WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.020 align:middle line:90% So short is always good, yeah? 00:00:06.020 --> 00:00:08.039 align:middle line:84% I was supposed to take some questions, 00:00:08.039 --> 00:00:11.540 align:middle line:84% so I'm going to try to take them from not the first six 00:00:11.540 --> 00:00:16.400 align:middle line:84% rows, which seem to be full of grad school types, yeah? 00:00:16.400 --> 00:00:18.290 align:middle line:84% This is a good exercise, you guys, 00:00:18.290 --> 00:00:21.860 align:middle line:84% because one of my former mentors and beloved mentors 00:00:21.860 --> 00:00:23.780 align:middle line:90% is a writer, Samuel R. Delany. 00:00:23.780 --> 00:00:25.370 align:middle line:90% Does anybody know him? 00:00:25.370 --> 00:00:26.580 align:middle line:90% Yeah, in the back, nobody? 00:00:26.580 --> 00:00:27.740 align:middle line:90% Samuel Delany? 00:00:27.740 --> 00:00:30.620 align:middle line:84% Yeah, greatest writer alive, and he 00:00:30.620 --> 00:00:34.730 align:middle line:84% has this whole thing about asking questions 00:00:34.730 --> 00:00:36.470 align:middle line:90% in class or at events. 00:00:36.470 --> 00:00:39.590 align:middle line:84% He always says, if you don't learn to ask questions 00:00:39.590 --> 00:00:42.980 align:middle line:84% all the time, you're learning how to make 00:00:42.980 --> 00:00:46.720 align:middle line:84% do with what the fuck you got, and that it's easier 00:00:46.720 --> 00:00:49.180 align:middle line:84% to ask me something really dumb than to ask 00:00:49.180 --> 00:00:50.890 align:middle line:90% your boss for a raise. 00:00:50.890 --> 00:00:54.430 align:middle line:84% So he's like, this is good practice for asking for shit, 00:00:54.430 --> 00:00:56.890 align:middle line:84% though you're probably like some of my students. 00:00:56.890 --> 00:00:59.410 align:middle line:84% You don't have any problems asking for anything. 00:00:59.410 --> 00:01:02.102 align:middle line:84% But just in case, we'll put that out there. 00:01:02.102 --> 00:01:04.060 align:middle line:84% So I thought I would take a couple of questions 00:01:04.060 --> 00:01:06.775 align:middle line:84% from the back of any form about anything. 00:01:06.775 --> 00:01:09.560 align:middle line:90% 00:01:09.560 --> 00:01:13.580 align:middle line:84% That's a hand all the way in the back. 00:01:13.580 --> 00:01:20.060 align:middle line:84% So I was interested in what your relationship [INAUDIBLE] 00:01:20.060 --> 00:01:21.397 align:middle line:90% Do you mean just-- 00:01:21.397 --> 00:01:27.940 align:middle line:84% Your-- I don't know how [INAUDIBLE] 00:01:27.940 --> 00:01:30.220 align:middle line:90% That's a pretty big question. 00:01:30.220 --> 00:01:33.130 align:middle line:84% The question was, what is my relationship with Haiti? 00:01:33.130 --> 00:01:36.250 align:middle line:84% That's like, what's your relationship with the US? 00:01:36.250 --> 00:01:38.110 align:middle line:84% Yeah, no, I mean, it's a useful question, 00:01:38.110 --> 00:01:40.630 align:middle line:84% but it's kind of a tough one to answer. 00:01:40.630 --> 00:01:42.220 align:middle line:90% Do you mean like personally? 00:01:42.220 --> 00:01:45.886 align:middle line:90% 00:01:45.886 --> 00:01:46.870 align:middle line:90% Well-- 00:01:46.870 --> 00:01:48.242 align:middle line:90% I guess I don't know-- 00:01:48.242 --> 00:01:50.900 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:01:50.900 --> 00:01:54.013 align:middle line:84% Probably a better thing-- can I ask you a question? 00:01:54.013 --> 00:01:54.680 align:middle line:90% And I'll answer. 00:01:54.680 --> 00:01:56.930 align:middle line:90% I promise. 00:01:56.930 --> 00:01:59.480 align:middle line:84% What's your interest in that question specifically? 00:01:59.480 --> 00:02:00.980 align:middle line:84% And then I promise I will answer it. 00:02:00.980 --> 00:02:03.920 align:middle line:90% 00:02:03.920 --> 00:02:05.880 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:05.880 --> 00:02:07.840 align:middle line:90% 00:02:07.840 --> 00:02:16.500 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:02:16.500 --> 00:02:18.120 align:middle line:90% Damn, yeah. 00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:21.270 align:middle line:84% OK, I mean, it's kind of a tough question, 00:02:21.270 --> 00:02:22.690 align:middle line:90% and it's an important one. 00:02:22.690 --> 00:02:26.190 align:middle line:84% But it's one of those questions that it's like-- 00:02:26.190 --> 00:02:27.695 align:middle line:90% my relationship to Haiti. 00:02:27.695 --> 00:02:29.070 align:middle line:84% It's one of those questions, it's 00:02:29.070 --> 00:02:34.570 align:middle line:84% like it's an open door for like obfuscation and lying, yeah. 00:02:34.570 --> 00:02:38.220 align:middle line:84% Sort of anything I say I don't kind of have to prove. 00:02:38.220 --> 00:02:42.020 align:middle line:84% It's like, my best friends are Haitian, kind of nonsense, 00:02:42.020 --> 00:02:45.000 align:middle line:84% and you probably don't actually know any fucking Haitians, 00:02:45.000 --> 00:02:45.660 align:middle line:90% you know? 00:02:45.660 --> 00:02:50.130 align:middle line:84% So I mean, I would describe it as-- 00:02:50.130 --> 00:02:53.880 align:middle line:84% I would describe it as very complicated. 00:02:53.880 --> 00:02:58.020 align:middle line:84% I mean, I would definitely be the Dominican writer 00:02:58.020 --> 00:03:02.160 align:middle line:84% that most of the political figures in the Dominican 00:03:02.160 --> 00:03:06.480 align:middle line:84% Republic wouldn't mind deporting to Haiti, 00:03:06.480 --> 00:03:09.930 align:middle line:84% not because I'm threatening or nothing like that, 00:03:09.930 --> 00:03:16.860 align:middle line:84% but because I seem to think that the Dominican government's 00:03:16.860 --> 00:03:18.870 align:middle line:84% treatment of the Haitian and Haitian Dominicans 00:03:18.870 --> 00:03:20.880 align:middle line:90% is kind of screwed up. 00:03:20.880 --> 00:03:25.200 align:middle line:84% So it's sort of like Turkey and Armenians 00:03:25.200 --> 00:03:27.930 align:middle line:84% where in Turkey, you can't even mention that Turkish people 00:03:27.930 --> 00:03:29.760 align:middle line:90% killed Armenians. 00:03:29.760 --> 00:03:31.680 align:middle line:84% They're just like, never happened. 00:03:31.680 --> 00:03:33.460 align:middle line:90% Santo Domingo's the same thing. 00:03:33.460 --> 00:03:36.170 align:middle line:84% Anybody who even says that there's mistreatment 00:03:36.170 --> 00:03:38.460 align:middle line:84% is sort of persona non grata, but I 00:03:38.460 --> 00:03:39.630 align:middle line:90% would say it's complicated. 00:03:39.630 --> 00:03:43.530 align:middle line:84% I mean, I think for a person to sum up 00:03:43.530 --> 00:03:46.423 align:middle line:84% what their relationship is to an entire collective 00:03:46.423 --> 00:03:48.090 align:middle line:84% is difficult because I've never hung out 00:03:48.090 --> 00:03:49.500 align:middle line:90% with the whole collective. 