Poetry, Inclusivity, and Creativity in Classrooms

Last month, I spoke at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. Dr. Linda Pavonetti had invited me to visit her class, “The Author’s & Illustrator’s Art & Craft.” I was intrigued by the concept for the class. The masters students in education study the work of the visiting authors, illustrators, editors, etc. prior to the lecturer’s arrival. On the day I visited, I used my book ZING! as the basis for my PowerPoint focusing first on my books of poetry and why it’s my favorite genre as a writer. Sadly, many teachers feel hesitant to teach poetry though it’s a fine way to foster delight in language and to strengthen our writing at any age. I also stressed the importance of being inclusive of all the various parts of ourselves and of enjoying diversity in literature, colleagues and students. A key theme of my remarks was the seven practices I propose in ZING! to help nurture creativity in ourselves, our colleagues, and our pupils.

Symbols for the seven creative practices of ZING!

My flight experiences on this trip were the worst of my life (the challenge of flying these days), BUT I so enjoyed part two of the class when, after meeting in groups, the students asked me many thought-provoking questions. As educators at all levels prepare for a new academic year, I wish them excitement as they prepare to foster creativity in themselves and their students. Life’s details, technology, etc. can snare us. I find it takes daily effort to value our unique inventiveness.

Creativity Salon: an Interview with Metal Artist Anna Jaquez

Anna Jaquez

Welcome to my Bookjoy Creativity Salon, Anna. You and I are both from El Paso, and you teach art at UTEP where I taught part-time and was an administrator. I feel so fortunate to have met you on recent visits and am amazed by the art you produce. Miniatures in metal, no less. I can’t fully express how honored I am that some of your pieces are based in my poems. The whole notion leaves me a bit breathless.

Please begin by briefly introducing yourself.

AJ: I was born and raised in El Paso, Texas shortly after my parents migrated from Mexico. I am a life long resident of El Paso where I graduated from UTEP with a BFA then MA in Metals, then went on to receive an MFA from NMSU in 1993. I am now an artist and a lecturer at UTEP, active in several art organizations.

Have you always thought of yourself as creative?

AJ: The word “creative” is problematic for me because it can be intimidating for what it represents. I remember feeling envious of my siblings’ artistic creativity when my mother would challenge us to draw and color a picture to see who could create the most beautiful piece. I would sit and stare at the blank white page, afraid of ruining the perfect white paper with my “uncreative” marks, a frustration that follows me to this day.

How do you nurture your creativity?

AJ: Nature often incites the flame of creativity, but music, poetry, and exploring other visual artists’ work helps focus my inspiration and nurture my creativity.

What are your challenges in your creativity practices?  Is fear an element?

AJ: I always fear that things will not progress smoothly, since failure with a technique can destroy the creative process or omission of the minutest details can adversely affect its creative impact.

Do you have a space that helps you be more creative?

AJ: I do have a few spaces throughout my house that are important in recharging my spirit, yet aside from feeding the spirit, an artist must have a workable space to accomplish what he/her sets out to do, and despite the tiny 12’x 16’ space, my backyard studio is quiet, well lit, and comfortable.

We’re including your pieces based on my poems. Can you tell us which poems, your titles for the pieces, and how you decided to create these them? What was the process?

AJ: “There Was a Woman”(from Agua Santa: Holy Water) left me with a desire to make a visual interpretation of the overwhelming essence of lemon and woman as envy incarnate. The idea for Limonacida evolved from countless readings of the poem to help identify the kind of imagery necessary to convey my view of the poem. I knew I wanted to incorporate the luscious yellow fruit cradled in hands throughout the tree; however, the concept for the squeezed half lemons was an after thought, to exaggerate the lemons to a point where the viewer could practically smell and taste them. The dark overtones of the knives refers to the woman’s piercing and cutting attitude, while the mountain of sucked lemons alludes to her rotting teeth – victims of acidic excess.

Limonacida

In contrast, Colibri Argentina: Argollada is a much softer approach. I relate to “Pajarita” (from Borders) because of how I see my own mother and how she seems to defy all the odds in her daily battle against Diabetes. Despite her tired, frail body, she continues to live as the woman described in the poem, quietly and subtly enjoying life’s small pleasures.

I love the puissance of the cage analogy, and how in my mother’s case, her home is a place of confining security. Even after my father’s passing, my mother seems to demonstrate her newfound liberty yet continues to be confined in the same cage.

Colibri Argentina:  Argollada

What is your advice to people who doubt their artistic ability?

AJ: Stephen Vollmer once told me, “I don’t believe there is any bad art, it is simply a stepping stone for the next piece.” Express your creativity, since you never know where your stepping-stones will lead.

Creativity Salon: an Interview with Dr. Janice Gould

I’ll begin the post by saying: Welcome to my Bookjoy Creativity Salon, Janice, and congratulations on recently receiving tenure at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. You are a new friend with whom I’ve so enjoyed spending time recently.

Photo by credit Jason Ordaz, School for Advanced Research, Santa Fe, NM

 1. You’re a poet, scholar, teacher, musician, photographer, a woman creative in so many ways. When and how did your awareness of your creativity begin?

JG: My mother encouraged my sisters and me to be creative when we were just little. She gave us lots of room to explore our world and to play. We made up stories and acted them out: we were pioneers, cowboys, Indians, detectives, railroad engineers, wanderers and explorers. I liked to draw and color; my mom was always enthusiastic about my work. She taught us music—we had a piano—and we were always singing. In first grade, I wrote a poem about the rain, and doing this I realized all in a flash how I felt about rain, how I perceived it.

Writing that little poem provided me with an opportunity to gain insight into how I connect with the natural world. I had found a new way to see things and it felt exciting and marvelous.

