In the summer of 2021, I interviewed Juan Felipe Herrera AKA the US Poet Laureate from 2015-17, AKA barrio forest faerie for #LibrosSchmibros in #BoyleHeights about his new book #EveryDayWeGetMoreIllegal.
Here’s a photo from that adventure. Watch to the whole interview on Libros’ Youtube channel HERE. Get a copy of his book from City Lights Booksellers & Publishers.
To Collage, To Carry: A Fragmented Essay Writing Workshop, Sat. 8/24, 10am-12pm
ACE Hotel, $40 per person, limited full scholarships available. Register below:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdY9C2elvBW5NC_tdwFWL1CwD8rs0e46dCtvobZN92aTFWQ5A/viewform
Join Vickie Vértiz and Muriel Leung in a generative writing workshop that explores collage and fragments to illustrate the unreliability of memory in the personal essay.
Memory is only as reliable as anything else, that is, not very. What does it mean to remember something in pieces? What does it mean to tell a story in pieces? For many of our communities of color, queer, femme, women, and working class people, linear narratives do not serve our stories in the best form. We are constantly bombarded by efforts to erase our histories, our most intimate bodily knowledge, and the wisdom we carry through generations of survival. If our current political moment means we are left with fragments, then how can we use fragmentation to help us put our narratives back together again?
In this workshop Muriel and Vickie will lead participants through writing exercises to help generate or shape narratives that are nonlinear, in fragments, or as some might say, broken. No prior writing experience is necessary. Join these two award-winning writers and scholars as we figure out how to tell our stories in these broken times.
Vickie Vértiz 