00:03:49.500 --> 00:03:52.980 align:middle line:90% But I have five or six friends. 00:03:52.980 --> 00:03:54.870 align:middle line:84% But they're a bunch of weed heads, 00:03:54.870 --> 00:03:58.110 align:middle line:84% so it would be hard to be like, they're representative 00:03:58.110 --> 00:03:59.730 align:middle line:90% of the Haitian diaspora. 00:03:59.730 --> 00:04:02.340 align:middle line:90% I mean, I don't know. 00:04:02.340 --> 00:04:04.170 align:middle line:90% They smoke mad herb, yo. 00:04:04.170 --> 00:04:06.930 align:middle line:90% 00:04:06.930 --> 00:04:08.010 align:middle line:90% Another question? 00:04:08.010 --> 00:04:09.942 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:09.942 --> 00:04:11.874 align:middle line:90% 00:04:11.874 --> 00:04:17.200 align:middle line:90% Why or how [INAUDIBLE]? 00:04:17.200 --> 00:04:20.339 align:middle line:90% Why or how-- oh, sure. 00:04:20.339 --> 00:04:21.790 align:middle line:90% No, it's a good question. 00:04:21.790 --> 00:04:22.560 align:middle line:90% Part of it comes-- 00:04:22.560 --> 00:04:26.670 align:middle line:84% I come from a family with a lot of cancer, yeah? 00:04:26.670 --> 00:04:32.850 align:middle line:84% And part of it is just that it's, a lot of times, 00:04:32.850 --> 00:04:35.880 align:middle line:84% I think, as a writer, your personality 00:04:35.880 --> 00:04:40.710 align:middle line:84% is sort of not exactly the material that you work on. 00:04:40.710 --> 00:04:46.080 align:middle line:84% And I think I'm pretty much kind of a dumbass, but when I write, 00:04:46.080 --> 00:04:50.712 align:middle line:84% I can push a lot deeper into darker places. 00:04:50.712 --> 00:04:52.170 align:middle line:84% And I think part of it is because I 00:04:52.170 --> 00:04:56.280 align:middle line:84% felt that piece was more representative or emblematic 00:04:56.280 --> 00:05:01.680 align:middle line:84% of the sort of things I think about, and yeah, 00:05:01.680 --> 00:05:04.560 align:middle line:84% so it's just there's been so much cancer in my family. 00:05:04.560 --> 00:05:08.530 align:middle line:84% And I think about how even little kids who don't have 00:05:08.530 --> 00:05:10.510 align:middle line:90% it-- though kids can have it. 00:05:10.510 --> 00:05:12.250 align:middle line:90% That has such a huge impact. 00:05:12.250 --> 00:05:14.740 align:middle line:84% You're just coming of age, and somebody suddenly 00:05:14.740 --> 00:05:18.640 align:middle line:84% acquires something that you don't really understand. 00:05:18.640 --> 00:05:21.565 align:middle line:90% So that's mostly why I read it. 00:05:21.565 --> 00:05:25.090 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:05:25.090 --> 00:05:25.590 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:05:25.590 --> 00:05:28.512 align:middle line:90% 00:05:28.512 --> 00:05:34.370 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:05:34.370 --> 00:05:36.080 align:middle line:90% No. 00:05:36.080 --> 00:05:39.320 align:middle line:84% Specifically, the question was, did it 00:05:39.320 --> 00:05:40.910 align:middle line:90% make it easier or harder? 00:05:40.910 --> 00:05:43.040 align:middle line:90% I hope I'm paraphrasing. 00:05:43.040 --> 00:05:44.975 align:middle line:84% Why did you strategically pick the "you," 00:05:44.975 --> 00:05:48.770 align:middle line:84% which you say is hard for you to do for that piece? 00:05:48.770 --> 00:05:52.190 align:middle line:84% Actually, it was sort of important for the plot 00:05:52.190 --> 00:05:59.430 align:middle line:84% of the book, but for me, it wasn't any easier in the "you" 00:05:59.430 --> 00:06:01.560 align:middle line:84% because even though it's more distancing 00:06:01.560 --> 00:06:05.540 align:middle line:84% in certain areas, when you're writing it, of course, 00:06:05.540 --> 00:06:07.880 align:middle line:84% all you're thinking about is-- you're like, oh, 00:06:07.880 --> 00:06:09.440 align:middle line:90% my brother had cancer. 00:06:09.440 --> 00:06:12.530 align:middle line:84% You're not really thinking about how the sentences fall in. 00:06:12.530 --> 00:06:17.095 align:middle line:84% But I definitely needed the "you" there, and so no matter 00:06:17.095 --> 00:06:19.220 align:middle line:84% what, whether it was going to come out good or bad, 00:06:19.220 --> 00:06:22.310 align:middle line:84% I had to do it because of the structure. 00:06:22.310 --> 00:06:23.960 align:middle line:84% But those are really good questions. 00:06:23.960 --> 00:06:25.460 align:middle line:90% You're an undergraduate, yeah? 00:06:25.460 --> 00:06:26.420 align:middle line:90% Yeah, yeah. 00:06:26.420 --> 00:06:29.780 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:06:29.780 --> 00:06:31.220 align:middle line:90% I didn't figure. 00:06:31.220 --> 00:06:33.320 align:middle line:90% Thank you, though. 00:06:33.320 --> 00:06:35.210 align:middle line:84% No, I was just saying, it's pretty 00:06:35.210 --> 00:06:37.082 align:middle line:90% smart for an undergraduate. 00:06:37.082 --> 00:06:42.117 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:06:42.117 --> 00:06:43.700 align:middle line:84% No, I'm raised outside of Perth Amboy. 00:06:43.700 --> 00:06:44.930 align:middle line:90% What part of New Jersey? 00:06:44.930 --> 00:06:48.290 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:06:48.290 --> 00:06:50.850 align:middle line:84% I know Monmouth County inside it out. 00:06:50.850 --> 00:06:51.350 align:middle line:90% Where? 00:06:51.350 --> 00:06:52.270 align:middle line:90% West Long Branch. 00:06:52.270 --> 00:06:53.350 align:middle line:90% Of course. 00:06:53.350 --> 00:06:56.320 align:middle line:84% I was in West Long Branch a month ago. 00:06:56.320 --> 00:06:57.250 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:06:57.250 --> 00:06:58.720 align:middle line:84% Guys, the weird thing about what I 00:06:58.720 --> 00:07:00.430 align:middle line:84% did for a living going to college 00:07:00.430 --> 00:07:02.330 align:middle line:84% is I used to deliver pool tables. 00:07:02.330 --> 00:07:04.300 align:middle line:84% So if there were two rich people in the town, 00:07:04.300 --> 00:07:09.010 align:middle line:84% I was in their house installing a Brunswick gold crown. 00:07:09.010 --> 00:07:10.972 align:middle line:90% So yeah, I know your town. 00:07:10.972 --> 00:07:15.130 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:07:15.130 --> 00:07:15.933 align:middle line:90% Hey, fuck it. 00:07:15.933 --> 00:07:18.100 align:middle line:84% It's your night, so if you want to ask 12 questions, 00:07:18.100 --> 00:07:20.283 align:middle line:90% run with it. 00:07:20.283 --> 00:07:22.450 align:middle line:84% The amount of money y'all paying for the school, I-- 00:07:22.450 --> 00:07:23.720 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:07:23.720 --> 00:07:27.200 align:middle line:90% OK, other questions? 