk? 00:01:21.416 --> 00:01:28.406 align:middle And then there's other poems where I try to be a little more neutral in language 00:01:28.406 --> 00:01:35.196 align:middle and I think this is a point where I try to be -- To speak more of a regular Spanish 00:01:35.906 --> 00:01:37.646 align:middle and I'm not sure that I succeeded. 00:01:38.956 --> 00:01:43.746 align:middle And there were -- I spoke for the writing class. 00:01:44.436 --> 00:01:47.176 align:middle Was it yesterday or -- Last night. 00:01:47.176 --> 00:01:55.126 align:middle And this was one of the questions that was asked and I feel like there's various influences fore 00:01:55.126 --> 00:02:00.886 align:middle and foremost, it is the storytelling tradition that I grew up in, where my grandmothers 00:02:00.886 --> 00:02:04.786 align:middle and relatives and aunts would tell these stories. 00:02:04.786 --> 00:02:09.676 align:middle Both of my grandmothers spoke Mexican Spanish, which I don't -- 00:02:10.486 --> 00:02:12.896 align:middle That's not my natural way of speaking. 00:02:13.356 --> 00:02:23.946 align:middle They spoke Mexican Spanish very -- My mother and my father speak Chicano Spanish, 00:02:24.596 --> 00:02:27.496 align:middle but with more of the Mexican in it. 00:02:28.326 --> 00:02:36.226 align:middle I speak more of a Tex-Mex Spanglish, street, pachuco, Chicano Spanish. 00:02:37.066 --> 00:02:40.456 align:middle Ok. So I was influenced by all those registers when I was growing up. 00:02:41.206 --> 00:02:46.186 align:middle When I went to school, everything was English literature, American literature, 00:02:46.436 --> 00:02:50.716 align:middle Tom Dick and Jane, See, Spot, Run. 00:02:51.156 --> 00:02:55.366 align:middle You know, all the - 00:02:58.046 --> 00:03:03.126 align:middle Writers that are in the canon right now that are American and English and European. 00:03:03.866 --> 00:03:13.436 align:middle And when I was teaching, when I was in the latter part of the sixties, finishing up my B.A., 00:03:13.996 --> 00:03:19.966 align:middle was when I first started reading Chicanos and Spanish Literature. 00:03:20.676 --> 00:03:22.766 align:middle That's when it was introduced to me. 00:03:22.766 --> 00:03:28.266 align:middle Late in my life I was -- So I read Cortázar and I read Lorca 00:03:28.266 --> 00:03:31.676 align:middle and I read anything I could get my hands on. 00:03:31.676 --> 00:03:35.256 align:middle There's was very few Spanish stuff written, 00:03:35.256 --> 00:03:38.366 align:middle I mean there was very few Chicano stuff written in Spanish. 00:03:39.306 --> 00:03:43.896 align:middle Miriam Bornstein is one of the few that writes entirely in Spanish. 00:03:44.406 --> 00:03:50.976 align:middle I have some stories that are written entirely in Tex Mex as, you know, Chicano Spanish. 00:03:51.686 --> 00:03:53.666 align:middle But that's, you know, another register. 00:03:54.636 --> 00:03:58.356 align:middle Ok. So then I had all these [? pools ?] and not only did I have, you know, 00:03:58.566 --> 00:04:10.186 align:middle the Spanish that I heard growing up, but now I had the Western European literary influences 00:04:10.896 --> 00:04:15.706 align:middle and the Spanish, the Latin American and the Spanish influences. 00:04:16.596 --> 00:04:21.296 align:middle Still later, I read people like Elena Poniatowska, a Mexican writer. 00:04:21.866 --> 00:04:26.466 align:middle And Hasta no verte, Jesús mío made a great impression on me 00:04:26.466 --> 00:04:35.636 align:middle because this white middle-class Mexican woman, Jewish and French who emigrated to Mexico 00:04:35.636 --> 00:04:44.976 align:middle at the age of eight, took the life story of a peasant woman who was in the -- 00:04:47.416 --> 00:04:47.896 align:middle ¿Qué guerra era? 00:04:47.896 --> 00:04:49.946 align:middle It was the Revolutionary War. 00:04:50.536 --> 00:04:54.546 align:middle The, you know, the time of Pancho Villa, etcetera, etcetera. 00:04:55.776 --> 00:05:01.166 align:middle Elena Poniatowska took her words and made them into this novel Hasta no verte, Jesús mío, 00:05:01.506 --> 00:05:09.226 align:middle using the dialect of this working class peasant woman 00:05:12.586 --> 00:05:17.366 align:middle and I don't know what the -- If the translation was successful or not, but it really affected me 00:05:17.366 --> 00:05:19.606 align:middle because for the first time here was a Mexican writer 00:05:19.606 --> 00:05:24.446 align:middle who was using a Spanish that we use in South Texas. 00:05:25.586 --> 00:05:31.616 align:middle And maybe the Spanish is a class thing, the different registers are a class thing. 