¿Tu tío?

El nuevo libro de relatos cortos Sam no es mi tío recoge crónicas de 24 destacados escritores latinoamericanos en las que se plasma su visión, real o imaginada, de la vida diaria en Estados Unidos.

Editada por Ailen El-Kadi y Diego Fonseca, la antología ofrece una muestra variada, tanto geográfica como temática, de la experiencia inmigrante.

Críticos, irónicos, humorísticos e inspiradores, estos relatos retratan la presencia latina dentro y fuera de los grandes centros latinos del país, destacando sus diversas realidades.

Según los editores, el proyecto nació al reconocer las contradicciones que marcan el diario vivir de los inmigrantes latinos en EE.UU.

“Estas crónicas son los relatos de nuestra microhistoria americana contemporánea”, declaran en la introducción al volumen.

Si bien la extensión del territorio americano y la diversidad de las experiencias que alberga es algo que resalta tras la lectura del conjunto, algunas crónicas se enfocan precisamente en el consuelo hospitalario que provee esa inmensidad.

En “Aquí está bien”, el peruano Daniel Alarcón relata su encuentro con un inmigrante indocumentado en East Oakland, California, a quien, después de una semana laboral, le niegan el pago prometido por su trabajo.

Recién llegado él mismo a la ciudad, Alarcón no tiene más que ofrecerle que una cerveza y un aventón al lugar donde se hospeda el desconocido.

Al llevarlo, se da cuenta que ninguno de los dos sabe con certeza adonde se dirige, ni lo que les deparará el destino en este inmenso país.

El recuerdo de ese encuentro le sirve a Alarcón como punto de partida para reflexionar sobre la extensión del país y la diversidad de la experiencia migrante.

A pesar de los elementos xenófobos y racistas que puedan haber marcado la experiencia inmigrante, el territorio, en su inmensidad, se describe como acogedor, ya que le permite al inmigrante la posibilidad de adaptar los recuerdos de su tierra al nuevo entorno.

En lugar del mítico melting pot, en esta crónica Alarcón nos ofrece una nueva imagen de este país de contrastes: un mural del Cañón del Colorado que vio en un restaurante tailandés del oeste al que los nuevos dueños le habían añadido dragones y templos budistas.

El 11 de septiembre aparece en varios de los relatos como un evento que define los temores de una era, como es el caso de “Terror” del brasileño João Paulo Cuenca, donde el ataque terrorista sirve como telón de fondo.

Escrito en formato teatral, el texto presenta a unos amantes en el extranjero que después de una noche de placer, despiertan con las noticias del ataque a las Torres Gemelas en la televisión.

Impactada al ver la tragedia que se despliega “en vivo” sobre su ciudad de residencia, la mujer se pregunta si su esposo habría perecido en el ataque.

“I am magical” del mexicano Yuri Herrera ofrece una perspectiva diferente al terror que arropó a EE.UU. en 2001.

Residente en El Paso, Texas, al momento del ataque, Herrera describe la aparente indiferencia hacia los hechos entre los latinos de la ciudad como una “independencia de criterio”, lo cual les permite observar sin inmiscuirse en los extremos patrióticos y xenófobos que parecían promover los medios comunicativos.

Otra crónica que se destaca por su sencillez de observación es “Buenos Aires, Alabama” del boliviano Edmundo Paz Soldán.

Allí recuenta su llegada a EE.UU. tras haber recibido una beca deportiva que ni siquiera había solicitado.

En vista de la oportunidad que se le presenta, el autor recuerda haber abandonado sus estudios en Buenos Aires para ingresar en el equipo de futbol de una universidad menor en el estado de Alabama.

Al llegar, sin embargo, le sorprende la indiferencia de la mayoría de los estadounidenses hacia ese deporte mayor en Latinoamérica, y reflexiona: “¡Qué país tan rico y poderoso, capaz de dar tremendas becas a jugadores de un deporte que no interesa!”

Con la intervención del tiempo, los amigos, un buen profesor y el amor, su actitud nostálgica y crítica de recién llegado, se va tornando más afable y comienza a descubrir las posibilidades que alberga esta extraña nación.

(SAM NO ES MI TÍO: veinticuatro crónicas migrantes y un sueño americano. Alfaguara. 304 páginas).

We Will Miss You: Ellen Levine

In the summer of 2003, I flew to Montpelier, Vermont for the first time. I was accepted to the MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults! I was so eager to learn all the writing skills to become a better children's Book author.  Ellen Levine was my first workshop leader. She read and critiqued my work and gave me the bienvenida to Vermont College.  During my two years at Vermont College, Ellen was always there with open arms to guide me into the field of children's literature. Ellen left Planet Earth on May 26, 2012. Ellen thank you for all your books! There are a treasure for all our niños and niñas around the world. 

To read her obituary visit http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/nytimes/obituary.aspx?n=ellen-levine&pid=157842058

I had the privilege to interview her in La Bloga in 2007. Here is the interview again for el recuerdo. 

Interview with Author Ellen Levine 

About Authenticity on Children's Literature

Ellen Levine is the author of several picture books including I HATE ENGLISH!, HENRY’S FREEDOM BOX, and IF YOUR NAME WAS CHANGED AT ELLIS ISLAND.