00:07:27.200 --> 00:07:29.240 align:middle line:84% Here and then there's two that way. 00:07:29.240 --> 00:07:31.315 align:middle line:84% What part of the Dominican Republic are you from? 00:07:31.315 --> 00:07:32.190 align:middle line:90% It's a good question. 00:07:32.190 --> 00:07:34.280 align:middle line:84% What part of Santo Domingo am I from? 00:07:34.280 --> 00:07:35.405 align:middle line:90% No, no, Dominican Republic. 00:07:35.405 --> 00:07:40.210 align:middle line:84% It just in my head translates right to Santo Domingo, yeah? 00:07:40.210 --> 00:07:43.610 align:middle line:84% I'm a weird sort of-- not special, just weird. 00:07:43.610 --> 00:07:48.680 align:middle line:84% I come from the capital, which people know as Santo Domingo, 00:07:48.680 --> 00:07:53.720 align:middle line:84% but I was part of those kids who had a parent abroad. 00:07:53.720 --> 00:07:56.030 align:middle line:84% My father was in the Bronx working, 00:07:56.030 --> 00:07:57.470 align:middle line:90% and so I hadn't met him. 00:07:57.470 --> 00:08:02.120 align:middle line:84% And why I say that's weird it's because that meant since as 00:08:02.120 --> 00:08:04.940 align:middle line:84% soon as I could remember, I was that group 00:08:04.940 --> 00:08:07.850 align:middle line:84% of kids who had been singled out that you were not 00:08:07.850 --> 00:08:10.660 align:middle line:90% long for this country. 00:08:10.660 --> 00:08:12.570 align:middle line:84% I mean, my first memory is being told 00:08:12.570 --> 00:08:14.850 align:middle line:84% that, don't get fucking comfortable. 00:08:14.850 --> 00:08:17.220 align:middle line:90% You ain't sticking around. 00:08:17.220 --> 00:08:20.700 align:middle line:84% And it's a weird thing as a kid because what ends up 00:08:20.700 --> 00:08:24.090 align:middle line:84% happening is that people are always asking me, 00:08:24.090 --> 00:08:28.630 align:middle line:84% oh, this country or that country, which do you prefer? 00:08:28.630 --> 00:08:29.880 align:middle line:90% Which do you feel comfortable? 00:08:29.880 --> 00:08:32.280 align:middle line:84% And I've never known a moment in my life 00:08:32.280 --> 00:08:35.650 align:middle line:84% where Santo Domingo and the United States 00:08:35.650 --> 00:08:39.322 align:middle line:84% weren't simultaneously in my life. 00:08:39.322 --> 00:08:41.782 align:middle line:84% I actually had the same experience [INAUDIBLE].. 00:08:41.782 --> 00:08:44.740 align:middle line:90% 00:08:44.740 --> 00:08:46.366 align:middle line:90% What part of Santiago? 00:08:46.366 --> 00:08:47.824 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:08:47.824 --> 00:08:49.250 align:middle line:90% Uh-huh. 00:08:49.250 --> 00:08:50.900 align:middle line:84% Yeah, my father is from Santiago. 00:08:50.900 --> 00:08:54.650 align:middle line:84% So my island, our island is like the size of our foot, 00:08:54.650 --> 00:08:57.830 align:middle line:90% but there's still regionalism. 00:08:57.830 --> 00:09:01.543 align:middle line:84% My parents, they say they're a mixed marriage because my dad's 00:09:01.543 --> 00:09:02.210 align:middle line:90% from your place. 00:09:02.210 --> 00:09:05.060 align:middle line:90% My mom's from my place, yeah? 00:09:05.060 --> 00:09:06.560 align:middle line:90% My mother [INAUDIBLE]. 00:09:06.560 --> 00:09:12.560 align:middle line:90% 00:09:12.560 --> 00:09:17.270 align:middle line:84% Well, half of you is picked on because you ain't got a parent, 00:09:17.270 --> 00:09:18.980 align:middle line:84% and the other half of you is kind 00:09:18.980 --> 00:09:20.510 align:middle line:84% of like a little prince in waiting 00:09:20.510 --> 00:09:22.520 align:middle line:90% because you got dollars. 00:09:22.520 --> 00:09:24.670 align:middle line:84% And so your shit is like, doot-doot-doot-doot-doot. 00:09:24.670 --> 00:09:29.180 align:middle line:84% You can't figure it out, and it's much more 00:09:29.180 --> 00:09:31.280 align:middle line:84% common experience for young immigrants 00:09:31.280 --> 00:09:33.680 align:middle line:90% than I think people realize. 00:09:33.680 --> 00:09:37.130 align:middle line:84% Now we had some hands here, sir, glasses, and then right 00:09:37.130 --> 00:09:38.696 align:middle line:90% behind you. 00:09:38.696 --> 00:09:41.684 align:middle line:84% Both the male character from Drown 00:09:41.684 --> 00:09:45.668 align:middle line:84% and the female character from the story you just read 00:09:45.668 --> 00:09:51.146 align:middle line:84% do not have a father present most times [INAUDIBLE],, 00:09:51.146 --> 00:09:55.628 align:middle line:84% yet the male character seems to be very loyal to the mother, 00:09:55.628 --> 00:10:02.849 align:middle line:84% whereas the female character [INAUDIBLE] My question 00:10:02.849 --> 00:10:07.082 align:middle line:84% is, which of those two is closer to your experience? 00:10:07.082 --> 00:10:09.074 align:middle line:84% And then the follow-up to that would 00:10:09.074 --> 00:10:15.080 align:middle line:84% be, how did you draw inspiration from the other? 00:10:15.080 --> 00:10:16.290 align:middle line:90% Well, that's a good question. 00:10:16.290 --> 00:10:18.020 align:middle line:84% The thing is, I come from a big family. 00:10:18.020 --> 00:10:21.690 align:middle line:84% There's five of us, and four of us are a year apart. 00:10:21.690 --> 00:10:24.770 align:middle line:84% So it was like, when we were in high school, 00:10:24.770 --> 00:10:29.630 align:middle line:84% we were in high school, senior to freshmen. 00:10:29.630 --> 00:10:32.870 align:middle line:84% And the thing is that my experience was that, look, 00:10:32.870 --> 00:10:34.820 align:middle line:90% I was your typical guy. 00:10:34.820 --> 00:10:36.733 align:middle line:90% My mom, I was cool with my mom. 00:10:36.733 --> 00:10:38.150 align:middle line:84% I didn't really pay much attention 00:10:38.150 --> 00:10:43.190 align:middle line:84% to her, typical male bullshit where you're so 00:10:43.190 --> 00:10:44.370 align:middle line:90% thinking about other things. 00:10:44.370 --> 00:10:48.080 align:middle line:84% And my poor sisters, sort of to carve out their identity, 00:10:48.080 --> 00:10:50.900 align:middle line:84% they had to, in some ways, fight with my mother in ways 00:10:50.900 --> 00:10:53.072 align:middle line:84% that I never had to fight, because my mother would 00:10:53.072 --> 00:10:53.780 align:middle line:90% say things to me. 00:10:53.780 --> 00:10:56.600 align:middle line:84% And me and my brothers, we could just kind of ignore her. 00:10:56.600 --> 00:10:59.960 align:middle line:84% There was kind of the male privilege of sons in a house 00:10:59.960 --> 00:11:02.690 align:middle line:84% that I think is not general, but it can 00:11:02.690 --> 00:11:04.560 align:middle line:90% be found in certain families. 