00:05:32.096 --> 00:05:37.466 align:middle And what I had run up against in the University was a pure Castilian, you know? 00:05:37.656 --> 00:05:42.566 align:middle We wouldn't touch Chicano Spanish with a 10 foot pole. 00:05:43.486 --> 00:05:45.786 align:middle And get out of my face, you pocha. 00:05:46.736 --> 00:05:49.746 align:middle You know, you're contaminating the Spanish language. 00:05:50.346 --> 00:05:51.136 align:middle That attitude. 00:05:52.936 --> 00:06:00.346 align:middle So and then, I had to take English classes like I was talking in How to Tame a Wild Tongue, 00:06:00.896 --> 00:06:06.526 align:middle that I was forced to take linguistic courses, two of them, when I was doing my B.A., 00:06:06.526 --> 00:06:09.276 align:middle so that they would erase my accent. 00:06:10.576 --> 00:06:20.146 align:middle The sole purpose of these two required courses was so that the Chicana accent could be erased. 00:06:20.756 --> 00:06:26.946 align:middle Ok. So somehow, you know, I had all these pressures on me. 00:06:26.946 --> 00:06:28.926 align:middle Voices saying you should write this way. 00:06:28.926 --> 00:06:29.806 align:middle This is incorrect. 00:06:29.806 --> 00:06:30.796 align:middle Don't write that way. 00:06:30.946 --> 00:06:32.296 align:middle No, no, no, write this way. 00:06:32.356 --> 00:06:33.976 align:middle That way is like too -- 00:06:36.616 --> 00:06:37.276 align:middle -- vernacular. 00:06:37.276 --> 00:06:37.546 align:middle No, no, no. 00:06:37.546 --> 00:06:39.456 align:middle Don't write that way, that's too academic. 00:06:39.456 --> 00:06:40.906 align:middle No, no, no. 00:06:43.106 --> 00:06:46.636 align:middle So I thought I'm going to write the way I speak. 00:06:47.396 --> 00:06:49.676 align:middle I'm going to write the way I think. 00:06:49.676 --> 00:06:53.816 align:middle I'm going to write the way my brain and my mind process reality. 00:06:53.816 --> 00:06:56.846 align:middle I'm going to -- I'm going to switch codes just like I do in my head. 00:06:57.586 --> 00:06:59.406 align:middle So these are all the worlds I go into. 00:07:00.176 --> 00:07:07.386 align:middle And this particular poem, I'm not sure -- I'm not sure. 00:07:07.576 --> 00:07:11.646 align:middle I'm not sure what influenced it most, you know? 00:07:12.136 --> 00:07:17.866 align:middle The word order in English or the word order in Spanish. 00:07:18.186 --> 00:07:24.806 align:middle All I know is that my word order is in a combination of the two. 00:07:25.086 --> 00:07:26.726 align:middle Does that make sense to you? 00:07:28.476 --> 00:07:35.526 align:middle But I thought that this poem was more Castilian than it was Chicano Spanish. 00:07:36.006 --> 00:07:36.616 align:middle Was I wrong? 00:07:37.596 --> 00:07:37.786 align:middle No. 00:07:38.516 --> 00:07:48.546 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:07:49.046 --> 00:07:50.696 align:middle Yes, la mujer cacto. 00:07:51.516 --> 00:08:06.826 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:08:07.326 --> 00:08:07.976 align:middle Yeah, you what? 00:08:07.976 --> 00:08:08.486 align:middle I'm sorry. 00:08:08.486 --> 00:08:09.816 align:middle I couldn't hear you. 00:08:10.516 --> 00:08:12.646 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:08:13.146 --> 00:08:14.286 align:middle No, I myself. 00:08:14.786 --> 00:08:21.236 align:middle You know how -- I turn -- I do a lot of my translations from the Spanish into the English, 00:08:21.276 --> 00:08:24.946 align:middle but if the rhythm doesn't feel right or the images don't feel right, 00:08:25.626 --> 00:08:27.876 align:middle somebody else could translate it but I can't. 00:08:29.176 --> 00:08:35.716 align:middle Like, for example, I translated En el nombre de todas las madres que han perdido hijos en 00:08:35.716 --> 00:08:36.146 align:middle la guerra. 00:08:36.146 --> 00:08:36.826 align:middle That was fine. 00:08:36.826 --> 00:08:44.756 align:middle I translated El mar de repollo in the English worked fine, but in this poem I couldn't. 00:08:45.276 --> 00:08:49.396 align:middle Something in me couldn't translate but maybe somebody else could. 00:08:50.516 --> 00:08:58.676 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:08:59.176 --> 00:08:59.916 align:middle ¿Mujer cacto? 00:09:01.516 --> 00:09:03.646 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:09:04.146 --> 00:09:07.836 align:middle No, that was one that came out entirely in Spanish. 