What does a picture book need to have in order to be multicultural?

Multiculturalism is by the cleanest definition the recognition of multiple cultures/ethnicities/races in a society. This, to my way of thinking, can only be a good thing: first, it recognizes reality; second, it reminds the dominant culture's institutions to work to reflect that reality.

When the term multiculturalism is invoked here (USA) about a piece of literature, it usually refers to a book centered around a world and characters who are not of the dominant white protestant world, although white protestants can certainly be part of the story. Although I haven't thought a great deal about this, I'd say off the top of my head that such a book generally has a viewpoint character who's not of the dominant culture/ethnicity/ race of the country in which the book is published. I'd be careful how much further I'd go in defining the category.

The problems arise to my way of thinking when rules are set forth and arbitrary standards mandated. Have you looked at Hazel Rochman's book AGAINST BORDERS: PROMOTING BOOKS FOR A MULTICULTURAL WORLD? In her introduction she writes about moving "beyond political correctness" both because it's stifling in itself and because it often provokes a backlash of reactionaries. Usually I myself avoid the term "political correctness" because it is used most often as a weapon by the right wing to stifle discussion. Call something "pc" and we all smile uncomfortably and don't discuss the substantive issues. But I acknowledge there are legitimate issues to discuss -- who can write about what. Actually for me, there's not much discussion when the question is phrased that way. 

Can an author write books outside his/ her culture?

My answer is anyone can write anything. And we all reserve the right to critique a work based not on the skin color or ethnic origin of the author, but on the accuracy, power, and beauty of the story. 

What do these authors need to do in order to write an authentic multicultural picture book?

Most important, and this applies to whoever writes the book: the same criteria exist that make any book good (or by contrast, unsuccessful or poor)-- no stereotypes and no socio-political-cultural errors. My point is if you think about it, we use these criteria even when we don't call a book "multicultural." To be sure, these criteria do take on meaning contoured in slightly different ways when we talk about nondominant cultures. Prejudice is often deeply embedded in socially-accepted images that are really reflections of the dominant culture's values and not accurate reflections of the culture portrayed. And so we get "lazy" Blacks or "chattering" and "noisy" Hispanics, or "stingy" and "inscrutable" Asians, etc. The reverse danger is that we romanticize or sentimentalize and keep "pure" and make "perfect" our minority protagonists and their stories. Both are to my way of thinking equally unacceptable.

We're often quick to question the motivation of the writer who's not a member of the group depicted if he or she has written of the characters with open eyes, that is, the ugly along with the beautiful. We should demand the same (rounded characters, real stories) of writers who are of the group they're writing about. The imperative is for accuracy, and this applies to fiction or nonfiction. There are many Hispanic, Black, Asian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, etc., sub-societies. No one person ever can speak for all. If writers are of the group they're writing about, then they start out with some bona fides, but they must recognize that notwithstanding their "insiderness," they still can't automatically count on being accurate, i.e., there are too many variations in any large social/ethnic/racial group.

If writers are not of the group they're writing about, they must have explored it deeply enough to reflect and reproduce it with accuracy and understanding. I don't know about the market in general; I tend to think about books one at a time, so I'm not much good to you there.

What inspired you to write I HATE ENGLISH!?

I can tell you a few things about I HATE ENGLISH! I spent several years working first on a television documentary about Chinatown in New York (we covered a little of San Francisco, but were really focused on NYC) and then tutoring Chinese immigrant kids at a Chinese community center. I even served a term on the board of the organization. I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours with Chinese immigrant young people, tutoring, counseling, sharing cups of tea and coffee, celebrating triumphs, sharing sadness, etc. When years later I sat down to write I HATE ENGLISH!, I was able to travel back in my mind and heart to those days.

And here's an interesting twist. The publisher decided to run the manuscript by a Chinese-American editor on staff. Her comments, as I told my editor, made little or no sense. And this wasn't surprising. She was born here to upper middle class parents and lived in that world, not the world of Chinatown with its immigrants and first generation kids. And so she didn't know the world I was writing about, even though she was of Asian background and I wasn't.

Another story: a Danish-born American I know (caucasian) wrote a children's book about the Hopi Indians. The first fan letter she got was from a Hopi couple who loved her book and, as they said in their letter, assumed she was Hopi. What she was in fact was a good researcher and writer.

Chicano Renaissance. Banned Books Update. On-Line Floricanto.

Chicano renaissance

Michael Sedano

I rode shotgun up from Deming to Silver City, New Mexico. We were heading up to meet with the vato who first published the phrase “the Chicano Renaissance,” Felipe Ortego. ¡Saludos Don Felipe!

Felipe Ortego

The first time I read the phrase “the Chicano Renaissance” I understood Ortego’s enthusiasm. Anyone surveying the United States literary landscape between the late 1960s through the 1980s would share Don Felipe’s comprehension that el movimiento was producing a new cultural current, and his metaphorical “renaissance” echoed historic emergences like in Florence or London or Harlem.

A new renaissance is stalking America, the Chicano Renaissance, and this time, it really is. The “Chicano Renaissance” grew from regional small press and newsmedia publication. Taken up by big publishing, Chicana Chicano literary production joined the institutional rat race.

