Outside the Box: PALABRA by Melinda Palacio

elena minor, photo courtesy of PALABRA

The editor and publisher of PALABRA, a Magazine of Chicano & Latino Literary Art, keeps a fairly low profile. However, she was adventurous enough to meet with La Bloga. I’m lucky in that I have an insider’s view.

When I first heard about PALABRA in 2006, I sent many poems and short stories to the magazine, which were rejected. As someone who relishes rejection, I kept sending work to the magazine until I finally had a breakthrough with two poems in 2009 issue 5.

One important memo I’ll divulge has to do with the magazine’s visual aesthetics, a bit of information that might help potential contributors to the literary magazine. PALABRA is always spelled with capital letters and the publisher’s name is always spelled with lower case letters, as in “elena minor.” If you get this visual quality correct, she won’t frown at your submission or be in a bad mood when she reads your promising manuscript.

Remember, persistence. I don’t take anything for granted. PALABRA is an annual publication that rejected my work for three straight years, published my work in 2009, and rejected everything I sent in 2010. I’m happy to report that PALABRA has accepted my poetry for the forthcoming 2011 issue.

The Bay Area native started PALABRA in 2006 because she wasn’t finding any Latino literary magazines that published the kind of work she wanted to see. “I wanted writing that wasn’t geared to an Anglo audience, whose interest didn’t lie in trying to explain us (Chicanos and Latinos),” she said. “I wasn’t interested in footnoted Spanish. I wanted work that was different and unapologetically Latino.”

Over the past five years, PALABRA has taken on a life of its own. Also, she gets the word out by attending AWP, the Association of Writers and Writers Programs conference; this is her fourth year at the roving conference. In addition, she started the PALABRA readings at the REDCAT Lounge in the Disney Center in Downtown Los Angeles three years ago. She also gives authors who’ve been published in PALABRA the opportunity to read and feature their books at REDCAT. Working for CalArts at REDCAT helped secure the lounge’s excellent reading space. PALABRA Press will soon publish single-authored books of short, unconventional fiction.

Being the publisher, marketer, and editor of PALABRA takes its toll on minor’s writing time. She hopes to retire someday from all her jobs and devote more time to her writing. She’s an award-winning dramatist who also writes fiction, poetry, and hybrid works. She is currently polishing a poetry manuscript and working on an episodic novel. The MFA grad from Antioch puts her name out there and also rides the acceptance and rejection roller coaster. “I want to make sure they know Latino writers exist,” she said. “There are still a lot of editors of lit mags who have no clue about Latino literature.”

Eventually, the publisher would like to hand off the editorial decisions to someone else. For now, she thrives on finding exciting work that’s different. “I’m not a big fan of trying to repeat a formula,” she said. “I’m looking for writing that’s working from some well spring of originality.” She’s such a fan of originality, she tries to give that element of surprise in every issue and page of PALABRA: “I try to surprise people. Surprise is a reflection of the many different ways we write.” She’s also happy to discover new writers: “I enjoy the response of writers who’ve been published for the first time in PALABRA.”

This weekend I will attend the Fiction Bootcamp Intensive in Oxnard. You can join the next one March 11, 12, 13. Contact Toni Lopopolo or Shelly Lowenkopf. Shelly Lowenkopf is an editor and fiction instructor from Boyle Heights. He’s lived in New York and Mexico City and may surprise you by correcting your prose and Spanish. Toni Lopopolo is an East Coast agent, former executive editor at Macmillan and St. Martin’s press in New York City. The literary agent since 1991 is seeing novels written by Latinas. Try your luck with this NY agent, now based in Santa Barbara. The March intensive is for advanced novelist. So you think you’re advanced? Send some pages to Lopopolobooks@aol.com to find out before signing up for the 3-day intensive. The fee, including reception, is $350 for the March workshop that’s limited to 15 people.

Literary and Popular Fiction, my Agita, y Zapata

According to Judi Clark at mostlyfiction.com, "...it can be the broadest category and in a sense is a catch all, but the intention is to list books that really draw you in with language, imagery, character insight and sense of place".

In an article in the Guardian Unlimited, Robert McCrum wrote,"What is 'literary fiction'? To many, it's the titles on the short list for the Booker Prize. To some, it's those serious-minded novels of high artistic intent by writers with a passionate commitment to the moral purpose of fiction.
To others, it's a slippery piece of book jargon. It's certainly a label that's attracted its share of critical opprobrium. 'Literary' can be synonymous with 'highbrow', but I've heard 'pretentious' and even 'unreadable'. Literary fiction is what many writers aspire to, though quite a few will also run a mile at the first hint of it, too. Every reader will have his or her idea of what constitutes such a category".

(Above quotes from an online article by Nancy Boisseau)

I have this conversation with my sister blogista, Ann Cardinal about once a month. We're both writers, both MFA people, been to writer's residencies, and learned the hard way the ins and outs of getting published. One theme we keep coming back to is the idea of 'literary' vs. 'popular' fiction. Truth be told, I'm sort of a heretic in that I feel it's a false construct, much in the same way the term 'value-free-science/history/sociology' is.

I've read that popular fiction is more concerned with plot, less with character, less thought provoking. I categorically reject this. One blurb on literary fiction really drove home the point that I want to reject: that literary fiction is equal to literary merit. There's nothing artistic, nothing popular, nothing cultural that isn't influenced by the dynamic of who's in power, who's values, tastes, mores are held up as 'norms'. How is John Cheever considered literary fiction, and Raymond Chandler not? Shakespeare in his time was the bawdy, populist, people's scribe. How is superbly crafted noir any less about alienation than Salinger? Are there puerile, self-indulgent, navel gazing books out there with little wit and heart? Of course.

But I would say that you're just as likely to find them on The New York Times best-seller list as on the sale shelves at Borders. Really, it's something that's been in my craw for a while, gente, and so I'm opening the discussion for your two cents, too. Let's have at it!

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GENERAL!

From "The Story of the Questions -- The Real Story of Zapata:"

"That Zapata appeared here in the mountains. He wasn't born, they say. He just appeared just like that. They say he is Ik'al and Votan who came all the way over here in their long journey, and so as not to frighten good people, they became one. Because after being together for so long Ik'al and Votan learned they were the same and could become Zapata. And Zapata said he had finally learned where the long road went and that at times it would be light and at times darkness but that it was the same, Votan Zapata, and Ik'al Zapata, the black Zapata and the white Zapata. They were both the same road for the true men and women."

From current Zapatista writing: "The man who assassinated Zapata, Colonel Guajardo, was promoted to General and given a reward of 52,000 pesos for his act, instead of being tried and convicted. After being shot, Zapata was loaded onto a mule and taken to Cuautla, where he was dumped on the street. To prove that he was really dead, flashlights were shown on his face and photographs taken. This didn't destroy the myth of his death, because Zapata could not and would not die! Like Commandante Marcos, he was too smart to be killed in an ambush. Hadn't Zapata's white horse been seen on top of the mountain? Every single person in the valley of Morelos still believes to this day that Zapata is still alive. Perhaps they are right."

Lisa Alvarado