00:09:10.736 --> 00:09:11.526 align:middle You know what? 00:09:11.526 --> 00:09:15.026 align:middle That happens when I'm trying to write theoretical stuff 00:09:16.126 --> 00:09:19.776 align:middle because I don't have the vocabulary to write theory in Spanish. 00:09:20.796 --> 00:09:23.816 align:middle I will write the Spanish as though it were English. 00:09:24.096 --> 00:09:26.976 align:middle And so, I'm translating from English into -- 00:09:29.556 --> 00:09:30.176 align:middle That happens. 00:09:30.176 --> 00:09:33.616 align:middle I've done that, but not in this particular poem. 00:09:35.256 --> 00:09:36.946 align:middle But it sounds to you like that. 00:09:37.516 --> 00:09:45.856 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:09:46.356 --> 00:09:48.276 align:middle So anybody else agree or disagree? 00:09:53.626 --> 00:09:55.966 align:middle Maybe it was in an English space then. 00:10:01.496 --> 00:10:04.356 align:middle Sometimes I don't even know if I'm doing it in one language 00:10:04.476 --> 00:10:06.586 align:middle or the other, to tell you the truth. 00:10:07.186 --> 00:10:08.906 align:middle Because it's such a -- 00:10:09.916 --> 00:10:10.976 align:middle >> The tense that you wrote it in. 00:10:13.276 --> 00:10:14.816 align:middle >> The tense that I wrote it in? 00:10:15.516 --> 00:10:24.966 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:10:25.466 --> 00:10:26.256 align:middle That's interesting. 00:10:26.256 --> 00:10:27.556 align:middle I'll think more about that. 00:10:27.556 --> 00:10:28.566 align:middle You may be right. 00:10:32.226 --> 00:10:36.816 align:middle All I know is that I didn't want to translate it or couldn't or was blocked. 00:10:36.996 --> 00:10:42.646 align:middle One more, one more, one more person and then we will shut the house down. 00:10:48.106 --> 00:10:49.416 align:middle Did somebody else have their hand up? 00:10:56.176 --> 00:10:58.016 align:middle Come on, somebody be brave. 00:10:59.366 --> 00:11:00.686 align:middle Put a closure to this. 00:11:03.216 --> 00:11:05.826 align:middle >> I just wanted to say that I have a friend 00:11:06.576 --> 00:11:09.436 align:middle that [inaudible] your books and a couple of other books. 00:11:09.436 --> 00:11:14.106 align:middle She said she can understand enough because that's the way I speak. 00:11:14.136 --> 00:11:14.226 align:middle And -- 00:11:14.256 --> 00:11:14.976 align:middle >> Because that's the way you speak? 00:11:15.516 --> 00:11:18.616 align:middle [ Inaudible ] 00:11:19.116 --> 00:11:22.496 align:middle >> A lot of Spanish or English or both. 00:11:22.496 --> 00:11:27.976 align:middle And so she can read your books easier, she says, because she's heard me for ten years. 00:11:37.056 --> 00:11:38.586 align:middle >> I'd like to know what your favorite [? piece is ?] -- 00:11:41.836 --> 00:11:42.256 align:middle -- right now. 00:11:43.186 --> 00:11:45.246 align:middle I know that changed you. 00:11:45.316 --> 00:11:46.596 align:middle >> Of all the stuff that I'm writing? 00:11:46.816 --> 00:11:46.936 align:middle >> Yeah. 00:11:46.936 --> 00:11:51.936 align:middle >> Of all the stuff that I'm writing? 00:11:55.466 --> 00:12:04.566 align:middle I have a -- I have a piece that I'm working on called werejaguar, which is about a being 00:12:04.566 --> 00:12:07.826 align:middle that is half human and half jaguar, like a werewolf? 00:12:08.826 --> 00:12:09.646 align:middle Were, jaguar. 00:12:10.596 --> 00:12:13.916 align:middle And it's very rough right now but I'm excited about it because I'm -- 00:12:13.916 --> 00:12:18.656 align:middle This has an entry into the -- It starts out with a woman 00:12:18.656 --> 00:12:20.626 align:middle at the keyboard on the computer, writing. 00:12:20.626 --> 00:12:24.086 align:middle And it goes into a dream she has 00:12:24.086 --> 00:12:27.406 align:middle And then, it goes into, you know, external reality. 00:12:28.056 --> 00:12:35.356 align:middle And the jaguar that comes to her in the dream, in the rain, actually comes to her 00:12:35.826 --> 00:12:40.376 align:middle and her external reality, the so-called real world. 00:12:41.066 --> 00:12:43.316 align:middle And it's also in the text. 00:12:44.296 --> 00:12:48.676 align:middle And also it goes back to the ancient times. 00:12:48.676 --> 00:12:51.146 align:middle It goes back in history to the Olmecs. 00:12:52.206 --> 00:12:57.306 align:middle And so, it's a -- I'm trying to do a combination of all the things and I'm not sure 00:12:57.306 --> 00:13:01.786 align:middle that I'm going to pull it off, but give me another 10 years. 00:13:04.046 --> 00:13:04.796 align:middle Thank you very much.