00:11:04.560 --> 00:11:06.350 align:middle line:84% And so part of what this came from 00:11:06.350 --> 00:11:09.530 align:middle line:84% was my own sister's struggles with my mother, 00:11:09.530 --> 00:11:11.420 align:middle line:84% and my mother was a tremendous personality, 00:11:11.420 --> 00:11:13.040 align:middle line:90% a very powerful woman. 00:11:13.040 --> 00:11:15.290 align:middle line:84% And my sisters were very strong willed, too, 00:11:15.290 --> 00:11:16.550 align:middle line:90% and so they would go at it. 00:11:16.550 --> 00:11:18.080 align:middle line:84% And me and my brothers, we were just 00:11:18.080 --> 00:11:19.970 align:middle line:84% would be eating our dinner as my sisters 00:11:19.970 --> 00:11:24.140 align:middle line:84% and my mother would be like arguing incredible fine 00:11:24.140 --> 00:11:30.110 align:middle line:84% points of logic that would make a Jesuit brain malfunction. 00:11:30.110 --> 00:11:33.020 align:middle line:84% But they were sort of arguing about other shit 00:11:33.020 --> 00:11:34.740 align:middle line:84% that we didn't really understand, 00:11:34.740 --> 00:11:37.910 align:middle line:84% but I found that to be part of my life 00:11:37.910 --> 00:11:41.270 align:middle line:84% because I was living it all the time. 00:11:41.270 --> 00:11:44.120 align:middle line:84% And again, I mean, you can't explain it, I don't think. 00:11:44.120 --> 00:11:47.720 align:middle line:84% Every family's particular, but in my family, my sisters, 00:11:47.720 --> 00:11:50.923 align:middle line:84% to grow up, they first had to defeat my mother. 00:11:50.923 --> 00:11:52.340 align:middle line:84% And they're all very good friends. 00:11:52.340 --> 00:11:53.210 align:middle line:90% I mean, they love each other. 00:11:53.210 --> 00:11:54.627 align:middle line:84% They hang out with each other now, 00:11:54.627 --> 00:12:00.020 align:middle line:84% but adolescence, it was some old Conan shit. 00:12:00.020 --> 00:12:02.360 align:middle line:84% And I wanted to capture that because, as a kid, 00:12:02.360 --> 00:12:05.600 align:middle line:84% I was left outside of it, but I could tell 00:12:05.600 --> 00:12:06.830 align:middle line:90% it affected my sister deeply. 00:12:06.830 --> 00:12:10.230 align:middle line:90% 00:12:10.230 --> 00:12:12.856 align:middle line:84% There was a second hand back there, yeah? 00:12:12.856 --> 00:12:26.520 align:middle line:84% [INAUDIBLE] blending a fictional story with a [INAUDIBLE] 00:12:26.520 --> 00:12:32.170 align:middle line:84% all the military commanders from the story [INAUDIBLE] 00:12:32.170 --> 00:12:32.670 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:12:32.670 --> 00:12:36.120 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:12:36.120 --> 00:12:36.750 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:12:36.750 --> 00:12:40.170 align:middle line:84% That connects a little bit to the question 00:12:40.170 --> 00:12:43.860 align:middle line:84% that I left unanswered from the young gentleman there, 00:12:43.860 --> 00:12:47.670 align:middle line:84% is about the father, the absence of the father figure. 00:12:47.670 --> 00:12:51.030 align:middle line:84% Part of what interested me about the Americas 00:12:51.030 --> 00:12:53.970 align:middle line:84% is that whether you got a dad or you don't get a dad, 00:12:53.970 --> 00:12:57.900 align:middle line:84% one of the cool things or most excruciatingly horrible things 00:12:57.900 --> 00:13:00.300 align:middle line:84% about the Americas is that there's 00:13:00.300 --> 00:13:05.320 align:middle line:84% an already in-place masculinity for you to jump on. 00:13:05.320 --> 00:13:07.840 align:middle line:84% I mean, what's interesting is that-- 00:13:07.840 --> 00:13:10.670 align:middle line:90% 00:13:10.670 --> 00:13:13.670 align:middle line:84% I mean, guys, for God's sake, it's 00:13:13.670 --> 00:13:15.200 align:middle line:84% a little weird that the country that 00:13:15.200 --> 00:13:16.970 align:middle line:84% claims to be the most religious country 00:13:16.970 --> 00:13:20.330 align:middle line:84% on the planet in some ways is also the happiest 00:13:20.330 --> 00:13:22.700 align:middle line:90% to go to war, yeah? 00:13:22.700 --> 00:13:26.210 align:middle line:84% I mean, my nephews are in Iraq, and my little brother just 00:13:26.210 --> 00:13:27.650 align:middle line:90% got out of the Marines. 00:13:27.650 --> 00:13:30.140 align:middle line:84% And half the time you hear, the US 00:13:30.140 --> 00:13:32.720 align:middle line:84% is like, we're really about our values, 00:13:32.720 --> 00:13:34.070 align:middle line:90% and we're really about this. 00:13:34.070 --> 00:13:37.190 align:middle line:84% But it's kind of a weird thing that the most Christian country 00:13:37.190 --> 00:13:41.190 align:middle line:90% is in a war every 10 years. 00:13:41.190 --> 00:13:43.440 align:middle line:84% I mean, if you were just a fucking alien, 00:13:43.440 --> 00:13:45.390 align:middle line:90% you would be on some CSI shit. 00:13:45.390 --> 00:13:47.700 align:middle line:84% You'd be like, that's a little weird. 00:13:47.700 --> 00:13:49.980 align:middle line:84% That's like saying you're the most peaceable person, 00:13:49.980 --> 00:13:52.980 align:middle line:84% but every day, you come in covered in blood. 00:13:52.980 --> 00:13:54.780 align:middle line:84% You're like, oh yeah, they jumped me. 00:13:54.780 --> 00:13:57.080 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:13:57.080 --> 00:14:00.540 align:middle line:90% And so I was interested in this. 00:14:00.540 --> 00:14:03.450 align:middle line:84% I came from a military family, and again, 00:14:03.450 --> 00:14:05.940 align:middle line:84% it was like, in my family, my family was like, 00:14:05.940 --> 00:14:07.180 align:middle line:90% we're incredibly disciplined. 00:14:07.180 --> 00:14:09.722 align:middle line:84% We're rational, but any chance there was a war, it'd be like, 00:14:09.722 --> 00:14:11.700 align:middle line:90% let's do it. 00:14:11.700 --> 00:14:17.190 align:middle line:84% So part of it was just my personal interest in the way 00:14:17.190 --> 00:14:21.570 align:middle line:84% that this kind of insane masculinity of the Americas, 00:14:21.570 --> 00:14:24.330 align:middle line:84% whether it's military, whether it's sports, 00:14:24.330 --> 00:14:27.360 align:middle line:84% that if you're a guy, you pick up very quickly. 00:14:27.360 --> 00:14:29.970 align:middle line:84% Whether you decide to reject most of it or not, 00:14:29.970 --> 00:14:32.220 align:middle line:84% you're still kind of a PhD in masculinity 00:14:32.220 --> 00:14:34.338 align:middle line:84% if you grow up in the United States. 