Early literatura chicana mirrored and helped create the community ethos that, in multiple languages, featured images of la tierra and farmworkers, noble outcasts or hagiographic antepasados, a separate eden, a battle against a blue-eyed devil, a lost and ruined homeland.

A catalog of such dominant themes fails to capture the elegance, wit, and capacity of Chicana Chicano writers of that time and now. Then, it was chest-thumping time.

Today, a writer is likely to see the label “Chicana Chicano Writer” as a boundary against work being considered simply “American Literature.” That’s an irony that an apex of success for a Chicana Chicano writer would portend the end of “Chicano Literature.”

Fortunately, there’s likely a new Chicano Renaissance on the horizon, one that portends global penetration of raza writing into every market where readers who have a computer or an e-book reader can choose to read all manner of Chicana Chicano literature.

How does it look from your horizon? Leave a comment below, how does it?

Banned Books Update

Arizona’s laws remain on the books. The day after Veterans Day, it’s a good time to acknowledge my 19 months in uniform defended their hateful power. But we draftees were not going to roll over and play dead, we would actually die, if it came to that, so Arizona could elect people like those. Oh well.

Carmen Tafolla’s landmark collection, Curandera, is banned in Arizona. That doesn’t prevent people in Arizona or any place in the world, from buying the 30^th Anniversary Edition of Curandera from Wings Press.

This is what gives certain blue-eyed devils nightmares in Arizona:

Los Corts 2. (el chamaquito)

¡Jiiiii-jo! ¡Me jayé un daime!

¡Ta hueno eso!

Pa los airplanes que venden de wood

(¿O eran de cuara esas?)

Nuimporta—hasta los beisbol carts se compran a nicle

(También esos dientes de wax…)

Cuando llega Deri del trabajo, le voy a decir,

O le asusto con los dientes.

Y esa vieja mala a la tiendita

Que siempre me tá regañando,

Le voy a enseñar ese daime

Pa que vea

Pa que vea…

Show them your vote, pa que vean, Arizona. In the meantime, you can order Tafolla's banned book--order one to keep and one to donate to a local school library--from the publisher or any Independent Publishing Group bookseller.

Chicano Writer Donates to National Award

This is from the Hansen Publishing Group webpage commemorating La Bloga friend Gregg Barrios' leadership in United States letters.

Gregg Barrios, a board member of the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC), has donated funds for the NBCC Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing, which was established in 1987. 

Barrios’ donation provides first-time funding for the  award. NBCC President Eric Banks made the announcement in his “President’s Message”:

Thanks to a generous contribution from board member Gregg Barrios dedicated to funding the award, we are able for the first time to provide a monetary award to go along with the citation."

The 2012 recipient of the award will be presented with a citation and a $1,000 check. Gregg Barrios has donated enough money to fund the Balakian award for several years.

La Bloga Bloguero Daniel Olivas reported on Gregg's successful play RANCHO PANCHO. Gregg Barrios read at the historic second and third Festival de Flor y Canto. Click the publisher's website below for news of Barrios' upcoming books. 

http://hansenpublishing.com/gregg-barrios-funds-national-book-critics-circles-balakian-award/

On-Line Floricanto May 2012 Finale

 Abel Martinez, Ana Chig, Alma Luz Villanueva, Tom Sheldon, Elizabeth Cazessús

"Sleeping" by Abel Martinez

"Identidad perdida" by Ana Chig

"Querido Popocateptl" by Alma Luz Villanueva

"Lo siento" by Tom Sheldon

"Los rehenes" by Elizabeth Cazessús

SLEEPING

by Abel Martinez, 2012

At Mary McLeod Bethune

Elementary School,

Mr. Bonet’s feminine

Hips stretched against

His light blue

Polyester slacks.

He called to me,

Panting through

His nose,

Because he thought

That I was sleeping.

He grabbed the soft

Of my lobes

And shook them

Hard.

“Wake up, Martinez!”

But I wasn’t sleeping.

He’d patrol

His class,

Legs tightly rubbing

Against each other

As he stuck his finger

Thickly into the

Dark faces around him.

“Your people…”

“Makes me sick…”

He’d steal their candy,

Rubber band shooters,

Hot wheel cars,

And store them in a drawer

That dwarfed

In his immensity.

His voice,

A hammer

In a towel

Would bounce around the walls,

Rattle the thin dust

On the shudders

And scare me

Until I raised my hands

To my head

And pinched my elbows

Together

In front of my face.

He would explain

That Washington

Chopped down a tree

And Lincoln freed the slaves

And Martin Luther King

Fought for “our” rights

But it was just a waste of time;

That King did not anticipate

This border “situation”.

At the end of the day

Mr. Bonet would pay

His penance and

Call me over

After the last bell.

His plump

Pasty white hands

Surrounding nails

Tooth ground to the skin

Would reach into his desk

To pull out a rubber band shooter,

Or car,

And he’d place it in my hand,

Tousle my hair

And say, “Wake up, Martinez”

In a soft, chewy voice.

But I wasn’t sleeping

Mr. Bonet.

I wanted to tell him,

That there was no line

Between us,

But an expansion

That caused him

To seethe at the mouth

Over his desk

And hate his life

And the unlucky draw

Of a straw that drove him

To the West Side of Fresno

Every morning.

And I, seeing him burn,

Hated myself for his

Dumb luck.

