Institute for Latino Studies :: Momotombo Press :: Interview with Lisa Gonzales

	An Interview with Lisa Gonzales Over the week of October 25, 2004, María Meléndez, one of Momotombo Press’ two Associate Editors, conducted the following e-interview with Lisa Gonzales, author of Arroyo. The interview with Gonzales is the first of what will be a series of interviews on this website to present new perspectives in Latino literature. Interview: MM: Were the three stories in Arroyo written at different periods in your life, or were they created together? LG: Actually, they did occur fairly consecutively about five or so years ago, which is evident from how their subject matter clicks together. However, the original incarnation of the title story was quite different—a third person narrative that focused on the violent act itself at the crux of the story. I couldn't get the tone right, and my writing teacher at the time thought that I might not ever be able to fix it because of the origins of the story. MM: Because the subject seemed too personal to your teacher? Too overwhelming? LG: I think her position had to do with the idea that the story came from a place too exact and seminal for me, that I would not be able to fictionalize it. Specifically, the event behind the piece was one of the first stories I remember my mother telling me. When she was growing up, a neighbor boy from a wealthy family ran over another boy in the neighborhood, this one from a poor family, and got away with it. The story had a deep impact on me at the age of six or seven, and what I remember most about that time was not knowing what to do with these feelings that I had never experienced before—my sadness and frustration at the very wrongness of the situation, yet helplessness to make it any different. This was what I wanted to create within the character of Teresa, a moment in which a young girl is so overwhelmed by her thoughts and emotions that the only way she can experience them is through the filter of her fractured consciousness. Not until I put the story in her first person point-of-view and reconfigure it around the aftermath of the death did it finally come together. MM: Tell me about your current projects. How does the writing you're doing now relate to the work in Arroyo? Which themes from Arroyo could you see yourself picking up again and again in the coming years, and which could you see moving beyond? LG: My current project is quite different than that of Arroyo. It's a novel rather than short stories and it's set in contemporary Northern California rather than historical Hawai'i. However, I suppose there are some similarities, such as the role of the landscape in the lives of the characters. I grew up in an agricultural area right outside Travis Air Force Base—the Gateway to the Pacific—located between Sacramento and San Francisco. I don't think I was able to really appreciate the uniqueness of the place until I left it, and have only begun to write about it since I've been living in Indiana. It's not that I've "moved beyond" the work I did in Arroyo (and the larger manuscript from which these stories are drawn, Hearts of Palm). I'll always be drawn to female characters who seek to create an identity within their family unit while also trying to distinguish themselves from it. But I do think that one's first book is usually about the stories that the writer has been obsessed with from very early on. Once you write that book, you have to figure out why you should continue. MM: I want to ask you about the talismans of creativity: spots of time, favorite notebooks, etc. Do you make ritual use of objects or schedules to help yourself write? LG: When I first started to write fiction, I used to be very ritualistic—votives, fresh flowers, empty house, window seat—but now I can write anywhere. Much like athletes, writers have superstitious tendencies that become more pronounced when stuck. I've tried to mix things up a lot to counteract that. MM: As a reader, who were some of your first loves? And lately, which writers have you been admiring and/or drawing inspiration from? LG: The writers that first cracked me open to literature were primarily minority women writers—Cisneros, Tan, Alvarez, Morrison, Silko. They wrote about people and experiences that I could identity with. Morrison still continues to transfix me—I can open up Beloved to any page and be left awestruck. Some things that have inspired me with my current project are Haruf's Plainsong and Banks' Sweet Hereafter for their multiplicity of voices, Schoemperlen and Waldie's novels for their mosaic construction, and Rodoreda's short stories for the sheer heart of her characterizations. MM: Momotombo's inclusion of your work in an all-Latino series presents an interesting example of how cultural boundaries are continually in flux, continually evolving, as is the case here with the designation "Latina." To what extent do you self-identify as Latina, and/or do you identify in sisterly (or other) terms with Latinas? LG: Well, this is a question that I find bothersome, but I suppose it's one I should address. It's a question that I was not entirely aware of until my submersion in academia; it's not something one is asked when living in Northern California with my last name and skin color, not to mention religious background and family size. MM: One is not asked because, under these circumstances, one is assumed to be Hispanic? LG: Exactly. My family moved to California from Hawai'i before I was born, when my father was stationed at Travis Air Force Base. We had been in Hawai'i since the latter part of the 19th century—my mother's side from Portugal/England/Ireland, my father's side from the Philippines/China/Spain/Portugal. The multiple mestizo is common in Hawai'i. Indeed, one of the first things someone may ask you when first meeting you is, "What are you?" and everyone seems to have their own ideas about what these different combinations create. Coming from this background, my only sense of myself was that I wasn't a "haole," which is a Hawaiian term that technically means outsider but whose practical application is as a reference to white people. Because of where I grew up, the school I attended, and my family experience, I identified generally as brown and specifically as Latina, although I don't know if I used this word. That was who I looked like, whose experience was most like mine, and whose ethnic slurs were directed at me by Anglos, quite often actually. I knew that I was primarily Portuguese, but I didn't know that this was not a sanctioned Hispanic ethnicity. Most likely, if I had been raised in Hawai'i, I would not have identified as Hispanic. Most likely, I would have then identified as Filipino, in part because of larger family issues that I won't go into here. MM: You have maintained your commitment to writing over many distinct periods in your life. In your experience, what is the relationship between being a woman of color and being a writer? LG: A big factor in my development as a writer has been the process of placing myself within an artistic tradition and becoming aware of the audience to whom I'm writing. So I've moved beyond the goal of writing for a general readership (which is often code for an Anglo readership), instead reaching for a narrower audience who shares my cultural background. This readership can understand the nuances I'm creating in order to tell delicate and complicated stories. Coming out of the workshop setting that dominates contemporary writing programs and is primarily made up of Anglo writers, I've had to become comfortable with the fact that not everyone will get what I'm doing. And that's okay. I don't believe that cultural access must be given to everyone. There are parts of my experience and therefore my writing that only other women of color will ever understand, so I'm reluctant to use the limited space available on the page trying to do otherwise. In many ways, this is more an aesthetic point than a political one in that I'm of the school of writing that communicates ideas through implication and inference, the blank page rather than direct statement. In turn, this style lends itself to a system of withholding in which I have to trust the reader to make connections. Instead of spelling everything out, emotions and subtext are conveyed through gestures, objects, and symbols—perhaps another vestige of my Catholic upbringing.

An Interview with Lisa Gonzales

Over the week of October 25, 2004, María Meléndez, one of Momotombo Press’ two Associate Editors, conducted the following e-interview with Lisa Gonzales, author of Arroyo. The interview with Gonzales is the first of what will be a series of interviews on this website to present new perspectives in Latino literature.

Interview:

MM: Were the three stories in Arroyo written at different periods in your life, or were they created together?

LG: Actually, they did occur fairly consecutively about five or so years ago, which is evident from how their subject matter clicks together. However, the original incarnation of the title story was quite different—a third person narrative that focused on the violent act itself at the crux of the story. I couldn't get the tone right, and my writing teacher at the time thought that I might not ever be able to fix it because of the origins of the story.

MM: Because the subject seemed too personal to your teacher? Too overwhelming?

LG: I think her position had to do with the idea that the story came from a place too exact and seminal for me, that I would not be able to fictionalize it. Specifically, the event behind the piece was one of the first stories I remember my mother telling me. When she was growing up, a neighbor boy from a wealthy family ran over another boy in the neighborhood, this one from a poor family, and got away with it. The story had a deep impact on me at the age of six or seven, and what I remember most about that time was not knowing what to do with these feelings that I had never experienced before—my sadness and frustration at the very wrongness of the situation, yet helplessness to make it any different. This was what I wanted to create within the character of Teresa, a moment in which a young girl is so overwhelmed by her thoughts and emotions that the only way she can experience them is through the filter of her fractured consciousness. Not until I put the story in her first person point-of-view and reconfigure it around the aftermath of the death did it finally come together.

MM: Tell me about your current projects. How does the writing you're doing now relate to the work in Arroyo? Which themes from Arroyo could you see yourself picking up again and again in the coming years, and which could you see moving beyond?