2. Thinking back to yourself in third grade, are you surprised at what you are doing now, at the woman you have become?
JG: When I was in third grade, I had a teacher who segregated our class, putting all the “dark” children together, and treating us one way, and placing all the white children together and treating them another way—giving them certain privileges, and treating us “dark” children as if we were too “dumb” to protest this. Back in those days, we learned folk dancing as part of our curriculum. The teacher didn’t want the white children to partner with the “dark” children.

My mother had talked with my sisters and me about discrimination based on race, something she had faced as a young person (and as an adult). It seemed wrong to me that the teacher had separated us children into distinct groups. I went home and complained about this to my parents. The sense of social justice and injustice my mom instilled in us still resides in me.

I was also sure from an early age that I wanted to be an artist. I loved drawing, enjoyed making music, and as a teenager began exploring poetry. I studied oboe, and when I started college, I majored in music. But because I liked to read and write, and because I was rebellious in my own way, I eventually followed the path of poetry.

After I realized that I was a lesbian (I was a teenager, and this was an era when people did not talk about sexuality or sexual orientation), I felt that there was no place where I could be naturally and truthfully myself. It was a very difficult time, and it took years before I felt comfortable being “open” about my sexual preference. As feminism emerged on the scene, making it possible for girls and women to dream and imagine different possibilities for themselves, the world opened up in new ways. I found I could live truthfully.

3. Family and nature seem deep sources of inspiration for your poetry, yes? Are they also sources for your other creative work?
JG: While family and the natural world are to be sources for my writing, it is the idea of relationship that motivates and inspires me. As a photographer—and I am an amateur at this practice—I love recording the natural world. I respond affectionately to “landscape” in my photographic work and also with my music.
Friendship and love are equally inspiring sources for writing. Perhaps inwardly (and against all reason), I am always fearful that love will withdraw, leaving me bereft, lacerated, and in a kind of despair. The power of that withdrawal is frightening to me. I have always pursued intense friendships and sought intensity in lovers. And like many artists and others, I desire praise; it helps feed creativity. “Am I connecting with you?” is my unspoken question.

4. Are your varied creative expressions connected?
JG: Yes, but I’m not entirely sure how. Music and poetry have much in common: sound, rhythm, and tone. My poetry tends to be lyrical—I sometimes use more formal structures to express an idea, though I also employ free verse. My work is also narrative. My impulse, again, is to connect with others through emotional knowledge, through the body’s knowledge.

I’m still learning how to take photographs. I notice in professional photography uses of lighting or coloring that ask me to look deeper, to observe the surface and also what lies below the surface, what emerges from another layer. I am drawn to work that is generous, inclusive, and affectionate, that helps us connect with the beautiful and fecund world.

5. You have studied and been inspired by the grand Spanish poet Federico García Lorca. What fascinates you about his voice on the page?
JG: Lorca seemed aware of the power that brings both life and death. He called it “duende,” a term that we associate with flamenco, with the movements and rhythms of dance, theater, and performance. In his famous essay on this subject, Lorca disposed of the muse and the angel, forces that worked for earlier generations of writers—those given to nostalgia or pure intellectualism. He wanted to tap into a stronger impulse, something that came right up out of the earth and entered the body, tearing away masks and pretences, useless language, politeness, effeteness. He wanted to connect with something that felt more raw, “primitive,” and truthful. For him, it seems, truth could be found in the magic of the natural world: in wind, shadow, snow, and water; in the various acids that eat away at surface; in death and decay.

While Lorca’s imagination could explore violence, he tempered violence with language, always aware of the sounds of lamentation, loneliness, and longing. As a homosexual living under the repressive order of that day and time, he probably experienced life as a surface, for when people cannot live openly, they must resort to secrecy and deceptions—ways to carry on their own natural impulses inwardly when the reality of the surface prohibits and disdains them. I believe that Lorca imagined the stultification and sterility of Spanish conservatism through a feminine reality (for example in his plays) because it was clear to him that women suffered from sexual and political repression. Yet Lorca’s voice seldom feels “political,” and never didactic. His approach was to encourage human connection through lyricism—song and music were important to him—and imagination, through a magical, sometimes whimsical, sometimes violent apprehension of the natural world and the world of human making.

6. In your essay in the book you co-edited, Speak to Me Words: Essays on Contemporary American Indian Poetry, you write, “We have to forgive our imperfections and heal the hole in our hearts that is left there by shame.” The book was published in 2003. What have you learned in the intervening years about the connection between creative work and healing ourselves?

JG: Healing is creative when it comprises a re-creation of self, the work of the psyche, the soul. As I think about my own inner work, I realize I have become clearer about what I want to do, and as importantly, what I do not wish to do. I have learned to say “no” to certain tasks that would take psychic time and energy away from writing poetry or music. Creative work is healing when it’s undertaken without guilt, when we move past the distractions that life presents. If we believe our job is to give back through our creative works, we must sometimes be “selfish” to accomplish this.

7. Any new projects you’d like to share with us?
JG: I’ve been working on a new manuscript of poems since 2009. I have several “gacelas” (a term I borrow from García Lorca), some lyric poems in free verse, and some that I term “prose poems.” I post some of my photos to my blog. And I continue to practice guitar and to write music for it and for accordion.

8. What makes Janice really laugh?
JG: I saw Marcel Marceau in performance once. He made me laugh because Bip was most always in a daydream, which meant that whatever he was trying to accomplish came with goofy mistakes (having to re-button his shirt many times, tripping over his own feet, trying to look nonchalant, even debonair, but slipping on a banana peel at the last moment). Bip had a sweetness and innocence that came from having an affectionate heart, a heart that took in all the world and gave it all back with the largest of grins, voicelessly.
Although Marceau has passed on, I still love Bip’s humanity and relate to his penchant for error. I enjoy being in the company of people who act from the heart, who are not afraid of silliness, who laugh with soft laughter.

Read Janice's blog and see more photographs.

Teacher Appreciation Day

Congratulating dedicated teachers at all levels! Thanks for the vitality, the ZING you bring to your classrooms and libraries.

Zing! Seven Creativity Practices for Educators and Students

Creativity Interview: Yuyi Morales

Like many, I admire the multiple talents of Yuyi Morales—author, illustrator, videographer, moving speaker. I also admire Yuyi's creative spirit. Many thanks, Yuyi, for making time for this interview.

1. What were you like as a child?
YM: A few things that described me as a child:
1. I liked drawing, and I practiced so much that I could draw my own face from memory.
2. I was obsessed with UFOs and constantly feared that extraterrestrials were coming to take me with them.
3. I liked reading, so I devoured all of the comic magazines my father bought on Sundays, the encyclopedia my mother bought for my sisters and I, and many of my father's books, all of which were not for children.
4. When I was five my mother taught me how to crochet, and I made myself a colorful vest and a hat. She also taught me how to knit and use the sewing machine. At school, she would encourage me transform simple school projects and written assignments into models, drawings, and little books.
5. I didn't have many friends, I was what people in Mexico call “seria”, which meant that I didn't talk or smile much.

2. My sense is that you have always thought of yourself as creative. How do you nurture your creativity?
YM: Everything in my life is an art project. Just like my mother helped me make simple tasks, like my homework, into creative endeavors, nowadays, most of the things that happen during my daily life, I tend to do it creatively. I love to read, and I have a great need for storytelling. I could watch movies everyday (but I don't because most nights I go to bed late drawing or painting). I like gardening and I look for the compositions and the mixing of colors. I like listening to music, and although I am not a musician, I like to make songs. I love to dance and so I take lessons, and I often break into dancing while I am working. I like taking photographs and sharing them. And I like making friends and loving them. And to me it is all art.

3. Is there a special space that helps you be creative?YM: My studio is the best place in the world. In my studio there is space to daydream, and there is space to work. Having tools around me excites me. I get carried away by thinking about what I could to with materials. But I also need inspiration and references, so having things to look at, as well as places for research such as the library and the internet, give me an urge to create.

4. What are your challenges at this point in your career?
YM: Time is one of my main challenges. I tend to want to have things to materialize immediately. So I have had to learn to be patient, to take my time, and to be gentle with myself and my work. Although I tend to be impatient, I try to take time to exercise, to learn new things, to be with my friends, family, and the people I love, and time to have sacred things in my life. Then, when I am in my studio, I constantly remind myself that steady work will give me the results I want.

5. You have a very intriguing web site. Did you design it yourself?
YM: Yes, I designed it myself a long time ago. At the time, I wanted to have a web site, and not knowing how to get someone to do what I wanted, I decided to learn to do it myself. My husband helped me choose a good book where I could learn HTML. Most of what I did was to take the same approach I use with my art: I played with it. The web page became another blank canvas to be creative with. The result seems to be  less functional and more surprising--you just never know what you might find there.

6. You were an early Día supporter. Tell us why and how you think we all could be more creative in promoting Día.
YM: To me Día de los Niños is a very significant day, because I grew up in Mexico where ever since I can remember, my family always celebrated it. When I arrived at the USA, I found myself celebrating alone with my infant son. I had no one else to celebrate it with. Years later, when I was already a published author, I began to be asked to come to libraries to celebrate with hundreds of children, and I couldn't have been more delighted! What was even better was that Día del Niño had been paired with something else I loved: books and reading.

Día de los Niños, Día de los Libros, is one of my favorite days of the year. I am sure that many people have come up with fantastic ideas to celebrate this day; my favorites would be the ones that bring together adults and children through books. Día de los Niños, Día de los Libros is not only a day for children to enjoy and love books, but is also a day for us, adults, to love and celebrate our children by sharing books, reading with them, and connecting forever in that way.

7. Any upcoming projects you want to share with us?
YM: I am currently putting the final touches to a book I wrote titled Niño. In this book there will be a lot of action, and more than one scary character brought from my childhood in Mexico. Also, I am working in a book I wrote about Frida Kahlo, and I have started illustrating a book about the poet Pablo Neruda.

8. How does Yuyi relax?
YM: I have my favorite spot in my garden where two colorful hammocks hang. There, when I need a good time to just be, I swing in one of them looking at the sky and the mulberry tree that holds them. Some times I fall asleep, just like when I was a baby and my mother lullabyed me to sleep, swinging in my crib made of a box weaved into a hammock above my parents bed. I close my eyes, and I am whole again.

Visit Yuyi's blog, Corazonadas.

Savor Silence?

My New Year’s resolutions always include 1) create more writing time and 2) be a more effective advocate. There’s an inherent tension between these two goals. When I avoid e-mail and devote myself to a writing project, ah! I feel a special pleasure since I relish the time to create on the page, to explore the possibilities of an evolving manuscript. I love to write which for me means: I need quiet.

Some authors manage to write in coffee shops and cafes while I’d stop the refrigerator motor if I could. I savor total silence. A professor who teaches my book, Zing! Seven Creativity Practices for Educators and Students to future writing teachers tells me that the students are most uncomfortable with the second suggested practice: Enjoy quiet. “Really?” I ask surprised. It seems that quiet made the students uncomfortable, nervous. Indeed, their world is probably full of noise--radio, iPods, music in restaurants, elevators, bars, malls; and group sessions in all areas of education and the work place.

A recent article in The New York Times, “The Rise of the New Groupthink,” includes Picasso’s words, “Without great solitude, no serious work is possible.” Eek! Again in 2012, I say to myself, “Pat, you’ve got to create more quiet for writing. Stay off e-mail.”

It’s not that I like e-mail (except with family and friends), but it is my connection to the amazing and committed advocates with whom I have the honor to work.