I tried

Hard to straighten

My back

And still my boney knees.

I’d lift my head

To the ceiling

And drift away

Far – where my skin

Was the earth

And the sky held me

Above turbulent seas

Parted by my father’s

Thunder- my mother’s

Quiet storm;

And cooled me through

Glacial battles

Over imaginary lines

Drawn by Crypts and Bloods

And F-14 homeboys.

And somehow,
I made it here

To the dry lawns

And tan buildings,

With my circus hair

And crooked teeth,

Sloppy in the nose

And barely, just barely

Right in the head.

I wasn’t sleeping

Mr. Bonet,

I was dreaming.

SÉ QUE ESTA OSCURIDAD NO ES CIERTA

by Ana CHig

Sé que esta oscuridad no es cierta

Símbolos de peces nocturnos me acompañan

Uno, tres, dos desyelmados en cadena de esta patria mía

La sombra de un eclipse lo anunció hace días

Una serena y húmeda tarde anticipándose en romance con la luna

Y hubo un alfanje en la tarde de cielo, emblema curvo a una nueva era

Irremisible a hombres ya pasados

Al hombre que se hace fuerte en la ceniza 

Y la que ahora cae apocalíptica por la ruta luminosa

Un volcán activo como la conciencia inaplazable

Derramara el fruto de sueños y principios 

Porque esta oscuridad no es cierta, un nuevo sol ya anuncia la aurora…

Querido Popocateptl

by Alma Luz Villanueva

The villagers call you

father, brother, uncle, son-

I call you lover, my

ancient lover- flying in

to Mexio City I saw

your snowy peak, you

didn't fool me, I felt

the heat of your body,

your lava, your core,

your longing, for my

touch, ancient lover,

the Earth danced beneath

my feet, our Mother, la

Madre, she knew nothing

could keep me from you,

your body, your lava,

your core, the ancient 

memory of our union.

I dream your body, gift

from Earth, Sun, Moon,

every Star, I see

your molten eyes,

your molten mouth,

your molten hands,

your molten sex, lava

bright, meteor bright, first

eruption, genesis of

our longing. I am coming,

wait for me, I am dreaming,

wait for me, I am singing,

wait for me. I am dying

to receive. Your burning

body. Lava.

Lo siento

by Tom Sheldon

The sullen prep boy smirks

Sunshine patriots kowtow like humble sheep

While Wall street wails its siren song

Yale grads with laptops in lieu of carpetbaggers

Float under a beatific sky dreaming of vengeance?

All from a nation who in 300 years

That has never uttered the phrase Thank You, Please or I'm sorry.

LOS REHENES

por Elizabeth Cazessús

…el viento del crimen a la altura del delirio. Rodolfo Hasler

es la hora de escribir un poema acerca del mundo

de diagnosticar las formas en que amedrenta con su odio

y deslava el rostro de la sinrazón para justificar mil malabares políticos,

es hora de escribir que estamos al acecho de ladrones,

de gangsters, de capos del poder y la avaricia

ante la falta de libertad, la zozobra y su mezquina entelequia,

es hora de no callar lo escrito, aquello que no tiene razón en la sobremesa;

congestionadas las entropías mediáticas ante verdades telúricas y tan llanas;

es hora de nombrar en lo oscuro la íntima ejecución de los días,

la denuncia, el porvenir y la esperanza con un silencio atroz que no deje dudas;

es hora de contar metrallas, muertos, a los que corren,

ver la película en las calles y al desnudo,

dilucidar acaso en la espesura de ciertas e inexplicables densidades;

es hora de escribir un poema acerca del mundo,

de éste y no del otro bordado de metáforas,

ya no podemos escapar, no hay letras de salva,

somos rehenes de la impunidad que nos cohabita.

Copyright Elizabeth Cazessús, Tijuana, Baja California

BIOS

"Sleeping" by Abel Martinez

"Identidad perdida" by Ana Chig

"Querido Popocateptl" by Alma Luz Villanueva

"Lo siento" by Tom Sheldon

"Los rehenes" by Elizabeth Cazessús

 Abel Martinez’s upbringing continues to inspire and direct his writing and his professional choices.  Born in the West Side of Fresno, California; where poverty and violence collaborated against residents on a daily basis, Abel chose creative outlets rather than a destructive relationship with the gangs that existed in his world.  Abel left the barrio years ago, but returns every day in his writings and in his work as a Clinician for children and families.

Abel continues to write poetry and has more recently had the honor of contributing to the Facebook page Poets Responding To SB 1070, as well as having the great honor of being published in the online journal, La Bloga.  

Ana Chig. Poeta. Residente de la ciudad Fronteriza Tijuana, Baja California.  Es Editora y fundadora del proyecto Frontera Esquina, Revista Mensual de Poesía que se distribuye en Tijuana y San Diego, California.

Actualmente coordina el programa POETIC BORDERS que se realiza en La Casa del Túnel Art Center.

Ha participado en recitales poéticos, lecturas urbanas y conversatorios organizados por diferentes instituciones y centros culturales.  Su obra aparece publicada en diversos medios electrónicos, revistas y prensa escrita.

Alma Luz Villanueva was raised in the Mission District, San Francisco, by her Yaqui grandmother, Jesus Villanueva- she was a curandera/healer from Sonora, Mexico. Without Jesus no poetry, no stories, no memory...