00:14:34.338 --> 00:14:35.880 align:middle line:84% You might not be able to practice it, 00:14:35.880 --> 00:14:38.520 align:middle line:84% but boy, do you know it, you know? 00:14:38.520 --> 00:14:41.940 align:middle line:84% And I was interested in that, and I was interested in the way 00:14:41.940 --> 00:14:43.740 align:middle line:90% dictatorships work. 00:14:43.740 --> 00:14:47.530 align:middle line:84% I mean, again, I don't think that the Americans are special, 00:14:47.530 --> 00:14:52.000 align:middle line:84% but I do find that we have an interesting relationship 00:14:52.000 --> 00:14:56.050 align:middle line:84% to powerful males in the Americas 00:14:56.050 --> 00:14:58.990 align:middle line:84% that's probably been dangerous for us in the world. 00:14:58.990 --> 00:15:00.650 align:middle line:90% And I was curious about that. 00:15:00.650 --> 00:15:03.535 align:middle line:84% And so in the book, I had done a lot of research. 00:15:03.535 --> 00:15:05.440 align:middle line:84% I mean, I grew up with a military family, 00:15:05.440 --> 00:15:08.470 align:middle line:84% so you get a lot of exposure to military nonsense. 00:15:08.470 --> 00:15:10.330 align:middle line:90% But I needed to do a lot more. 00:15:10.330 --> 00:15:14.260 align:middle line:84% I feel like you can't make jokes in a language 00:15:14.260 --> 00:15:16.840 align:middle line:84% until you're good at the language, right? 00:15:16.840 --> 00:15:18.550 align:middle line:84% And I needed this to be funny, so I 00:15:18.550 --> 00:15:20.200 align:middle line:84% had to learn a ton of military stuff 00:15:20.200 --> 00:15:25.483 align:middle line:84% before I could actually make any kind of jokes, yeah? 00:15:25.483 --> 00:15:27.900 align:middle line:84% We'll just take a couple more, and then I'll leave you off 00:15:27.900 --> 00:15:29.640 align:middle line:90% with a small reading. 00:15:29.640 --> 00:15:30.370 align:middle line:90% Hand up front. 00:15:30.370 --> 00:15:34.200 align:middle line:90% I hate calling on the faculty. 00:15:34.200 --> 00:15:35.145 align:middle line:90% It's a setup, Jason. 00:15:35.145 --> 00:15:38.812 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:15:38.812 --> 00:15:41.020 align:middle line:84% How is my writing received in the Dominican Republic? 00:15:41.020 --> 00:15:42.820 align:middle line:84% Well, first of all, people in Santo Domingo 00:15:42.820 --> 00:15:46.000 align:middle line:84% got better things to do with 20 bucks than buy a fucking book, 00:15:46.000 --> 00:15:46.720 align:middle line:90% you know? 00:15:46.720 --> 00:15:48.910 align:middle line:84% I mean, straight off the bat, I think people like me 00:15:48.910 --> 00:15:52.697 align:middle line:84% as a-- they think of me as a positive as an abstract. 00:15:52.697 --> 00:15:54.280 align:middle line:84% They're like, he's a Dominican kid who 00:15:54.280 --> 00:15:57.820 align:middle line:84% likes Dominicans, still hangs out with Dominicans, 00:15:57.820 --> 00:16:00.640 align:middle line:84% comes home twice a year, you know? 00:16:00.640 --> 00:16:03.550 align:middle line:84% And so they're like, that's not bad. 00:16:03.550 --> 00:16:06.160 align:middle line:84% He doesn't want any money, so that's OK. 00:16:06.160 --> 00:16:07.750 align:middle line:90% He's not a politician. 00:16:07.750 --> 00:16:11.650 align:middle line:84% But I mean, am I more popular than a bachatero? 00:16:11.650 --> 00:16:13.030 align:middle line:90% No. 00:16:13.030 --> 00:16:16.210 align:middle line:84% I think it's just, wow, how mildly intriguing, 00:16:16.210 --> 00:16:20.200 align:middle line:84% a non problematic art boy, you know? 00:16:20.200 --> 00:16:21.220 align:middle line:90% So they're cool. 00:16:21.220 --> 00:16:26.470 align:middle line:84% I mean, I think I'm like a seven on positivity, 00:16:26.470 --> 00:16:28.240 align:middle line:90% but I'm not sure. 00:16:28.240 --> 00:16:33.520 align:middle line:84% Honestly, I wouldn't say that the pueblo has read the books. 00:16:33.520 --> 00:16:35.830 align:middle line:84% I mean, there's a lot of young people who have, 00:16:35.830 --> 00:16:38.410 align:middle line:84% but again, a lot of that is just photocopies. 00:16:38.410 --> 00:16:41.500 align:middle line:84% And it's hard to generalize what a collective thinks 00:16:41.500 --> 00:16:43.030 align:middle line:90% about an individual. 00:16:43.030 --> 00:16:46.270 align:middle line:84% I know mad rich Dominicans who can't stand the fact that-- 00:16:46.270 --> 00:16:49.300 align:middle line:84% look, guys, if you all know rich people, 00:16:49.300 --> 00:16:52.390 align:middle line:84% you know one thing rich people love is other fucking rich 00:16:52.390 --> 00:16:54.670 align:middle line:90% people, you know? 00:16:54.670 --> 00:16:57.510 align:middle line:84% They might like to fuck some of you poor people, 00:16:57.510 --> 00:17:00.260 align:middle line:84% but they really like themselves some rich people. 00:17:00.260 --> 00:17:02.660 align:middle line:84% And Santa Domingo is no different. 00:17:02.660 --> 00:17:04.849 align:middle line:84% I think a lot of times if the elites have 00:17:04.849 --> 00:17:06.829 align:middle line:84% a comment about my work, it tends 00:17:06.829 --> 00:17:09.530 align:middle line:84% to be couched in the terms of the class. 00:17:09.530 --> 00:17:11.780 align:middle line:84% They're like, well, he comes from a poor neighborhood, 00:17:11.780 --> 00:17:12.762 align:middle line:90% doesn't he? 00:17:12.762 --> 00:17:14.720 align:middle line:84% I don't know what that has to do with the book, 00:17:14.720 --> 00:17:17.520 align:middle line:84% but they'll write a review with that. 00:17:17.520 --> 00:17:20.280 align:middle line:84% But I think it's hard to generalize because there's 00:17:20.280 --> 00:17:23.410 align:middle line:84% an enormous range of response even within the various groups 00:17:23.410 --> 00:17:25.380 align:middle line:84% and the various sectors, but I would 00:17:25.380 --> 00:17:29.940 align:middle line:84% say most people are Junot-positive seven. 00:17:29.940 --> 00:17:31.320 align:middle line:90% They're not as positive on-- 00:17:31.320 --> 00:17:34.770 align:middle line:84% air conditioners, more popular, you know? 00:17:34.770 --> 00:17:39.690 align:middle line:90% So I mean, for real, no jokes. 00:17:39.690 --> 00:17:42.930 align:middle line:84% Again, I haven't done anything wrong until the day I 00:17:42.930 --> 00:17:44.340 align:middle line:90% get caught smuggling drugs. 00:17:44.340 --> 00:17:47.070 align:middle line:84% Then they'll be like, oh, he's a gangster. 00:17:47.070 --> 00:17:50.148 align:middle line:90% Now he's the man. 00:17:50.148 --> 00:17:51.420 align:middle line:90% Just a couple more, Jason. 00:17:51.420 --> 00:17:52.560 align:middle line:90% I won't let you since you-- 00:17:52.560 --> 00:17:54.960 align:middle line:84% Jason came up with some loot this way, sir. 00:17:54.960 --> 00:17:59.160 align:middle line:84% Well, I was hoping you'd just repeat something 00:17:59.160 --> 00:18:01.350 align:middle line:84% I heard you saying to PR earlier today 00:18:01.350 --> 00:18:05.430 align:middle line:84% about the genre mixing in your novel 00:18:05.430 --> 00:18:09.260 align:middle line:84% and the political implications of that, 00:18:09.260 --> 00:18:11.060 align:middle line:90% how you had to go outside-- 00:18:11.060 --> 00:18:12.560 align:middle line:84% people have to go outside of realism 00:18:12.560 --> 00:18:15.130 align:middle line:84% to address the reality of America. 