Human creativity is amazing and given our diversity—introverts/extroverts, tidy/messy, sober/silly, Type A/Type B, etc.—we need varying circumstances to produce our unique work. Important as sharing bookjoy is to me, though, I long to write more and better, so: silence in my future.

What do you need to be creative?

(photo credit: Silence by wickednox1)

Creativity Interview: Father Murray Bodo, OFM

Father Murray Bodo, a fellow Southwesterner though he has lived in Cincinnati for many years, is a treasured friend. All of us lucky enough to know Murray personally treasure him not only as a fine and prolific writer but as a raconteur who makes us laugh, and as a wise, compassionate and devout man. Welcome to Bookjoy Creativity Salon, dear Murray!

1. Little Louis Bodo who grew up in Gallup, New Mexico, now annually spends time in Italy. How did that happen and how has it affected your life and your writing?

MB: The first time I went to Italy was on a mission from my Franciscan Province to write a book about St. Francis. That was in 1972, and the book was Francis: The Journey and the Dream. A fortieth anniversary edition of that book is now available from St. Anthony Messenger Press. Then in 1976 I began leading pilgrimages as a staff member of Franciscan Pilgrimage Programs. I’ve been going to Italy for a couple of months in the summer or fall for 35 years now; it’s like a second home to me, especially Assisi where I continue to be inspired by the life and times of St. Francis and by the beauty of the Umbrian countryside and the enchanting streets of Assisi.

2. You were a teacher and professor for many years. Now you lead retreats. Do you miss teaching and what is the challenge of leading a retreat well?
MB: I do miss teaching. I taught for 36 years and loved my years in the classroom. But in 2002 I asked to be relieved of that ministry to devote my time to writing and leading pilgrimages. Interestingly, the challenges of a good retreat or pilgrimage are much the same as those of teaching: thorough and ongoing preparation, interesting delivery and lively inter-acting with the group; and, for me, prayer – my own and those supporting me and the retreatants, or pilgrims, with their prayers.

3. I believe I met you in 1989 in Cincinnati. During those 22 years, you have always been writing new poems and working on two to three books at a time. You amaze me. What keeps you writing at such a pace?
MB: I was asking myself that same question lately. For one thing I love writing and don’t know what I would do if I couldn’t write. And secondly, because of my age, I may be writing against time, trying to be an instrument of God’s Spirit while I still have it in me to create. But most of all, it is because writing is something I just have to do to be me. It’s intimately a part of my identity.

4. Have you always thought of yourself as creative? How do you nurture your creative life?
MB: I was the kind of kid who, as far back as I can remember, was always performing improvised skits for whoever could endure my extemporaneous plays. But it wasn’t till I was in high school that I discovered poetry as a creative outlet for me. Poetry, both reading it and writing it, gives me life; and I nurture that creative outlet by reading poets who stimulate my own writing and by walking, observing, meditating on the world around me and within me. I wait for a line, an image, or word to come to me.

5. What are your new writing projects?
MB: At present I’m completing a new book of poetry, Something Like Jasmine, which will be released by Tau Publishing in early 2012. I’m also working on the introductions for a St. Francis Day Book, which I’m co-authoring for St. Anthony Messenger Press with Pat McCloskey, a Franciscan confrere. In addition, I’m writing a small pamphlet on Pilgrimage that will be published by Abbey Press in their Prayer Notes series.

6. What makes Father Murray laugh?
MB: Usually, its human nature and the goofy, inconsistent things we all do, especially when we’re trying to be serious, and instead we tickle someone’s funny bone. But animals and birds make me laugh even more. I love to observe their antics, their play, and their inexhaustible curiosity.

Creativity Interview: Dr. Monica Rosas-Baines

I’ll begin by saying: I’m the proud aunt of one niece, thus my favorite niece, Dr. Monica Rosas-Baines. Welcome to Bookjoy Creativity Salon, dear Niki! I’ve been so impressed by your work with Latinas Juntas.


1. When and why did you decide to become a psychologist?
NR: I wish I had a romantic answer, like all my life I knew that I wanted to work in mental health but truthfully, it was somewhat by accident. I started off as a biology major, thinking maybe I’d be a vet. I took Abnormal Psychology as an elective and fell in love (well that’s romantic, I suppose). I was completely intrigued by the different disorders and theories of psychopathology. I began taking more courses in psychology and eventually changed my major. I decided to become a psychologist because I enjoy studying people and helping them understand the reasons they think, feel and behave as they do. It’s extremely rewarding to help people. I’m lucky that I can say I really love my job.

2. How did Latinas Juntas begin?

L: Dr. Denna Sanchez; R: Dr. Monica Rosas-Baines

NR: My dear friend and fellow campus psychologist, Dr. Denna Sanchez, and I observed that our Latina patients reported similar cultural pressures that often made their academic journey more challenging… issues like family and gender role conflicts, lack of role models, isolation on campus and personal insecurities. These clinical observations as well as our own identification with these issues inspired us to design a program to offer support and mentorship. We know that not every Latina is interested in personal counseling so we wanted to develop a forum where we could address these issues and help them create a supportive network.

3. What have been the key challenges? The rewards?
NR: Fortunately, our campus administrators, faculty and staff are very supportive of our efforts. However, the budget for these kinds of student support events is shrinking.

I can’t say enough about the rewards. Every year I get to help create a sense of community among our Latina students and staff. Evaluations from student participants invariably include comments about how they are inspired by the faculty, Dr. Sanchez, and me. However, I’m not sure that our students are aware of how much they inspire us. Their perseverance in spite of cultural pressures and personal challenges is remarkable and it is an honor to work with them. By the end of the day, there is a palpable sense of unity, empowerment and cultural pride in the room. It’s a very special day.