LG: My current project is quite different than that of Arroyo. It's a novel rather than short stories and it's set in contemporary Northern California rather than historical Hawai'i. However, I suppose there are some similarities, such as the role of the landscape in the lives of the characters. I grew up in an agricultural area right outside Travis Air Force Base—the Gateway to the Pacific—located between Sacramento and San Francisco. I don't think I was able to really appreciate the uniqueness of the place until I left it, and have only begun to write about it since I've been living in Indiana. It's not that I've "moved beyond" the work I did in Arroyo (and the larger manuscript from which these stories are drawn, Hearts of Palm). I'll always be drawn to female characters who seek to create an identity within their family unit while also trying to distinguish themselves from it. But I do think that one's first book is usually about the stories that the writer has been obsessed with from very early on. Once you write that book, you have to figure out why you should continue.

MM: I want to ask you about the talismans of creativity: spots of time, favorite notebooks, etc. Do you make ritual use of objects or schedules to help yourself write?

LG: When I first started to write fiction, I used to be very ritualistic—votives, fresh flowers, empty house, window seat—but now I can write anywhere. Much like athletes, writers have superstitious tendencies that become more pronounced when stuck. I've tried to mix things up a lot to counteract that.

MM: As a reader, who were some of your first loves? And lately, which writers have you been admiring and/or drawing inspiration from?

LG: The writers that first cracked me open to literature were primarily minority women writers—Cisneros, Tan, Alvarez, Morrison, Silko. They wrote about people and experiences that I could identity with. Morrison still continues to transfix me—I can open up Beloved to any page and be left awestruck. Some things that have inspired me with my current project are Haruf's Plainsong and Banks' Sweet Hereafter for their multiplicity of voices, Schoemperlen and Waldie's novels for their mosaic construction, and Rodoreda's short stories for the sheer heart of her characterizations.

MM: Momotombo's inclusion of your work in an all-Latino series presents an interesting example of how cultural boundaries are continually in flux, continually evolving, as is the case here with the designation "Latina." To what extent do you self-identify as Latina, and/or do you identify in sisterly (or other) terms with Latinas?

LG: Well, this is a question that I find bothersome, but I suppose it's one I should address. It's a question that I was not entirely aware of until my submersion in academia; it's not something one is asked when living in Northern California with my last name and skin color, not to mention religious background and family size.

MM: One is not asked because, under these circumstances, one is assumed to be Hispanic?

LG: Exactly. My family moved to California from Hawai'i before I was born, when my father was stationed at Travis Air Force Base. We had been in Hawai'i since the latter part of the 19th century—my mother's side from Portugal/England/Ireland, my father's side from the Philippines/China/Spain/Portugal. The multiple mestizo is common in Hawai'i. Indeed, one of the first things someone may ask you when first meeting you is, "What are you?" and everyone seems to have their own ideas about what these different combinations create. Coming from this background, my only sense of myself was that I wasn't a "haole," which is a Hawaiian term that technically means outsider but whose practical application is as a reference to white people. Because of where I grew up, the school I attended, and my family experience, I identified generally as brown and specifically as Latina, although I don't know if I used this word. That was who I looked like, whose experience was most like mine, and whose ethnic slurs were directed at me by Anglos, quite often actually. I knew that I was primarily Portuguese, but I didn't know that this was not a sanctioned Hispanic ethnicity. Most likely, if I had been raised in Hawai'i, I would not have identified as Hispanic. Most likely, I would have then identified as Filipino, in part because of larger family issues that I won't go into here.

MM: You have maintained your commitment to writing over many distinct periods in your life. In your experience, what is the relationship between being a woman of color and being a writer?

LG: A big factor in my development as a writer has been the process of placing myself within an artistic tradition and becoming aware of the audience to whom I'm writing. So I've moved beyond the goal of writing for a general readership (which is often code for an Anglo readership), instead reaching for a narrower audience who shares my cultural background. This readership can understand the nuances I'm creating in order to tell delicate and complicated stories. Coming out of the workshop setting that dominates contemporary writing programs and is primarily made up of Anglo writers, I've had to become comfortable with the fact that not everyone will get what I'm doing. And that's okay. I don't believe that cultural access must be given to everyone. There are parts of my experience and therefore my writing that only other women of color will ever understand, so I'm reluctant to use the limited space available on the page trying to do otherwise. In many ways, this is more an aesthetic point than a political one in that I'm of the school of writing that communicates ideas through implication and inference, the blank page rather than direct statement. In turn, this style lends itself to a system of withholding in which I have to trust the reader to make connections. Instead of spelling everything out, emotions and subtext are conveyed through gestures, objects, and symbols—perhaps another vestige of my Catholic upbringing.