Author of eight books of poetry, most recently, 'Soft Chaos' (2009). A few poetry anthologies: 'The Best American Poetry, 1996,' 'Unsettling America,' 'A Century of Women's Poetry,' 'Prayers For A Thousand Years, Inspiration from Leaders & Visionaries Around The World.' Three novels: 'The Ultraviolet Sky,' 'Naked Ladies,' 'Luna's California Poppies,' and the short story collection, 'Weeping Woman, La Llorona and Other Stories.' Some fiction anthologies: '500 Great Books by Women, From The Thirteenth Century,' 'Caliente, The Best Erotic Writing From Latin America,' 'Coming of Age in The 21st Century,' 'Sudden Fiction Latino.' The poetry and fiction has been published in textbooks from grammar to university, and is used in the US and abroad as textbooks. Has taught in the MFA in creative writing program at Antioch University, Los Angeles, for the past fourteen years.

     Alma Luz Villanueva now lives in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, for the past seven years, traveling the ancient trade routes to return to teach, and visit family and friends, QUE VIVA!! And taking trips throughout Mexico, working on a novel in progress, always the poetry, memory.

www.almaluzvillanueva.com

I’m Tom Sheldon, I was born in New Mexico on 9 Dec 1958, and come from a large Hispanic

family. As far as my own personal history in Art goes, it is brief. I have always

appreciated the gift of creating since I was young. I like all mediums and love

(Southwestern) nature and organic based subjects. While I have had little in the way of

formal training and education, I've enjoyed a modicum of success, mostly in

drawing/drafting. I teach students on occasion, and have also illustrated for (HWI) Hawk

Watch International. I also enjoy the Art of photography.

My work has shown in local galleries, as well as the Museum of Natural History here. I

have won art competitions at the State Fair level. I also love to write poetry; my poetry

was featured in La Bloga, Monique's Passions e-magazine, Poets Supporting SB1070 on

Facebook, and also, Writers in the Storm (October,1992)....

Elizabeth Cazessús, Tijuana B. C. México. Realizó Periodismo Cultural de 1985 al 1992 en Tijuana. Es autora de siete libros de poesía: Ritual y Canto,1994, Mujer de Sal, 2000; Huella en el agua, IMAC; Veinte Apuntes antes de dormir; 1995; 2001; “Casa del sueño”,  2006; “Razones de la dama infiel”, Gíglico ediciones 2008; No es mentira este paraíso, 2009.  Enediana, Giglico, 2011.

Su obra ha sido traducida al inglés y al polaco.
 Y está incluida en varias antologías: “Across the  Line”, Junction Press 2003; Trilogía de Poetas de Hispanoamérica Pícaras, Místicas y Rebeldes, 2004; Antología Femenina de Poesía Hispanoamericana, “El Rastro de las Mariposas”, Perú, 2006; Antología de “Voces Sin Fronteras”, Montreal, Canadá, 2006; Mujeres Poetas de México (1945-1965), Atemporia, 2008; Revista de Poesía, La Nueva Región de los poetas (Nowa Okolica Poetow), Varsovia, Polonia, 2008; San Diego Poetry Annual, Ca. E.U.A. 2008; Nectáfora, Antología del Beso en la Poesía Mexicana, México,  D.F. 2009.

Obtuvo la beca del FONCA de B. C. 1998.
Ha obtenido los premios: Municipal de Poesía, en los Juegos Florales de Tijuana, 1992;
Premio de Poesía, Anita Pompa de Trujillo en Hermosillo, Sonora, 1995.
Ha  participado con su obra en encuentros Internacionales, en Chile Poesía, Puerto Rico, Cuba, México, Estado Unidos, Canadá.

A TESTAMENT TO THE BRAVERY AND CONTRIBUTIONS OF LATINOS WHO FOUGHT IN WW II

[In honor of Memorial Day, I am reprising this piece that originally appeared on November 12, 2007.]

As I was browsing at Williams’ Book Store in San Pedro recently, I came upon a book with a title that caught my eye: Arizona's Hispanic Flyboys 1941-1945 (Writers Club Press, 2002) by Rudolph C. Villarreal (pictured below). I flipped through its pages and immediately knew that I had to buy it. The first thought that went through my mind was: Ken Burns should have read this book.

La Bloga has extensively covered the controversy over Burns’ initial failure to include any interviews – whatsoever – with Latino veterans of World War II for his PBS documentary, The War. Only after much public outcry did he relent and add a couple of interviews. Then we learned from Gus Chavez of Defend the Honor Campaign that in the book version of the documentary, other than one reference to Mexicans when describing the population of Sacramento, Burns excludes any reference to the Latinos who served in our armed forces.

Burns should have read Villarreal’s book before moving forward with his version of history. Though Villarreal limits his book to Latinos from Arizona who flew or supported flight crews, he was able to tell the story of 77 – yes, 77 – Latinos who served this country during WW II. As Villarreal notes in his introduction:

World War II remains probably the most significant historical event of the 20th Century. It has been well documented in print and film over the last sixty years. Not much, however, has been written about Hispanics who served in uniform from 1941 through 1945. This is especially true of those who served in the so-called "glamorous" air corps of the US Army and Navy. This is a documentary of Hispanic young men from Arizona who served as pilots, navigators, bombardiers, flight engineers, gunners, and radio operators. Hispanics make up the largest ethnic minority in Arizona. Many of Arizona's Hispanics served valiantly in ground and sea forces during WWII, and today, in the Hispanic community as elsewhere, their service is remembered proudly. Less well known, however, is the contribution made by those young men in the elite volunteer services that fought the war from above.

Each “flyboy” receives a chapter that begins with the basics: a photo (if available), hometown, branch served, rank, duty (i.e., bombardier, pilot, engineer, gunner, etc.), medals won and where they did battle. Villarreal offers a narrative of each life, often footnoted, and sometimes he includes newspaper clippings with such headlines as “Sgt. Estrada Dies in Action,” or “Five Yuma Fliers Killed in Crash” or “Missing: Mesa Fighter Pilot.” These are heartbreaking accounts that are personalized by Villarreal’s extensive research. Sometimes Villarreal has nothing more than one newspaper clipping to offer; even these short entries are moving and enlightening. Other times, he has enough information to write extensively on a flyboy’s education, family and acts of valor. Sometimes we read letters from a flyboy to his loved ones. Here is an excerpt from such letter:

England-E.T.O
August 17, 1943

Hello Dad,

I have never been so tired before. My hands are still jittery with the shock of the guns. I may be able to get a good sleep tonight. Our raid today will be old headlines when you receive this, but we gave Jerry hell. It is rugged, dad... Write as often as you can. Perhaps I will hear from you. I am tired and may have to go again tomorrow. How is everybody? I wonder how little Diane is doing. Hector.

Lt. Hector E. De Vargas was killed two months later flying a mission over Germany.

At the end of his book, Villarreal includes an appendix explaining the numerous (and inevitable) acronyms and abbreviations used throughout the text. Interestingly, Villarreal also offers an in-depth bibliography which demonstrates that others have chronicled the role of Latinos in WW II.

Villarreal is a native of Morenci, Arizona, and currently makes his home in Tempe with his wife, Mary Ellen. He is a graduate of Northrop Institute of Technology, and is retired after 30 years in the aerospace industry, having worked for Douglas, Lockheed and Allied Signal. Villarreal served in the United States Army from 1964 to 1966.

Flyboys from Arizona with names like Sosa, Gallegos, Ochoa and Campos fill these pages with their brave acts and dedication. If Villarreal could tell the stories of 77 Latino flyboys from one state, how is it that Burns failed so miserably in his attempt to tell the "real" story of those who fought in WW II?

In sum, Villarreal has written a gripping and indispensable testament to the bravery and contributions of Latinos who fought in World War II.

Arizona’s Hispanic Flyboys may be purchased through a myriad of online booksellers or you can ask for it at your favorite bookstore and they will order it for you. Also, if you wish to read an interesting profile of Villarreal, visit this link to a piece written last year by Angela Cara Pancrazio for The Arizona Republic. [Photo credits: photo of Rudolph C. Villarreal from The Arizona Republic; photo of a group of Flyboys from p. 171 of book.]

Make good art

It's graduation time again, and graduation commencement address time. This year I decided not to compose an address, since once again my alma maters didn't return my calls about inviting me to speak. Instead, I'm sharing two inspiring pieces by other writers. First, the one below by Neil Gaiman to the class of 2012 at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

Gaiman is famous and gifted. Born in England, he now lives in the U.S. and if you've never read his Sandman, you've missed out on a classic. He's won a Newbery and Carnegie Medals 4 Hugos, 2 Nebulas, 1 World Fantasy Award, 4 Bram Stoker Awards, 6 Locus Awards, 2 British SF Awards, 1 British Fantasy Award, 3 Geffens, 1 International Horror Guild Award and 2 Mythopoeic Awards. And that's not the full list.

In a period of U.S. history where the job market is bleak and the average college loan burden, enslaving, a writer who never attended college but nevertheless found something elusive in life, shares his thoughts, relevant to all Americans, whatever our heritage.
[If you prefer to hear the video of this, go here.]

By Neil Gaiman:
I never really expected to find myself giving advice to people graduating from an establishment of higher education.  I never graduated from any such establishment. I never even started at one. I escaped from school as soon as I could, when the prospect of four more years of enforced learning before I'd become the writer I wanted to be was stifling.

I got out into the world, I wrote, and I became a better writer the more I wrote, and I wrote some more, and nobody ever seemed to mind that I was making it up as I went along, they just read what I wrote and they paid for it, or they didn't, and often they commissioned me to write something else for them.

Which has left me with a healthy respect and fondness for higher education that those of my friends and family, who attended Universities, were cured of long ago.

Looking back, I've had a remarkable ride. I'm not sure I can call it a career, because a career implies that I had some kind of career plan, and I never did. The nearest thing I had was a list I made when I was 15 of everything I wanted to do: to write an adult novel, a children's book, a comic, a movie, record an audiobook, write an episode of Doctor Who... and so on. I didn't have a career. I just did the next thing on the list.

So I thought I'd tell you everything I wish I'd known starting out, and a few things that, looking back on it, I suppose that I did know. And that I would also give you the best piece of advice I'd ever got, which I completely failed to follow.

First of all: When you start out on a career in the arts you have no idea what you are doing.

This is great. People who know what they are doing know the rules, and know what is possible and impossible. You do not. And you should not. The rules on what is possible and impossible in the arts were made by people who had not tested the bounds of the possible by going beyond them. And you can.

If you don't know it's impossible it's easier to do. And because nobody's done it before, they haven't made up rules to stop anyone doing that again, yet.

Secondly, If you have an idea of what you want to make, what you were put here to do, then just go and do that.

And that's much harder than it sounds and, sometimes in the end, so much easier than you might imagine. Because normally, there are things you have to do before you can get to the place you want to be. I wanted to write comics and novels and stories and films, so I became a journalist, because journalists are allowed to ask questions, and to simply go and find out how the world works, and besides, to do those things I needed to write and to write well, and I was being paid to learn how to write economically,  crisply, sometimes under adverse conditions, and on time.

Sometimes the way to do what you hope to do will be clear cut, and sometimes  it will be almost impossible to decide whether or not you are doing the correct thing, because you'll have to balance your goals and hopes with feeding yourself, paying debts, finding work, settling for what you can get.

Something that worked for me was imagining that where I wanted to be – an author, primarily of fiction, making good books, making good comics and supporting myself through my words – was a mountain. A distant mountain. My goal.

And I knew that as long as I kept walking towards the mountain I would be all right. And when I truly was not sure what to do, I could stop, and think about whether it was taking me towards or away from the mountain. I said no to editorial jobs on magazines, proper jobs that would have paid proper money because I knew that, attractive though they were, for me they would have been walking away from the mountain. And if those job offers had come along earlier I might have taken them, because they still would have been closer to the mountain than I was at the time.

I learned to write by writing. I tended to do anything as long as it felt like an adventure, and to stop when it felt like work, which meant that life did not feel like work.

Thirdly, When you start off, you have to deal with the problems of failure. You need to be thickskinned, to learn that not every project will survive. A freelance life, a life in the arts, is sometimes like putting messages in bottles, on a desert island, and hoping that someone will find one of your bottles and open it and read it, and put something in a bottle that will wash its way back to you: appreciation, or a commission, or money, or love. And you have to accept that you may put out a hundred things for every bottle that winds up coming back.

The problems of failure are problems of discouragement, of hopelessness, of hunger. You want everything to happen and you want it now, and things go wrong. My first book – a piece of journalism I had done for the money, and which had already bought me an electric typewriter  from the advance – should have been a bestseller. It should have paid me a lot of money. If the publisher hadn't gone into involuntary liquidation between the first print run selling out and the second printing, and before any royalties could be paid, it would have done.

And I shrugged, and I still had my electric typewriter and enough money to pay the rent for a couple of months, and I decided that I would do my best in future not to write books just for the money. If you didn't get the money, then you didn't have anything. If I did work I was proud of, and I didn't get the money, at least I'd have the work.

Every now and again, I forget that rule, and whenever I do, the universe kicks me hard and reminds me. I don't know that it's an issue for anybody but me, but it's true that nothing I did where the only reason for doing it was the money was ever worth it, except as bitter experience. Usually I didn't wind up getting the money, either.  The things I did because I was excited, and wanted to see them exist in reality have never let me down, and I've never regretted the time I spent on any of them.

The problems of failure are hard.

The problems of success can be harder, because nobody warns you about them.

The first problem of any kind of even limited success 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.

In my case, I was convinced that there would be a knock on the door, and a man with a clipboard (I don't know why he carried a clipboard, in my head, but he did) would be there, to tell me it was all over, and they had caught up with me, and now I would have to go and get a real job, one that didn't consist of making things up and writing them down, and reading books I wanted to read. And then I would go away quietly and get the kind of job where you don't have to make things up any more.

The problems of success. They're real, and with luck you'll experience them. The point where you stop saying yes to everything, because now the bottles you threw in the ocean are all coming back, and have to learn to say no.

I watched my peers, and my friends, and the ones who were older than me and watch how miserable some of them were: I'd listen to them telling me that they couldn't envisage a world where they did what they had always wanted to do any more, because now they had to earn a certain amount every month just to keep where they were. They couldn't go and do the things that mattered, and that they had really wanted to do; and that seemed as a big a tragedy as any problem of failure.

And after that, the biggest problem of success is that the world conspires to stop you doing the thing that you do, because you are successful. There was a day when I looked up and realised that I had become someone who professionally replied to email, and who wrote as a hobby.  I started answering fewer emails, and was relieved to find I was writing much more.

Fourthly, I hope you'll make mistakes. If you're making mistakes, it means you're out there doing something. And the mistakes in themselves can be useful. I once misspelled Caroline, in a letter, transposing the A and the O, and I thought, “Coraline looks like a real name...”

And remember that whatever discipline you are in, whether you are a musician or a photographer, a fine artist or a cartoonist, a writer, a dancer, a designer, whatever you do you have one thing that's unique. You have the ability to make art.

And for me, and for so many of the people I have known, that's been a lifesaver. The ultimate lifesaver. It gets you through good times and it gets you through the other ones.

Life is sometimes hard. Things go wrong, in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all the other ways that life can go wrong. And when things get tough, this is what you should do.

Make good art.

I'm serious. Husband runs off with a politician? Make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by mutated boa constrictor? Make good art. IRS on your trail? Make good art. Cat exploded? Make good art. Somebody on the Internet thinks what you do is stupid or evil or it's all been done before? Make good art. Probably things will work out somehow, and eventually time will take the sting away, but that doesn't matter. Do what only you do best. Make good art.

Make it on the good days too.

And Fifthly, while you are at it, make your art. Do the stuff that only you can do.
 
The urge, starting out, is to copy. And that's not a bad thing. Most of us only find our own voices after we've sounded like a lot of other people. But the one thing that you have that nobody else has is you. Your voice, your mind, your story, your vision. So write and draw and build and play and dance and live as only you can.

The moment that you feel that, just possibly, you're walking down the street naked, exposing too much of your heart and your mind and what exists on the inside, showing too much of yourself. That's the moment you may be starting to get it right.

The things I've done that worked the best were the things I was the least certain about, the stories where I was sure they would either work, or more likely be the kinds of embarrassing failures people would gather together and talk about  until the end of time. They always had that in common: looking back at them, people explain why they were inevitable successes. While I was doing them, I had no idea.

I still don't. And where would be the fun in making something you knew was going to work?

And sometimes the things I did really didn't work. There are stories of mine that have never been reprinted. Some of them never even left the house. But I learned as much from them as I did from the things that worked.

Sixthly. I will pass on some secret freelancer knowledge. Secret knowledge is always good. And it is useful for anyone who ever plans to create art for other people, to enter a freelance world of any kind. I learned it in comics, but it applies to other fields too. And it's this:

People get hired because, somehow, they get hired. In my case I did something which these days would be easy to check, and would get me into trouble, and when I started out, in those pre-internet days, seemed like a sensible career strategy: when I was asked by editors who I'd worked for, I lied. I listed a handful of magazines that sounded likely, and I sounded confident, and I got jobs. I then made it a point of honour to have written something for each of the magazines I'd listed to get that first job, so that I hadn't actually lied, I'd just been chronologically challenged... You get work however you get work.

People keep working, in a freelance world, and more and more of today's world is freelance, because their work is good, and because they are easy to get along with, and because they deliver the work on time. And you don't even need all three. Two out of three is fine. People will tolerate how unpleasant you are if your work is good and you deliver it on time. They'll forgive the lateness of the work if it's good, and if they like you. And you don't have to be as good as the others if you're on time and it's always a pleasure to hear from you.

When I agreed to give this address, I started trying to think what the best advice I'd been given over the years was.

And it came from Stephen King twenty years ago, at the height of the success of Sandman. I was writing a comic that people loved and were taking seriously. King had liked Sandman and my novel with Terry Pratchett, Good Omens, and he saw the madness, the long signing lines, all that, and his advice was this:
“This is really great. You should enjoy it.”

And I didn't. Best advice I got that I ignored.Instead I worried about it. I worried about the next deadline, the next idea, the next story. There wasn't a moment for the next fourteen or fifteen years that I wasn't writing something in my head, or wondering about it. And I didn't stop and look around and go, this is really fun. I wish I'd enjoyed it more. It's been an amazing ride. But there were parts of the ride I missed, because I was too worried about things going wrong, about what came next, to enjoy the bit I was on.

That was the hardest lesson for me, I think: to let go and enjoy the ride, because the ride takes you to some remarkable and unexpected places.

And here, on this platform, today, is one of those places. (I am enjoying myself immensely.)

To all today's graduates: I wish you luck. Luck is useful. Often you will discover that the harder you work, and the more wisely you work, the luckier you get. But there is luck, and it helps.

We're in a transitional world right now, if you're in any kind of artistic field, because the nature of distribution is changing, the models by which creators got their work out into the world, and got to keep a roof over their heads and buy sandwiches while they did that, are all changing. I've talked to people at the top of the food chain in publishing, in bookselling, in all those areas, and nobody knows what the landscape will look like two years from now, let alone a decade away. The distribution channels that people had built over the last century or so are in flux for print, for visual artists, for musicians, for creative people of all kinds.

Which is, on the one hand, intimidating, and on the other, immensely liberating. The rules, the assumptions, the now-we're supposed to's of how you get your work seen, and what you do then, are breaking down. The gatekeepers are leaving their gates. You can be as creative as you need to be to get your work seen. YouTube and the web (and whatever comes after YouTube and the web) can give you more people watching than television ever did. The old rules are crumbling and nobody knows what the new rules are.

So make up your own rules.

Someone asked me recently how to do something she thought was going to be difficult, in this case recording an audio book, and I suggested she pretend that she was someone who could do it. Not pretend to do it, but pretend she was someone who could. She put up a notice to this effect on the studio wall, and she said it helped.

So be wise, because the world needs more wisdom, and if you cannot be wise, pretend to be someone who is wise, and then just behave like they would.

And now go, and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here. Make good art. – Neil Gaiman, May 17, 2012

From RudyG: A writer who I obviously respect once said that one of my fantasy stories reminded her of Gaiman's writings. You can go to Rudy Rucker's Flurb #13 to see a current sci-fi story of mine, Last Call for Ice Cream, that might make you realize how subjective such opinions can be.

Es todo, hoy