4. Do you think of yourself as creative? How has your creativity and that of your colleagues strengthened this initiative?
NR: I would say that I’m creative, and my creativity is enhanced by working with a partner who is enthusiastic and creative as well. Our event is annual, so we try to make it so that students can get a different experience each year. This event has really stretched my creative muscle because we’re always thinking of new and fun activities that will inspire dialogue and sharing. It really helps to work as a team because we can bounce ideas off of each other regarding large and small group activities, guest speakers, art projects, etc.

5. Do you know of any other campuses in your area or in CA who are following your good example?
NR: Yes, in fact it was our participation as small group facilitators at the Latina Connection Conference (offered through California State University, Long Beach) that inspired us to create a similar program on our campus. I am unaware if other college campuses provide similar programming although I have provided consultation to staff members at Washington and Texas campuses that are interested in creating programs for Latinas.

6. I know you’ve always been a reader. What kind of books do you enjoy?
NR: My husband always teases me that I only like tragedies. I will admit that I am drawn to novels, particularly memoirs, about people who have survived difficult challenges, whether it’s abuse, poverty, loss, etc.

Click here to read an article about Latinas Juntas.


Attendees at the Latina Juntas conference listen as a student reads "University Avenue," a favorite poem of Niki's, written by her aunt, Pat Mora.



Creativity Interview: Monica Brown

I’ll begin by saying: I’ve had the pleasure of occasionally spending time with warm, energetic and talented Monica Brown. Congratulations on your eleven wonderful children’s books, Monica! Welcome to Bookjoy Creativity Salon!

1. You are an author, presenter, professor, friend and inspiration to many, and a family member. Wow! Do you enjoy your academic life?
MB: I do enjoy being a professor—for the decade before I started writing children’s books I had the pleasure of teaching and writing about the most amazing Latino/a literary works and introducing college students to new worlds of literature. I think the best preparation for writing is reading, so I had the best training of all. First, teaching, researching, and talking about Latino/a literature and then I began creating Latino/a literature for children, inspired by the birth of my two daughters, Isabella and Juliana. I wanted them to know who Gabriela Mistral was, who Celia Cruz was.

2. Is there a connection between that life and your work as an author for children? Has being a writer changed your teaching?
MB: The two are intimately connected, in mostly positive ways. For example, when I was researching my book on Gabriel Garcia Marquez, I decided to develop a new class—a comparative literature of the Americas. I taught a senior seminar that compared magical realist texts by U.S. Latino/a authors such as Luis Urrea’s The Hummingbird’s Daughter, Ana Castillo’s So Far from God, and Marie Arana’s Cellophane to South American novels such as Isabel Allende’s House of Spirits and Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s seminal One Hundred Years of Solitude, a book that changed the direction of my life. I first read One Hundred Years of Solitude when I was a senior in high school and it captured me as no other, perhaps before or since. This teaching and writing led me to the publication of my very own magic realist text for children, Chavela and the Magic Bubble.

3. Tell us briefly about your publishing journey and your newest books.

MB: My publishing journey is long in that it started, I think, long before I published my first children’s book, and even before I published my first scholarly book. My mind, even as a child, was never quiet, for better or for worse. In some ways I had a fairy tale journey into children’s books because the first manuscript I ever wrote, on Gabriela Mistral, secured a publisher and the first book I ever published, My Name is Celia: The Life of Celia Cruz/Me Llamo Celia: La Vida de Celia Cruz (and the second I wrote), was honored with awards. But I like to say that I spend years honing my craft—first as new graduate working as a journalist in Guadalajara in 1991, and then through my scholarly writing in graduate school and beyond. I was very lucky to meet my agent, Stefanie Von Borstel and her partner, Lilly Ghahremani, who were two amazing women of color just founding Full Circle Literary. So in addition to having a supportive husband and family, I had an amazing Latina agent who had my back and shared my vision.

4. Are you connected to sharing bookjoy through Día?
MB: I am connected and committed to sharing bookjoy through Día! I’m not sure that folks who haven’t been to a Día celebration can fully understand the joy and delight on the faces of children. There are worlds between the pages of books, and when I’m reading and working and playing with children at a Día event, I am bringing them on an adventure to these new worlds.

5. Did you always want to be a writer?
MB: I always wanted to express myself creatively, and that took different forms. Theater was probably my first venue of creative expression, and then books and writing. Believe it or not, being an English major seemed a lot more “practical” than being an actor or director! For this reason, I enjoy the performative aspects of working with children and Día and during presentations, I involve children in the music and dance of my books. I joke that my presentations are up and out of the rocking chair.

6. Have you always thought of yourself as creative? How do you nurture your creative life?
MB: My mother was an amazing artist and she nurtured me and inspired me. I also grew up in a home surrounded by incredible art, which I feel helped me think visually and helped me to better write for artists. The picture book is the meeting place of text and art, after all. My mother also instilled confidence in me, something that any writer needs, because no matter how good you are, rejection becomes a regular presence for writers. But in the present, the way I nurture my own creativity by be open to the magic and sometimes craziness of each and every day. Laughter is a big part of that, and also searching out new experiences. I often find inspiration and renewal in the works of my fellow artists—in writing, film, theater and music.

7. Are you working on other writing projects?
MB: I am working on several projects—in my mind at least. Part of the work will have to wait until I go on sabbatical next year. The hardest part about being an academic as well as a children’s author is simply my lack of time. I want to write, but during the semester, my students need to come first, not to mention my daughters, my family, and my community! With so much negativity going on in my state around issues of immigration there are some things that are politically pressing. Luckily, when I do have the time to write, I can be very focused. My most immediate plans are to finish a middle grade novel based on the character in my new picture book, Marisol McDonald Doesn’t Match.

8. What is a favorite time of your day?
MB: I like different times of day for different reasons. Afternoon naps are delicious, but so is sharing a cup of coffee with my husband in in our backyard underneath the ponderosa pines. When my daughters were little, there was no greater joy than Saturday and Sunday mornings when they tumbled into bed with us. Now that I have a teen and a tween, I look forward to picking them up from school and hearing about their days—they usually both talk at once in a jumble. As for writing, it really only ever is the mornings for me, when my energy is up and things are at their most hopeful.

 View book trailers.       

See teacher resources for Monica's books on her website.
   
Read a  downloadable bio and brochure.

Creativity Interview: Guadalupe Garcia McCall

I’ll begin by saying:  Who has her first book coming out this fall?  My guest Guadalupe Garcia McCall. Her verse novel, Under the Mesquite, will be published in September. I met Guadalupe through e-mail, and we soon discovered our many connections including a love of nature.  Congratulations on your verse novel, Guadalupe and welcome to Bookjoy Creativity Salon!

1. So how does it feel to have your first book published?
GGM: This is an amazing feeling, indescribable. When the ARCs first came in, I walked around the house holding it like a baby, carrying it everywhere. I would stand it on the counter and look at it while I cooked. I stood it next to me on my desk and watched it while I worked on novel number 2. I think I read it in ARC form like 20 times because it was such a dream come true.

2. Tell us about your publishing journey.


Under the Mesquite (Sept. 2011)

 GGM: It has really been quite a journey. Under the Mesquite started as a collection of poems I wrote over many years when I wanted to "show" my students how easy writing poetry can be. They would say, "This is hard," and I would show them how easy it was by just taking a memory and turning it into a poem in class. Of course, I had to rewrite it for every class, so by the end of the day, the poem was usually revised several times. I started collecting these "little poems" and when I had about 35 of them, I sent them out. Emily Hazel, my editor at Lee & Low, saw the potential for a novel in verse in them, and the rest is history.

3. Did you always want to be a writer?
GGM: Oh, yes, always. My first memories of writing are special. My father taught me to write so that I would be "prepared" for school in the United States. I loved listening to the pencil "whisper the words" as it travelled on the paper with his hand guiding mine. But the one who really put the idea in my head was my third grade teacher, Mr. Hernandez. After he read one of my stories (I was in a bilingual classroom, so I wrote it in Spanish) he asked me if I had written the story by myself. I said I had, and he said, "Someday, you're going to be a writer." Of course, hearing him say it cemented it in my head. It's amazing the profound effect a good teacher can have on us. If Mr. Hernandez hadn't said it quite like that, I might not have grown up believing it.

4. Have you always thought of yourself as creative? How do you nurture your creative life?
GGM: I have always loved the arts. My father, who was a carpenter, was very creative. He used to play the guitar, sing, and draw. One day, I came home from school crying because my teacher had given me a zero on a drawing of the earth. He sat down and taught me how "easy" drawing could be. It opened up the world of art for me.

My mother too was instrumental in helping me find my creativity. She recognized that I was "artistic" before I did and enrolled me in singing, dancing, and acting classes in Mexico when I was in elementary. I love to sing (although, I am not good at it) and still draw. I nurture my creative side by staying close to nature. I find nature is the most artistic entity of all. The movement of the elements as they interact is dance, the sounds of water and fire and air is music, and everything that happens on our planet is performance, and it's all out there, a feast for the senses, if we just open our eyes and feel and look with our hearts.

5. You are an experienced and committed teacher. What are your key challenges as a teacher? As a writer?
GGM: As a teacher and as a writer and as a mother and also as a person, I find that my biggest challenge in life is patience. I am not as patient as I'd like to be with myself or others. I like to finish things fast. I love movement and productivity. It comes from having two very hard working parents and also being somewhat of a perfectionist. So, every day I pray for patience and force myself to wait for perfection to come at its own pace and dressed in its own favorite outfit, not mine.

6. Are you working on other writing projects?
GGM: Oh yes. Absolutely. I am always writing. I finished revising Six Little Sisters last month. It is a multicultural novel (prose) with lots of magic realism, and I hope to find it a home someday soon. And now I am finishing up another novel-in-verse tentatively titled I Am Joaquin. It is a multicultural YA historical piece based on the conflicts in South Texas resulting from the Plan de San Diego in 1915. I have to say I am really taken by the voice of Joaquin and the story he has to tell. I Am Joaquin deals with rebellion and social injustice, but, at the heart of it, is a story about a boy, his family, and the girl he loves.

7. What do you do to relax?
GGM: Believe it or not, I write to relax. To sit in front of the computer means that I have time away from everything else that is ordinary and average. To sit in front of the computer means that I am on "vacation" from my life. I love to sit and daydream and think profoundly about life. Don't get me wrong, I am a social person. I have many friends and I love to talk, but to be able to sit and think, that is special. That's having time for myself. Time to do what I want.

More information:
Read an interview with Guadalupe at BookTalk on the Lee & Low website.
Visit Guadalupe's website.

Creativity Interview: Margarita Engle

I've had the pleasure of visiting with Margarita Engle, reading her books and savoring the Colorín Colorado interview below. I strongly recommend that you watch the interview for many reasons including to hear Margarita's eloquent response to why she writes in free verse.

Margarita, welcome to this Bookjoy Creativity Salon.



Photo by Marshall W. Johnson

 Hello, my name is Margarita Engle, and I write young adult novels in free verse, primarily about Cuban history. Although I was born in Los Angeles, my mother is from Cuba. When I was a child, we spent summers on the island, and I developed the deep attachment that inspires my writing.