00:18:15.130 --> 00:18:16.600 align:middle line:90% Damn, Jason. 00:18:16.600 --> 00:18:17.160 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:18:17.160 --> 00:18:19.180 align:middle line:84% I mean, it sounded so good earlier. 00:18:19.180 --> 00:18:22.000 align:middle line:84% I know, so you'll get the budget version, gang. 00:18:22.000 --> 00:18:24.820 align:middle line:84% The faculty get together and have a couple of drinks 00:18:24.820 --> 00:18:26.980 align:middle line:90% and, they're like, yeah. 00:18:26.980 --> 00:18:27.970 align:middle line:90% We're so smart. 00:18:27.970 --> 00:18:29.956 align:middle line:90% We're teaching. 00:18:29.956 --> 00:18:31.060 align:middle line:90% Fuck, man. 00:18:31.060 --> 00:18:34.025 align:middle line:84% So we were talking about this book has a lot of genre stuff 00:18:34.025 --> 00:18:35.900 align:middle line:84% because someone was asking about the history. 00:18:35.900 --> 00:18:37.270 align:middle line:84% There's these footnotes with all this history 00:18:37.270 --> 00:18:39.040 align:middle line:84% about the history of the Americas, 00:18:39.040 --> 00:18:41.948 align:middle line:84% the Dominican Republic, of Haiti, all 00:18:41.948 --> 00:18:43.240 align:middle line:90% sorts of kind of bizarre stuff. 00:18:43.240 --> 00:18:45.640 align:middle line:84% But also, in this book, there's a lot of kind 00:18:45.640 --> 00:18:48.670 align:middle line:84% of the nerd references, everybody whose friend collects 00:18:48.670 --> 00:18:52.555 align:middle line:84% the comic books, or maybe not friend, the person you know 00:18:52.555 --> 00:18:57.180 align:middle line:90% who plays Magic, that card game. 00:18:57.180 --> 00:19:01.530 align:middle line:84% Some people up front hiding their cards, you know? 00:19:01.530 --> 00:19:04.680 align:middle line:84% So there's a lot of nerd references to books, 00:19:04.680 --> 00:19:06.270 align:middle line:90% comic books, games, and stuff. 00:19:06.270 --> 00:19:10.680 align:middle line:84% And we were talking earlier that one of the things 00:19:10.680 --> 00:19:14.620 align:middle line:84% is that, look, we live in such a complicated, 00:19:14.620 --> 00:19:18.350 align:middle line:84% in such a tremendously, bizarrely ungraspable world 00:19:18.350 --> 00:19:18.850 align:middle line:90% right now. 00:19:18.850 --> 00:19:20.860 align:middle line:84% I mean, I'm sure it's always been that way, 00:19:20.860 --> 00:19:22.735 align:middle line:84% but this is the only world I'm familiar with. 00:19:22.735 --> 00:19:24.850 align:middle line:84% So I'm only going to judge the present right now-- 00:19:24.850 --> 00:19:27.280 align:middle line:84% that it's such an extraordinarily complex 00:19:27.280 --> 00:19:30.550 align:middle line:84% and really difficult thing to grapple with, 00:19:30.550 --> 00:19:33.070 align:middle line:90% to wrap your minds around. 00:19:33.070 --> 00:19:35.650 align:middle line:84% I mean, I always think about just the standard anyone here 00:19:35.650 --> 00:19:38.260 align:middle line:84% who's ever emigrated from a poor background 00:19:38.260 --> 00:19:41.540 align:middle line:84% and then found themselves the United States. 00:19:41.540 --> 00:19:45.470 align:middle line:84% It's kind of difficult to describe even to yourself what 00:19:45.470 --> 00:19:49.520 align:middle line:84% it means to wake up one day in a house 00:19:49.520 --> 00:19:53.060 align:middle line:84% with no electricity, no running water, no TV, 00:19:53.060 --> 00:19:55.710 align:middle line:84% and go to bed in a house with electricity, 00:19:55.710 --> 00:19:58.640 align:middle line:90% running water, and cable. 00:19:58.640 --> 00:20:00.810 align:middle line:90% How do you describe that? 00:20:00.810 --> 00:20:02.810 align:middle line:84% And one of the things that we were talking about 00:20:02.810 --> 00:20:08.600 align:middle line:84% was that often the world is so hard to put your arms around, 00:20:08.600 --> 00:20:12.860 align:middle line:84% to even get an approach, to even get an approximation of what 00:20:12.860 --> 00:20:15.260 align:middle line:90% we call the real. 00:20:15.260 --> 00:20:19.260 align:middle line:84% There's no way that realistic fiction can do it. 00:20:19.260 --> 00:20:20.900 align:middle line:84% In other words, if you just stick 00:20:20.900 --> 00:20:25.310 align:middle line:84% to the sort of strategies of realistic fiction, 00:20:25.310 --> 00:20:27.470 align:middle line:84% you're going to miss what I would 00:20:27.470 --> 00:20:30.860 align:middle line:90% call 90% of experience, yeah? 00:20:30.860 --> 00:20:35.180 align:middle line:84% Because it's in the genres, in things like science fiction 00:20:35.180 --> 00:20:36.740 align:middle line:84% and things like fantasy and things 00:20:36.740 --> 00:20:39.740 align:middle line:84% like horrors and things like western where 00:20:39.740 --> 00:20:43.310 align:middle line:84% a lot of the preoccupations or a lot of the concerns 00:20:43.310 --> 00:20:46.730 align:middle line:84% or a lot of the realities of a culture which it doesn't know 00:20:46.730 --> 00:20:50.010 align:middle line:84% how to address yet find expression, 00:20:50.010 --> 00:20:51.860 align:middle line:84% which is a long way of saying that if you 00:20:51.860 --> 00:20:54.830 align:middle line:84% read realistic fiction in the United States in English-- 00:20:54.830 --> 00:20:57.230 align:middle line:84% let's say you only read realistic fiction-- 00:20:57.230 --> 00:21:01.190 align:middle line:84% you would never know that 90% of the planet 00:21:01.190 --> 00:21:06.510 align:middle line:84% lives in a dictatorship situation. 00:21:06.510 --> 00:21:08.160 align:middle line:84% You would think it was an anomaly. 00:21:08.160 --> 00:21:11.070 align:middle line:84% It was an odd thing, because realistic fiction 00:21:11.070 --> 00:21:13.890 align:middle line:84% tends not to be obsessed with how 00:21:13.890 --> 00:21:18.300 align:middle line:84% power works, how individual power works on collectives. 00:21:18.300 --> 00:21:21.120 align:middle line:84% How does one person dominate a society? 00:21:21.120 --> 00:21:24.830 align:middle line:84% This is stuff that realistic fiction tends to shy away from, 00:21:24.830 --> 00:21:26.580 align:middle line:84% and for every hundred books, you might get 00:21:26.580 --> 00:21:28.470 align:middle line:90% one book about a dictatorship. 