1. You've said you were a book worm as a child and connected that to then becoming a writer. Many readers, though they may love reading, do not become writers. How/why, then, do you think your writing life began?
ME: I loved The Black Stallion, and Island of the Blue Dolphins. Both were books about children stranded on islands, trying to survive. Looking back, I think I must have related to those stories because of the Missile Crisis, travel restrictions, and my own sense of isolation from Cuba. Growing up in the hectic city of Los Angeles, I craved the peace of nature. Writing was an exploration, and an escape. I started writing lyrical nature poems when I was very young. The only one I vaguely remember was about dry hills that looked like brown lizards. I do remember that writing felt comforting, and it still does.

2. Your books have appropriately received many awards. You are the first Latina (o) to receive a Newbery Honor Award, yes? What is your reaction to that fact?
ME: I walked through the Newbery ceremony in a daze. To this day, I still suspect that I might have been dreaming. I didn't realize how much it meant to the Latino community, until I was included in articles and books about women who changed America. It's humbling too, because all I did was daydream on paper. I feel like I'm standing on the shoulders of Latino earlier Latino authors who were not honored.

3. What is your personal writing challenge?
ME: There are so many tempting stories, and so many fascinating subplots. It's easy to get sidetracked. Each time I start a book, I have to write a note to myself about the theme. Later, when I feel confused, I can read the note and remember what I'm really trying to say. When I finish the book, the note becomes my "Author's Note."

4. Have you always thought of yourself as creative? How do you nurture your creative life?
ME: I have always been a daydreamer. My mother must have mistaken my daydreams for philosophy, because when I gazed into space, she would tell people not to bother me while I was thinking! She understood the key to creativity: quiet time. In the modern world, that means turning off noisy gadgets and electronic interruptions. I need time alone in a hammock, or out in the woods, walking... Many great poets (Antonio Machado!) have been avid walkers. The rhythm of footsteps turns into the music of verse.

5. Would you like to tell us about the projects you're working on or topics that intrigue you, those, to use your words, that now "haunt" you?

ME: My next novel in verse is The Wild Book, scheduled by Harcourt for March, 2012. Unlike my historical books, this one is completely personal. It was inspired by stories my grandmother told me about her childhood. She grew up on a farm during the chaos following the U.S. occupation of Cuba after the "Spanish-American" War. She also had dyslexia, so the book is dedicated to reluctant readers. Exploring my grandmother's childhood, and taking on her voice, was an emotional experience!

My next picture book is about search and rescue dogs, it's scheduled by Holt/Macmillan for 2013. This topic comes from my husband's volunteer work, training our two dogs in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. I am a volunteer "victim." I hide in the forest, so the dogs can practice finding a lost hiker.

6. You've talked about writing about people who made "hopeful choices." In what ways is writing a "hopeful" choice for you?
ME: I won't write a story for young people unless it has a hopeful ending, so every time I start exploring some complex historical situation, I'm forced to choose the optimistic aspects. I can only go ahead with the project if I discover that there were people who were kind while surrounded by cruelty, or fair while surrounded by injustice. If I don't find documented examples of admirable qualities, I drop that project, and move on to something else.

7. To end on a lighter note, what makes Margarita really laugh?
ME: Animals and folklore! In my daily life, our dogs make me laugh. They help me remember how to be silly. In my literary life, the exaggeration found in Cuban folktales is hilarious. I am trying to include some of that folklore in my writing.



Visit Margarita Engle's website.

Creativity Interview: Maria Melendez

I have so enjoyed preparing for this interview with my friend, the poet and editor Maria Melendez, who presently lives with her family in Pueblo, CO. Welcome to this Bookjoy Creativity Salon, Maria.

Thank you, Pat! I’m honored to be part of the lively work you foster here. BTW, I loved seeing the photos of the mural for The Desert Is My Mother that you included in your last post. I’m thrilled when the arts can be wellsprings for each other.

I've just finished re-reading your two poetry collections. Bravo! Such variety you offer readers.

PM: When did your deep attention and connection to nature begin? 

MM: Thanks to some good urban and suburban planning, and to my parents’ motivation for picnics or hikes outdoors, I experienced wonder in wild nature throughout my childhood in the East Bay area of Northern California. Sunol Regional Wilderness, Del Valle Reservoir and Sycamore Grove Park inhabit me “deep in the brain, far back” (as Roethke says).

PM: Why poetry? I have a friend who teases me that he wonders why I don’t just write in sentences and paragraphs, why don’t I just write prose?

MM: That is such a loaded question for me; I feel I have to answer it every time I sit down to create new work. There are so many anti-poetry forces swirling around us/me, that I’m always having to talk myself into poetry. Well. I undergo something, in the process of working on poetry, that I don’t undergo at any other time—a suite of sensations. I tried to write about this in an early poem called “Poeta Falsa,” which appeared in the Swan Scythe Press chapbook Base Pairs. It ends with this answer to the persistent “Why poetry?” question: “because at no other time / am I as half-assed and ragged / as the early draft, / or as mammoth, as orchestral, / as the near-end.” Ooh, I really get the willies when poets quote themselves, and here I’ve gone and done it.

PM:  I was struck by the boldness of your work from incorporating scientific terminology to juxtaposing Our Lady with web lingo. In “Catamite,” you write, “Where do you get the strength to be you?” Where do you get the strength to be the poet you are?

MM: When the writing process is hot and cookin’, I’m surrendering to the interests and concerns I’ve been given. More than in everyday life and conversation, in poetry I’m free to link them together, as they always are in my emotional life. I’ve been really enjoying the idea of writing as surrender, rather than as an exertion of strength or will.

PM: You are the editor of Pilgrimage: Story • Spirit • Witness • Place. How long have you been the editor and what intrigued you about doing this work? In my experience, editors don’t edit my poetry. They may make suggestions on my prose and copyeditors made plenty of suggestions on the definitions of poetic forms in Dizzy in Your Eyes, for example. How do you see your role as an editor?

MM: My family and I became Quakers, and that’s occasioned my renewed attention to “spirit/Spirit” in contemporary writing. The areas of emphasis outgoing editor Peter Anderson brought to Pilgrimage (story, spirit, witness, place) appealed to me as a Chicana writer interested in the environment and as a po’ biz playah who had grown tired of the purely secular efforts of professional striving I saw in so many literary magazines. While the s/S-word rarely appears in work I select, presences or processes bigger and greater than a human individual are implied throughout the essays and poetry I publish. I’ve usually done some “hands-on” editing for about 30-50% of the contents in any given issue. My suggestions involve condensing, expanding, or re-wording sections that don’t hold up to an individual work’s best moments. I so enjoy this dynamic engagement with literature that I’ve begun my own individual editorial consulting practice. I work one-on-one with writers preparing nonfiction or poetry manuscripts, and I try to help these clients make their work as artistically viable, moment to moment, as they want it to be.

PM:  In your poem “Ars Poetica: Platanus Racemosa,” you write “listen/for what’s asking to be written.” So, what’s “asking to be written” in your life now, María?

MM: I have a new book of poetry that’s in the sludgy, murky, chaotic phase—I’ve fished about a book’s worth of drafts from my stream of notes, journals, fits and starts. Knowing I have to intuit some sense of artistic coherence from this heap feels daunting—but as a friend reminded me today, at least by now I know enough to know this phase will pass. The murk, though it returns with regularity, always yields something new.

PM:  What do you, a busy mom, wife, editor, poet—what else am I missing?—do to refresh your spirit and to nudge you back to the page?

MM: Reading and re-reading literature I love helps refill the well. Moving around also helps. I walk on the bluffs along the Arkansas river at the Nature and Raptor Center of Pueblo—alone, with family, or with doggie—and I’ve also become very reliant on some Tai Chi classes and practices to shut off the anxiety-generating crawl that runs across the screen of my consciousness. This shut-off allows my awareness to return to physical experience and to my sub-conscious, two muses with more clarity and vision than my intellect can usually offer.


           

 

Creativity Interview: Steve Schecter

My first guest on this virtual salon (wouldn’t it be nice to be enjoying wine or tea or coffee and “assorted sweets” as my daughters say) is Steve Schecter, an independent director, producer, writer and editor. This man of many talents lives in northern California. Thanks to friends here in Santa Fe, I met Steve a few months back and am grateful that he agreed to come to our salon. I think you'll find his work with at-risk youth and his thoughtful answers inspiring.

1) Steve, after we met, you e-mailed me and wrote that we “share the same values about the importance of creativity and children.” I’m curious first about your personal creativity. Where did you grow up and do you think your childhood is connected to your creative work?
SS: I grew up all over the world, in Japan, Hong Kong, and Moscow, USSR. I always had to meet new people, and learn new languages growing up; become accustomed to new cultures. I think the flexibility and resilience that I learned as a child dealing with this adaptation to new people and places, are definitely a help with my creative life.

2) How did you become interested in creating documentaries and how do you choose your projects?
SS: I started making documentaries of my own when I was 13, after my uncle gave me a super 8 movie camera for my birthday. Before that I had taken pictures since I was about 9 with cameras my Dad gave me. I loved the magic of capturing images and sounds of the world around me, especially people; and telling stories of people’s lives. I attended an ethnographic film conference at the Smithsonian when I was in high school, and that led to my first job for the Smithsonian’s National Anthropological Film Center filming indigenous people around the world, beginning the summer after my freshman year at college. I started my own company to make documentaries soon after I graduated from college a few years later.

Projects often come to me, as subjects that people want a film made about. Usually, if they find me, it’s because it is a subject I will be interested in. Other times there are stories that I see around me that my kids might be involved in or that are part of my community that spark my interest, because the people involved are searching for a better life or are trying to help others lift themselves up.

3) What are a few of the significant challenges of the work you do?
SS: I would say the most significant challenge is finding the funds to make the films. I do not have a formula or a constant source I go to. I look to the people who would have the most interest in seeing the film made, and try to get them involved in finding the funds in their midst.

4) One of the young people in the video links below says, “When I’m in the zone ….” When are you in the zone?
SS: I am in the zone, when I am filming people and events, and my picture flows with the action. I am not thinking, but I am more like a calm lake reflecting the flow of activity and ideas. I like to shoot hand-held and move with the camera. I also get into a zone while editing, when my hands move over the keys, sewing images and sounds together in a burst of energy, creating a quilt of motion that unfolds the story as I would like.

5) I so liked the pace of your videos/films, how you steadily held my interest. Is that a skill you’ve always had?
SS: Thank you, Pat. I’m glad you liked the pace. That is always a tricky issue, because tastes and styles change with the times. I listen to my body and my mind as I watch what I am editing to see if there is something there that captivates me and moves me. Showing the rough cut to people is an important part of the process to see how they are responding. Whenever I watch my work with others, I always have a different response than if I watch it alone.

6) Now let’s return to our shared interest and commitment to children and creativity. How do you nurture creativity in your own children and how could we as a country foster creativity in our young people?
SS: I think that children are a lot smarter and more creative than adults generally give them credit for. I try to listen to my kids and learn from what they have to say in their words and their art-work or writing. I think I can learn a lot about myself that way. So, as far as fostering creativity in young people, I think we just have to give them the time, the tools, and the encouragement to tell their stories in words or images. It is all there within them. Clearly it is a critically important part of their growth as human beings to tell those stories.

Watch Steve's documentary of the Niroga Institute's work with students, incarcerated youth, cancer survivors and other underserved populations. Niroga TLS students and teachers talk about how their lives have changed since discovering yoga, meditation, and Transformative Life Skills.

Mindful Kids is a documentary about the introduction of 'mindfulness' in six schools in Oakland, California, to help students overcome very difficult personal, academic, and athletic challenges. Watch the trailer.