00:21:28.470 --> 00:21:30.450 align:middle line:84% On the other hand, you don't have 00:21:30.450 --> 00:21:33.990 align:middle line:84% to scratch more than the surface of science fiction and fantasy 00:21:33.990 --> 00:21:37.890 align:middle line:84% to see that the human obsession, that our anxieties 00:21:37.890 --> 00:21:41.370 align:middle line:84% about this situation are writ large in these narratives. 00:21:41.370 --> 00:21:44.430 align:middle line:84% Almost every science fiction novel and every fantasy novel-- 00:21:44.430 --> 00:21:48.660 align:middle line:84% almost all of them are obsessed with a dark lord or a Darth 00:21:48.660 --> 00:21:54.390 align:middle line:84% Vader or a dark side, one huge dominating figure who basically 00:21:54.390 --> 00:21:56.700 align:middle line:90% enslaves an entire population. 00:21:56.700 --> 00:22:00.450 align:middle line:84% I mean, if you really want a sense of what 00:22:00.450 --> 00:22:03.840 align:middle line:84% living in this world right now is like 00:22:03.840 --> 00:22:05.910 align:middle line:84% and the only book that survives is 00:22:05.910 --> 00:22:08.700 align:middle line:84% a piece of literary fiction, whoever is left 00:22:08.700 --> 00:22:11.260 align:middle line:84% is going to be in a lot of trouble 00:22:11.260 --> 00:22:13.960 align:middle line:84% because they're going to have no idea what it was really 00:22:13.960 --> 00:22:18.580 align:middle line:84% like to be human, and a lot of what it's like to be human 00:22:18.580 --> 00:22:21.070 align:middle line:84% is only expressed in the genres that we 00:22:21.070 --> 00:22:23.440 align:middle line:90% consider less reputable. 00:22:23.440 --> 00:22:27.760 align:middle line:84% Our worries about our body, our concerns about aging, 00:22:27.760 --> 00:22:30.910 align:middle line:84% our concerns about violence or the abject 00:22:30.910 --> 00:22:33.130 align:middle line:90% find expression in horror. 00:22:33.130 --> 00:22:38.440 align:middle line:84% Our concerns about power, our fears of technology, 00:22:38.440 --> 00:22:42.860 align:middle line:84% not only our fears but our fetishization of technology 00:22:42.860 --> 00:22:45.700 align:middle line:84% find their way through most of the science fiction, 00:22:45.700 --> 00:22:49.060 align:middle line:84% and for God's sake, guys, we all fuck a lot 00:22:49.060 --> 00:22:51.190 align:middle line:84% more than literary fiction says we fuck. 00:22:51.190 --> 00:22:53.810 align:middle line:90% 00:22:53.810 --> 00:22:56.690 align:middle line:84% I don't care what anybody says, you know? 00:22:56.690 --> 00:22:59.330 align:middle line:84% And it's like this comic book writer Alan Moore said. 00:22:59.330 --> 00:23:03.710 align:middle line:84% He's like, life is fantasy, science fiction, 00:23:03.710 --> 00:23:07.760 align:middle line:84% a thriller, often or not, a coming of age bildungsroman, 00:23:07.760 --> 00:23:10.760 align:middle line:84% and if we're lucky a bit of porn, yeah? 00:23:10.760 --> 00:23:13.718 align:middle line:84% And I guess part of me just thinks that if you're 00:23:13.718 --> 00:23:15.260 align:middle line:84% going to be a writer and you're going 00:23:15.260 --> 00:23:17.690 align:middle line:84% to try to approach this world that is enormously 00:23:17.690 --> 00:23:21.920 align:middle line:84% complex, if you dismiss genres, if you say, 00:23:21.920 --> 00:23:26.840 align:middle line:84% oh, horror, fantasy, romance, all these things are crap, 00:23:26.840 --> 00:23:29.360 align:middle line:84% you're basically robbing yourself of tools 00:23:29.360 --> 00:23:31.340 align:middle line:84% that you're going to need to describe 00:23:31.340 --> 00:23:36.170 align:middle line:84% a world that otherwise resists any attempt at description. 00:23:36.170 --> 00:23:39.150 align:middle line:84% And that's why I find the genre so useful, 00:23:39.150 --> 00:23:41.260 align:middle line:84% and that's why I put so much genre in this book 00:23:41.260 --> 00:23:43.130 align:middle line:84% among for other reasons, is I felt 00:23:43.130 --> 00:23:44.900 align:middle line:84% like you can't describe what it means 00:23:44.900 --> 00:23:48.350 align:middle line:84% to be a young person in the United States 00:23:48.350 --> 00:23:53.150 align:middle line:84% without thinking in science fiction or fantasy terms. 00:23:53.150 --> 00:23:56.150 align:middle line:84% Anybody who's ever been to a private school 00:23:56.150 --> 00:23:59.510 align:middle line:84% and whoever felt like they had a chance at making it 00:23:59.510 --> 00:24:02.960 align:middle line:84% or anyone who's ever had a feeling that the America gives 00:24:02.960 --> 00:24:05.480 align:middle line:84% you that feeling that you could become yourself, 00:24:05.480 --> 00:24:07.130 align:middle line:84% that you could become a superstar 00:24:07.130 --> 00:24:12.260 align:middle line:84% or a super athlete or super rich, read yourself a Harry 00:24:12.260 --> 00:24:15.410 align:middle line:84% Potter book, and that expresses that belief 00:24:15.410 --> 00:24:17.510 align:middle line:84% and that feeling much more clearly 00:24:17.510 --> 00:24:19.310 align:middle line:90% than any of the books about-- 00:24:19.310 --> 00:24:23.120 align:middle line:84% even my beloved Tobias Wolff's narratives about being 00:24:23.120 --> 00:24:26.720 align:middle line:84% in college or being in a private school, you know? 00:24:26.720 --> 00:24:30.050 align:middle line:84% And so I guess that's a long really not elegant answer 00:24:30.050 --> 00:24:32.540 align:middle line:90% to the more elegant question. 00:24:32.540 --> 00:24:34.820 align:middle line:84% So we'll just take one more that isn't this brainy, 00:24:34.820 --> 00:24:38.245 align:middle line:90% and we'll call it, yeah? 00:24:38.245 --> 00:24:40.620 align:middle line:84% This is the easy one because the last question can always 00:24:40.620 --> 00:24:42.810 align:middle line:90% be bad or good. 00:24:42.810 --> 00:24:46.550 align:middle line:84% Can you speak about the Americas and machismo? 00:24:46.550 --> 00:24:49.800 align:middle line:90% The Americas and machismo-- 00:24:49.800 --> 00:24:51.720 align:middle line:90% guys, come on, man. 00:24:51.720 --> 00:24:54.360 align:middle line:84% I don't know if I can answer the Americans and machismo. 00:24:54.360 --> 00:24:55.480 align:middle line:90% All I know is this. 00:24:55.480 --> 00:24:57.300 align:middle line:90% Think about it. 00:24:57.300 --> 00:25:00.973 align:middle line:84% The primary institutions that this country was founded on-- 00:25:00.973 --> 00:25:03.390 align:middle line:84% this is where you get to roll your eyes back and fall back 00:25:03.390 --> 00:25:04.410 align:middle line:90% to sleep, guys. 00:25:04.410 --> 00:25:07.500 align:middle line:84% As soon as you hear "primary institutions," you're like, 00:25:07.500 --> 00:25:10.128 align:middle line:90% pass out. 00:25:10.128 --> 00:25:10.920 align:middle line:90% But think about it. 00:25:10.920 --> 00:25:15.990 align:middle line:84% I mean, if you think about the Church, 00:25:15.990 --> 00:25:19.440 align:middle line:84% it's a pretty boyariffic institution, you know? 00:25:19.440 --> 00:25:23.220 align:middle line:84% I mean, it's pretty boy heavy, you know? 00:25:23.220 --> 00:25:28.070 align:middle line:84% And it's all about worship a male. 00:25:28.070 --> 00:25:29.900 align:middle line:90% God's pretty much it, you know? 00:25:29.900 --> 00:25:31.760 align:middle line:84% If you think about the Church but then you 00:25:31.760 --> 00:25:33.950 align:middle line:84% think about the other major institution that 00:25:33.950 --> 00:25:36.830 align:middle line:84% for a very long time dominated the social sphere 00:25:36.830 --> 00:25:40.260 align:middle line:84% of the Americas, which was the plantation-- 00:25:40.260 --> 00:25:42.420 align:middle line:90% I mean, look at any country. 00:25:42.420 --> 00:25:44.498 align:middle line:84% And whether we like to talk about the fact 00:25:44.498 --> 00:25:46.290 align:middle line:84% that the country was founded in these terms 00:25:46.290 --> 00:25:48.630 align:middle line:84% or the Americans was funded in these terms, it's true. 00:25:48.630 --> 00:25:53.570 align:middle line:84% The plantation had a much longer history in the Americas 00:25:53.570 --> 00:25:55.460 align:middle line:84% than we'd like to give it credit for. 00:25:55.460 --> 00:25:57.890 align:middle line:84% Everyone thinks it was just this kind of weird aberration. 00:25:57.890 --> 00:26:01.640 align:middle line:84% It happened to you people, But almost all 00:26:01.640 --> 00:26:04.010 align:middle line:84% of what we call American identity, 00:26:04.010 --> 00:26:07.610 align:middle line:84% that was the foundry of it, and the plantation 00:26:07.610 --> 00:26:11.810 align:middle line:84% was a deeply masculinist project and enterprise. 00:26:11.810 --> 00:26:14.450 align:middle line:90% And then think about this place. 00:26:14.450 --> 00:26:15.605 align:middle line:90% I mean, the frontier? 00:26:15.605 --> 00:26:18.630 align:middle line:90% 00:26:18.630 --> 00:26:22.320 align:middle line:84% You couldn't think more boy shit than the frontier. 00:26:22.320 --> 00:26:23.910 align:middle line:84% I mean, the frontier was basically 00:26:23.910 --> 00:26:29.370 align:middle line:84% land grab plus race war plus race genocide plus boys 00:26:29.370 --> 00:26:32.550 align:middle line:90% shooting each other. 00:26:32.550 --> 00:26:35.220 align:middle line:84% And so I just think that all of these things-- 00:26:35.220 --> 00:26:35.935 align:middle line:90% we can't help it. 00:26:35.935 --> 00:26:38.310 align:middle line:84% We think that these histories have nothing to do with us. 00:26:38.310 --> 00:26:39.727 align:middle line:84% There's people who are like, well, 00:26:39.727 --> 00:26:42.240 align:middle line:90% I came from France in 1982. 00:26:42.240 --> 00:26:44.570 align:middle line:84% What the fuck does that have to do with me? 00:26:44.570 --> 00:26:50.310 align:middle line:84% Well, all of these histories, while they may feel local, 00:26:50.310 --> 00:26:53.310 align:middle line:90% had an enormous global impact. 00:26:53.310 --> 00:26:56.310 align:middle line:84% They shaped the dreams of the entire planet. 00:26:56.310 --> 00:27:00.570 align:middle line:84% When people say the Americas is the dream of the world, 00:27:00.570 --> 00:27:03.330 align:middle line:84% they don't just mean that positively. 00:27:03.330 --> 00:27:06.450 align:middle line:84% They mean a lot of the things that happened here, 00:27:06.450 --> 00:27:09.690 align:middle line:84% whether we had any part or none of it, shaped 00:27:09.690 --> 00:27:12.390 align:middle line:84% the grammar of the way that human beings dream 00:27:12.390 --> 00:27:14.583 align:middle line:90% across the planet. 00:27:14.583 --> 00:27:17.250 align:middle line:84% And that might seem like a weird thing to say and unsustainable, 00:27:17.250 --> 00:27:20.610 align:middle line:84% but if we had years, we could argue. 00:27:20.610 --> 00:27:22.620 align:middle line:90% And I probably won't lose. 00:27:22.620 --> 00:27:26.280 align:middle line:84% I might lose, but I probably won't. 00:27:26.280 --> 00:27:28.500 align:middle line:84% And I think that a huge component 00:27:28.500 --> 00:27:30.390 align:middle line:84% of what we call the American project 00:27:30.390 --> 00:27:33.480 align:middle line:84% has a lot to do with a masculinity 00:27:33.480 --> 00:27:36.810 align:middle line:84% that if a person speaks Spanish they call machismo, 00:27:36.810 --> 00:27:39.090 align:middle line:84% but if a person speaks English in the United States 00:27:39.090 --> 00:27:42.280 align:middle line:90% they call patriotism, you know? 00:27:42.280 --> 00:27:46.930 align:middle line:84% It finds a number of iterations, but it's extremely powerful. 00:27:46.930 --> 00:27:49.870 align:middle line:84% And it's a really wonderful way of feeding 00:27:49.870 --> 00:27:54.920 align:middle line:84% our youth into a horrifying machine, you know? 00:27:54.920 --> 00:27:58.850 align:middle line:84% So I think that when I write as a Dominican writer, 00:27:58.850 --> 00:28:01.220 align:middle line:84% mostly what I'm writing about is masculinity 00:28:01.220 --> 00:28:06.860 align:middle line:84% in the Americas, both Santo Domingo and the US. 00:28:06.860 --> 00:28:08.930 align:middle line:84% I guess, guys, I actually thought 00:28:08.930 --> 00:28:10.790 align:middle line:90% it was harder to be a man-- 00:28:10.790 --> 00:28:12.590 align:middle line:84% I thought the demands of masculinity 00:28:12.590 --> 00:28:15.860 align:middle line:84% were much more demanding in the US, you know? 00:28:15.860 --> 00:28:19.330 align:middle line:84% It was really inflexible when I immigrated here, you know? 00:28:19.330 --> 00:28:21.015 align:middle line:84% It's like the codes of being a boy. 00:28:21.015 --> 00:28:23.140 align:middle line:84% I don't know if you guys have little brothers, man. 00:28:23.140 --> 00:28:24.223 align:middle line:90% Watch the little brothers. 00:28:24.223 --> 00:28:26.020 align:middle line:84% It's tough being a boy in this country. 00:28:26.020 --> 00:28:27.895 align:middle line:84% I mean, we all know it's harder to be a girl, 00:28:27.895 --> 00:28:34.960 align:middle line:84% but I think there's very little scrutiny of how much boys have 00:28:34.960 --> 00:28:36.970 align:middle line:84% to leave behind to fit themselves 00:28:36.970 --> 00:28:42.400 align:middle line:84% into this nice little neat box we call "the guy," you know? 00:28:42.400 --> 00:28:44.505 align:middle line:84% And I watch my little cousins, and I'm like, 00:28:44.505 --> 00:28:45.880 align:middle line:84% it's almost like they psychically 00:28:45.880 --> 00:28:48.970 align:middle line:84% have to cut their arms and legs off to fit in there. 00:28:48.970 --> 00:28:51.100 align:middle line:90% So with that cheery statement-- 00:28:51.100 --> 00:28:53.550 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER]