Category: Q & A WITH ANOTHER WRITER

Q & A with Poet Karren Alenier on her New Book “How We Hold On,” the WordWorks, Paul Bowles & More

“I have had numerous successful readings on Zoom. Check them out through my website at https://www.alenier.com/videos. I like the platform and I have been making opportunities for other poets through Zoom. Yes, of course, there is a future in online readings. You get a bigger more geographically diverse audience. It’s exhilarating.”— Karren Alenier

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

Karren Alenier

Karren Alenier is one of my very favorite poets, both for the quality of her poetry, but also for her enthusiasm for poetry and the generosity of her spirit. If memory serves, I met Karren 20 years ago when I was selected to read my work at the Joaquin Miller Cabin Poetry Series in Washington DC. And later I was delighted to learn that, in different years, an eon earlier, we had both studied with Paul Bowles in Tangiers. Karren has written about Paul and his wife Jane— read all about that in her The Anima of Paul Bowles. Since 2017 she also hosts a richly varied blog on publishing, https://alenier.blogspot.com.

I’ve been meaning to get Karren here for a Q & A for some time now; her new book, How We Hold On, makes for the perfect occasion.

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write How We Hold On? Can you talk about its genesis?

KARREN ALENIER: The loss of my husband Jim Rich is what inspired this manuscript, especially the poems about Jamaica. Jim loved the Jamaican poems and urged me to get them published.  The model for this work was my prize-winning book Looking for Divine Transportation. Both have 4 sections beginning with family poems and a section where poems from another country are featured.

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

KARREN ALENIER: Sometimes books of poetry are consciously written and other times, the work is collected. How We Hold On is a collected work driven by my desire to preserve the memory of my late spouse and the love we shared. Love poetry always has an audience. I also hoped that the poems would bring solace to some of Jim’s grieving friends. 

Other readers I hope to reach are those interested in poetic form. Grace Cavalieri, always a quick study, said that I had a different strategy for each poem and by that I took it that she meant I used a wide variety of poetic forms to contain what I was feeling and expressing. For audience interested in current events, I also managed to use very new work done as letters to my great grandfather who died in the 1918 pandemic flu.

C.M. MAYO: Which poets have been the most important influences for you? And for How We Hold On in particular?

KARREN ALENIER: Normally, I would say Wallace Stevens and Gertrude Stein have been important influences and they are over all, but for this work, I would say Elizabeth Bishop (form), Ed Hirsch (absurdity), Allen Ginsberg (passion), Guillaume Apollinaire (disconnected leaps).

C.M. MAYO: Which poets and writers are you reading now? 

KARREN ALENIER: Two poets who have caught my attention recently are Harryette Mullen (very Steinian) and Diane Seuss (lovely on absurdity). I read a lot of fiction. I’m currently reading Elena Ferrante’s The Lying Life of Adults. I love stories that take place in the countries of the Mediterranean. 

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to call down the Muse with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

KARREN ALENIER: I’m used to being interrupted. I grew up in house of six children. I was eldest. The point is when I am working, I am able to ignore the lure of online wonders like YouTube, blogs and newspapers. However, I like to work in silence and know that listening to radio, TV, or music is too distracting. Yes, my smart phone is an interrupter. Still I don’t turn that off because someone important to me might reach out and need me. Some of my friends get annoyed that I don’t read their Facebook pages except occasionally. The best way for me to get something done is to put it on my list of things to do. I take great pleasure in ticking off those items.

C.M. MAYO: How has it been to read poetry on Zoom? Do you see the future all Zoom-y?

KARREN ALENIER: I have had numerous successful readings on Zoom. Check them out through my website at https://www.alenier.com/videos. I like the platform and I have been making opportunities for other poets through Zoom. Yes, of course, there is a future in online readings. You get a bigger more geographically diverse audience. It’s exhilarating.

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish a book of poetry, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

KARREN ALENIER: If a publisher says s/he likes part of your manuscript, ask immediately if you can send a revision. Don’t delay by feeling sorry for yourself or thinking someone else might like the whole thing. Take your openings when they present.

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a poet?

KARREN ALENIER: I’m currently working on poems in response to Tender Buttons (Gertrude Stein) and I’m taking others along for the experience.  I expect to announce the Tender Buttons anthology project in October 2021. The first of three books will be published by The Word Works in 2022.

C.M. MAYO: Can you share your most vivid memory of Paul Bowles?

KARREN ALENIER: In August 1982, I arrived for a writing appointment at his apartment door in Tangier wearing a djellaba over my clothes and purse to protect myself from pickpockets or other people interested in my things. I was hot and when invited in by Paul Bowles, I asked if he would mind if I took off my robe. He looked at me with surprise and said, “oh, I forgot my jacket.” He grabbed his jacket and put it on and then he said, “Of course, you may take your djellaba off.”

C.M. MAYO: Can you talk about your involvement with The Word Works? 

KARREN ALENIER: I was the first poet published by The Word Works in 1975. The next year, I started workshopping poetry with other members of Word Works at the Joaquin Miller cabin in Washington, DC’s Rock Creek Park. By 1978, I started the Joaquin Miller Cabin Poetry Series which has been running every summer since then. In 1986, I became the second president and chairperson of the board of directors. In 1987, under my leadership, the Washington Prize moved from a single poem contest to a book prize with a cash purse. In 1989, I founded the Capital Collection imprint (now known as the Hilary Tham Capital Collection) which awards book publication to poets who volunteer for literary organizations like The Word Works. In 1999, I started the Café Muse Literary Salon at Strathmore Hall in Bethesda, Maryland. The series has been running monthly ever since with the excellent help of many volunteers.  In 2009, Nancy White became the third president of Word Works. She leads the publishing and, while staying involved in the publishing, I spend more time on public programs. I have innovated many programs for The Word Works and pride myself on this strategy—I tell our volunteers I expect them to have fun and if they aren’t, they shouldn’t continue.

how we hold on

my mother kept a steamer trunk
with classic clothes immune to fad
my husband owned a cedar chest
packed with bits reins and riding whip

I am neither fashionista
nor ardent horse enthusiast
in my chest an aging heart brims
with blood both beautiful and swift

—Karren L. Alenier

when it drops you gonna feel it

we traded
Internet for mosquito
net cocooned
for sleep
under a halo
of white mesh
the sea beating
the coral cliffs
of Negril a lullaby
of dominoes geckos
the kingpins in the road
hawking anythingyouwant
the minstrel Fire improvising
Toots Hibbert’s “Pressure Drop”
a daughter hopeful that her father
in a Sav-la-Mar hospital would kick
lung cancer with an herbal medicine
something six chemo treatments
in Georgia couldn’t do

—Karren L. Alenier

Visit Karren Alenier’s website at www.alenier.com

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me here.

Q & A with Diana Anhalt on Her Poetry Collection Walking Backward

Q & A: Joseph Hutchison, Poet Laureate of Colorado, on The World As Is

AWP 2019 (Think No One Is Reading Books and Litmags Anymore?)

Q & A with Lynne Sharon Schwartz About “Crossing Borders”

“The writers I most admired as I was starting out as a fiction writer were Henry James, Proust, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Bruno Schulz, and Natalia Ginzburg, the great Italian writer whose essays I’ve translated, A Place to Live: Selected Essays of Natalia Ginzburg, also published by Seven Stories Press, as is the anthology.”—Lynne Sharon Schwartz

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

Because I am a writer and literary translator myself, Lynne Sharon Schwartz’s collection Crossing Borders: Stories and Essays About Translation popped up blinking brightly on my Super-Interesting Radar (tip o’ the fez to Ellen Prentiss Campbell). Nonetheless, Crossing Borders is a book I would warmly recommend to any and all readers who appreciate superb writing and literary adventure. I relished every one of the pieces Schwartz collected, but my personal favorites were two short stories, Michelle Hermann’s “Auslander” and Lucy Ferriss’ “The Difficulty of Translation.” Triple-extra fun: Harry Mathews’ essay “Translation and the Oulipo.”

It is a delight and an honor that, for this month’s Q & A, Lynne Sharon Schwartz agreed to answer some questions.

Lynne Sharon Schwartz

C.M. MAYO: In brief, what inspired you to edit Crossing Borders? As the editor of an anthology of literary translations myself, I am also curious to know how you found these many and varied pieces. I know it can be quite challenging to find good pieces and to secure the permissions. (Did you send out a call for submissions?) Can you talk a little about your process?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: As a translator as well as a writer, I’ve always been interested in the translation process, and also in fiction written about translators, which is rare. I don’t recall how the idea for the anthology came to me, but it was quite a few years ago, in fact at a time when research could be done in the library with books, not solely online. So I used a large reference book organized by topic, and I simply looked through the section on Translation; that’s how I found several of the pieces. Of course I had many more than I could use, but it was fun reading them all.  Several of the stories I came across in my own personal reading, the ones by Joyce Carol Oates, Lydia Davis, Lucy Ferriss and Michael Scammell.  And sometimes one thing led to another.

I didn’t send out a call for submissions, simply worked from the listings I found, and the few I discovered on my own. Securing permissions was the most onerous part of the job.  Not that editors were unwilling, but in some cases finding the authors and editors, being referred from pillar to post, and that kind of thing.  But most of the authors and editors were pleased to have the work included, as why shouldn’t they be?

C.M. MAYO: Which of all the pieces that came your way was the biggest surprise for you?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: I’d have to say the most surprising was the one by Svetlana Velmar-Jancovic, “Sima Street,” which I found in An Anthology of Contemporary Serbian Stories, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press.  I can’t even remember how I found it; it must have been listed in the reference book I used.  Not only is it a fine story, referring to Serbian history, but how many Americans know anything about Serbian literature?  It was an eye-opener and a thrill to track it down.

C.M. MAYO: As you worked to assemble this anthology, what are the one or two things about translation and/or about the process of assembling the anthology that most surprised you?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: I was surprised by how many fine essays there are about translation, as well as the many stories whose protagonists are translators.  The whole process proved fascinating.  I learned a great deal by the various approaches to translation that  I found.

C.M. MAYO: Was there anything that turned out to be harder and/or easier than you expected?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: The hardest part was tracking down the works and obtaining the permissions.

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you as a writer?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: The writers I most admired as I was starting out as a fiction writer were Henry James, Proust, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Bruno Schulz, and Natalia Ginzburg, the great Italian writer whose essays I’ve translated, A Place to Live: Selected Essays of Natalia Ginzburg, also published by Seven Stories Press, as is the anthology.

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now? 

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: I’ve read so much during this pandemic I can hardly recall them all. The one book I promised myself I would finish—and did— was the Letters of Nelson Mandela from prison. This was inspiring and brilliant, and seeing how he surmounted enormous difficulties helped me enormously.  After all, getting through the pandemic doesn’t compare to what Mandela endured and achieved, and it helped me put things in perspective.

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: I avoid social media as much as possible—I think it is destroying critical thinking, as well as print journalism. A lot of it is simply garbage. I do like email, though I miss getting personal letters in the mail.

C.M. MAYO: For those contemplating trying their hand at literary translation, do you have any advice?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: Anyone trying to translate should read as much as possible in both the new language and the target language. And try to get to know the author being translated, that is by reading other works by them. I’ve always felt that my translations were successful not because of my knowledge of Italian, but rather because of my being good at writing in English!

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer? And as a translator?

LYNNE SHARON SCHWARTZ: I’m in the middle of several things, a new novel, which seems to have stalled because of the pandemic.  I’m assembling my third collection of essays, and hoping to translate an Italian Young Adult novel set in Paris at the time of the 1893 World’s Fair.

Visit Lynne Sharon Schwartz’s website at www.lynnesharonschwartz.com

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me here.

Daniel Chacón’s “Words on a Wire” Podcast Interview 
with Yours Truly About Francisco I. Madero’s Secret Book

Translating Contemporary Latin American Poets and Writers: 
Embracing, Resisting, Escaping the Magnetic Pull of the Capital

Q & A with Álvaro Santana-Acuña on Writing Ascent to Glory: How One Hundred Years of Solitude Was Written and Became a Global Classic

From the Archives: Q & A with Mary S. Black on “From the Frío to Del Río”

“The Lower Pecos Canyonlands are not well known by most people, but the landscape is incredibly majestic and unexpected.” — Mary S. Black

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

This finds me taking this Monday off so, herewith, an especially inspiring Q & A from the archives.

Q & A: Mary S. Black on Her New Book,
From the Frío to Del Río

Originally posted May 22, 2017 on Madam Mayo blog

One of my very favorite places not just in Texas but in the galaxy is the Lower Pecos Canyonlands, so I was delighted to see that Texas A & M Press has published Mary S. Black’s splendid and much-needed guidebook, From the Frio to Del Rio: Travel Guide to the Western Hill Country and Lower Pecos Canyonlands. 

From the catalog:

“Each year, more than two million visitors enjoy the attractions of the Western Hill Country, with Uvalde as its portal, and the lower Pecos River canyonlands, which stretch roughly along US 90 from Brackettville, through Del Rio, and on to the west. Amistad National Recreation Area, the Judge Roy Bean Visitors’ Center and Botanical Garden, Seminole Canyon State Park, and the Briscoe-Garner Museum in Uvalde, along with ghost towns, ancient rock art, sweeping vistas, and unique flora and fauna, are just a few of the features that make this distinctive section of the Lone Star State an enticing destination.

“Now, veteran writer, blogger, and educator Mary S. Black serves up the best of this region’s special adventures and secret treasures. From the Frio to Del Rio is chock-full of helpful maps, colorful photography, and tips on where to stay, what to do, and how to get there. In addition there are details for 10 scenic routes, 3 historic forts and 7 state parks and other recreation areas.”

Mary S. Black

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write this book?

MARY S. BLACK: I think what inspired me was the land itself, and the history. The Lower Pecos Canyonlands are not well known by most people, but the landscape is incredibly majestic and unexpected. You can be driving 70 miles per hour down the highway through the desert, when, wham, a huge canyon veers off to the left like a sudden tear in the earth. 

These canyons were inhabited by human beings for thousands of years. They lived off the land and made paintings on the canyon walls that illustrate their gods and belief systems. Over 300 of these paintings still exist, and you can visit some of them. They are a treasure of human culture, and I hope more people will learn to value them as something important for us to save. The people who settled this area historically were a diverse bunch with a lot of gumption. Do people know that word anymore? I guess in modern language, we might say they had a lot of guts. 

C.M. MAYO: In your view, what is the most underrated place in this region?

MARY S. BLACK: If I have to pick only one, I’ll say Las Moras Springs Pool at Ft. Clark in Brackettville.  I’m always looking for great swimming holes. Las Moras Springs Pool is the third largest spring-fed swimming pool in Texas. Crystal clear water at a year-round temperature of about 70 degrees comes into the pool from a strongly flowing spring, yet very few people swim there because they don’t know how to get access. 

The pool is located on Ft. Clark, and old U.S. Army fort originally built in 1849. You can get a day-pass for $5.00 at the guard house to enter the fort, enjoy the pool or play golf on either of two gold courses, and look at all the old stone buildings that remain from when the place was an active Army fort. There is also a really interesting museum there that is open on Saturdays.

C.M. MAYO: Which is your favorite place? 

MARY S. BLACK: Hands down, the White Shaman Preserve. The best studied of all the ancient murals is located there.  This is a polychrome painting about 25 feet long and 13 feet high done on a rock wall overlooking the Pecos River. This painting tells a story about creation and how the sun was born, according to Dr. Carolyn Boyd. You can visit the preserve on Saturdays at noon if you make a reservation online through the Witte Museum.  Tours are two-three hours long, and require a fairly strenuous hike down a canyon to a rockshelter, then back up.  But to be up there, to see the mural up close and in person, to look out over the river and imagine the people who made this painting, can change your whole perspective. It’s that powerful. 

C.M. MAYO: Your favorite seasonal or annual event? 

MARY S. BLACK: I have two: autumn color near Lost Maples State Natural Area near Vanderpool, and tubing in the cold Frio river in summer. Both are unique experiences in Texas and shouldn’t be missed. An isolated stand of bigtooth maple turns orange and red in Sabinal Canyon in late November. And swimming in the Frio at Garner State Park is like heaven on a hot day. 

C.M. MAYO: What surprised you in researching this book? 

MARY S. BLACK: How fascinating the area really is. The more I learned, the more I wanted to know.  The region has seven state parks and natural areas, nine ghost towns, three historic Army forts, and many scenic drives. But the coolest part was reading about all the crazy things that have happened there, like train robberies and early airplane adventures. And Indian battles. When settlers from the US and Mexico started coming in after the Civil War, the native Apaches and Comanches were fighting for their lives. And of course the U.S. Army was trying to drive them out. It gets complicated, but there were many interesting people involved in all this, like the Black Seminole Indian Scouts at Ft. Clark, and others. One of the first settlers in the Nueces River valley was a woman named Jerusha Sanchez, who came in the 1860s. Later a widow named Elizabeth Hill and her three sons also pioneered in the area. Blacks, women, immigrants from Italy, Mexico, Germany, and other places, and Native Americans made the history what it is. 

C.M. MAYO: You offer an excellent bibliography for further reading. If you could recommend only three of these books, which would they be?  

MARY S. BLACK: Hmm, they are so different, let me see.  First I think Carolyn Boyd’s new book, which is called simply The White Shaman Mural, just published by University of Texas Press in 2016.  She details her 25 years of research on the painting in this book and explains how she cracked the code on what it means, an amazing accomplishment.

Then I nominate Judge Roy Bean Country by Jack Skiles, published in 1996, which is a compilation of local stories of life in the Lower Pecos. The Skiles family has been ranching in the area for over 75 years and can tell stories about mountain lions and smugglers that will make you faint. 

Finally, one I found fascinating was The Newton Boys: Portrait of an Outlaw Gang by Willis and Joe Newton as told to Claude Stanush, published in 1994. It tells how they became train robbers and learned to blow bank safes with nitroglycerin, which they did in Texas and the Midwest all through the 1920s. By the time they were captured, they had stolen more money than all other outlaws at the time combined. 

 > Mary S. Black’s website and blog

> From the Frio to Del Rio is available from amazon.com or your independent bookseller.

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me here.

Carolyn Boyd’s The White Shaman Mural

Selected Cabeza de Vaca Books, Part I: 
Notes on the Two Editions of Cabeza de Vaca’s La Relación 
(Also Known as Account, Chronicle, Narrative, Castaways, 
Report & etc.) 
and Selected English Translations

Q & A with Biographer David O. Stewart on
the Stunning Fact of George Washington

Q & A with Biographer David O. Stewart on the Stunning Fact of George Washington

“We usually think of him as this marble man, this cold image on dollar bills and coins, but part of his great success was his emotional intelligence and accessibility.”
— David O. Stewart

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

David O. Stewart

Just in time for the 4th of July, this last Monday-of-the-month Q & A features acclaimed biographer David O. Stewart and his latest work, George Washington: The Political Rise of America’s Founding Father which, by the way, just won the coveted History Prize from the Society of the Cincinnati. I am very much looking forward to reading this biography for, I would suggest, dear writerly reader, that the qualities of George Washington’s leadership in the American Revolution and in the founding of the United States, and his personal evolution, are something vital to both comprehend and contemplate in this covid year when a good portion of our society— on all sides of the political rhombozoid— smombified by screens, self-delivered serfs to the tech lords and their algorithms, tweeting fury to the cyber-winds— seems to be stumbling towards the edge of…

But on to the Q & A.

“[A]n outstanding biography that both avoids hagiography and acknowledges the greatness of Washington’s character… Mr. Stewart’s writing is clear, often superlative, his judgements are nuanced, and the whole has a narrative drive such a life deserves.”
— Wall Street Journal

C.M. MAYO: In brief, what inspired you to write George Washington?

DAVID O. STEWART: I wanted to understand a stunning fact about him:  that he won four critical elections (twice as president, and also as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army in 1775 and as president of the Constitutional Convention in 1787), but also that he won them UNANIMOUSLY.  Who does that?  How did he do that?  The book is an attempt to answer those questions.

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

DAVID O. STEWART: I always try to write for curious readers, not for specialists or history enthusiasts.  Some of the best stories are true—it would be hard to invent a fictional Washington, someone that complex, brave and impressive, yet also with significant flaws that he struggled to repair yet (because he was human) never entirely fixed.  So my best reader is someone who wonders about this world and how we struggle to make our way.

C.M. MAYO: In your researches, what are the one or two things that most surprised you to uncover?

DAVID O. STEWART: With George Washington, I wasn’t prepared for how frankly emotional he was.  Much of his leadership was based on his ability to connect with others on an almost pre-cognitive level.  Sure, he was large and usually calm and centered, but he also had the gift of listening to others (John Adams called it his “gift of silence”).  Contemporaries called him “affable.”  At highly-charged moments in his life, Washington wept in public.  When he lost loved ones, he wrote movingly about the pain.  We usually think of him as this marble man, this cold image on dollar bills and coins, but part of his great success was his emotional intelligence and accessibility.

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you as a writer of narrative nonfiction (biography)? And for George Washington in particular?

DAVID O. STEWART: I read for entertainment and enlightenment, and am not usually looking for instruction.  I can be knocked out by someone else’s book— any of Robert Caro’s, for example— without ever thinking that I should write that way.  I may pick up a tip here or there (Joseph Ellis’ American Sphinx teaches that you can write a fine biography that overtly skips the dull stuff).  But other writers have their own magic.  It’s not mine.  I try to figure out the best way to tell well the story I’m working on.  As for Washington, many writers have taken him on with great success —Freeman, Flexner, Chernow, even Washington Irving— but I think I learned the most about Washington from some less-well-known writers like Don Higginbotham, Paul Longmore, Peter Henriques.  

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now? 

DAVID O. STEWART: I’m halfway through Ted Widmer’s Lincoln on the Verge, which is a remarkable snapshot of America careening into the Civil War; it’s digression as an art form.  Since I also write fiction, I usually have a novel or two going.  I’ve recently discovered Tana French’s Irish police stories, which are wonderfully written, and very much admired Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet.  I’m resolved to read a couple of Barry Unsworth’s historical novels; I read two of them a while back and enjoyed them immensely.

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

DAVID O. STEWART: For a lot of years, I was a trial and appellate lawyer with a dozen or more active cases at a time.  I used to describe my work as a life of interruptions.  Clients called.  Colleagues dropped by (remember offices?).  Opposing lawyers called.  Dumb firm meetings.  Interviewing job applicants.  I was constantly dropping one subject to pick up another.  I tried to be in my office by seven a.m. to get some uninterrupted time.  So these days, working at home by myself, I actually get antsy if I don’t have a few interruptions.  I’m used to working for a stretch, taking a few minutes off to do something stupid (see social media) or annoying (see call health insurer), and then getting back to work.  It’s normal.

C.M. MAYO: For writers of narrative nonfiction keeping notes and papers organized can be more than tremendously challenging. Would you have any tips to share / lessons learned?

DAVID O. STEWART: I have a very boring organizational system because I want to spend the least amount of time maintaining the infrastructure.  With each new project, I usually start a timeline but then give it up after a few weeks as more trouble than it’s worth.  I like maps.  I keep a list of sources I want to consult and sometimes remember to cross off the ones I’ve read.  I take notes on EVERYTHING, even if I have the source in hard-copy.  And I type all my notes in Word so it’s all word-searchable.  That’s it.  No index cards.  No file cabinets overflowing with stuff.  No cellphone photos of key passages.  No Scrib’d files.  No diagrams on cork boards.  

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

DAVID O. STEWART: Nobody asked you to write that book.  You’re doing it for you.  If you can’t get it published, accept that they’re all a bunch of morons and move on.

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer?

DAVID O. STEWART: I’ve been working on a trilogy of novels inspired by my mother’s family’s history, starting when the first ones came to the Maine coast in the 1750s.  It’s called The Overstreet Saga, and the first one (The New Land) should come out in November.

Excerpt from David O. Stewart’s George Washington (Dutton Books, 2021)

There was a real man named George Washington, one who stuffed his sixty-seven years with remarkable achievements.  This book examines a principal feature of his greatness that can be overlooked:  a mastery of politics that allowed him to dominate the most crucial period of American history.  For the twenty years from 1776 to 1796, he was a central force in every important event in the nation; often, he was the determining factor.  A former British soldier, far from an admirer, wrote in 1784 that Washington’s “political maneuvers, and his cautious plausible management,” had raised him “to a degree of eminence in his own country unrivalled.”One measure of Washington’s political skill was that when he denied having political talent or ambitions, people mostly believed him, and have continued to believe him ever since.

That those denials were disingenuous is beyond dispute.  Washington won several major elections in his life:  in 1775, the Second Continental Congress selected him as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army; his colleagues at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 made him presiding officer of that pivotal effort to invent a system of self-government; then the new nation elected him as its first president, and re-elected him.  As pointed out by others, the fact to linger over is that Washington did not merely win those four critical contests; he won them unanimously. Unanimous election was no more common in the late eighteenth century than it is today.  

Washington did not achieve such preeminence due to natural advantages or happy accidents, or because he was tall, rich, brave, and married a rich woman.  Nothing about Washington’s success was easy.  He had modest inherited wealth, so had to acquire the money that made his career possible.  He had a meager education, a temper that terrified those who saw him lose it, a cockiness that could make him reckless, and a deep financial insecurity that could lead him close to greed.

Washington studied his flaws. From a young age, he struggled against his own nature.  His early missteps might have crippled the prospects of a person with less dogged commitment to self-improvement.  He ruthlessly suppressed qualities that could hinder his advancement and mastered those that could assist it.  Washington’s story is not one of effortless superiority, but one of excellence achieved with great effort.  

That Washington was the paramount political figure of the turbulent founding era may be enough to deem him a master politician.  Yet the appellation applies even more firmly because of the restraint and even benevolence with which he exercised the power his contemporaries placed in his hands.  Acclaimed at countless public ceremonies through the last quarter-century of his life, he never became grandiose or self-important.  Often called “affable” by those who knew him, despite a personal reserve he maintained in public, his intense modesty and sense of his own fallibility allowed him to seek the advice of others on difficult decisions without preventing him from following his own judgment.  As the embodiment of the republican ideals of his time and place, he defined the expectations that Americans would have of their leaders for many generations.  

Read more about David O. Stewart and George Washington at davidostewart.com

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me here.

Q & A with Timothy Heyman on the Incomparable Legacy of 
German-Mexican Novelist B. Traven

Duende and the Importance of Questioning ELB

Selected Cabeza de Vaca Books, Part II: 
Notes on Narrative Histories and Biographies

Q & A with Kathleen Alcalá on “Spirits of the Ordinary”

“My three novels address the very different parts of my ancestry. I also hope to have this book in particular picked up by the Jewish reader interested in the Jewish diaspora from Spain, someone who realizes that an Eastern European background is not the only one.”— Kathleen Alcalá

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

Kathleen Alcalá, author of Spirits of the Ordinary

A couple of decades ago, when I was beginning to publish my own work about Mexico, and editing Tameme, a bilingual English/Spanish journal of new writing from Canada, the US and Mexico, I had the immense fortune to meet some of the most accomplished and innovative literary writers from the US-Mexico borderlands, among them, Kathleen Alcalá. The author of several books of fiction and nonfiction, Alcalá’s work has been recognized with Western States Book Award, the Governor’s Writers Award, and a Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award. In 2014 she was honored by the national Latino writers group, Con Tinta, and she has been designated an Island Treasure in the Arts on Bainbridge Island, where she lives in the state of Washington. When I first met Alcalá, her novel set in northern Mexico in the 1870s, Spirits of the Ordinary, based on the true history of Mexican Jews practicing their religion in secret, was then relatively recently published, and a sensation it was, for the history of the conversos of northern New Spain (Spanish Jews who had converted to Christianity at the time of the 15th century expulsion of the Jews) and the crypto-Jews (those who practiced Judaism in secret) was then little known. Spirits of the Ordinary received high praise, for example, from Publisher’s Weekly, which called it “A fecund fable about the convergence of cultures—Mexican, American and Jewish—along the Mexico/Texas border…. Alcalá’s seductive writing mixes fatalism and hope, logic and fantasy.” And no less a literary heavyweight than Larry McMurtry called it “continually arresting—a book in which passions both ordinary and extraordinary are made vivid and convincing.”

How delighted I was to learn from Kathleen that, for its 25th anniversary, Spirits of the Ordinary is back in print in a lovely new edition from Raven Chronicles Press, introduced by one of my favorite poets, Rigoberto González. Apropos of that, Alcalá agreed to answer some questions.

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write Spirits of the Ordinary?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: My first book was a collection of short stories in the manner of the stories told by my mother’s family. When I finished the last, long story I realized that I knew much more about these characters, based on my family’s history, enough for at least one novel. It turned out to be three novels.

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: I don’t know if I should be embarrassed to say that I expected my readers to be much like myself, people who grew up in the United States, but with our cultural roots firmly in Mexico. This comprises some of my audience. But a bigger part of it is the American readership that has good associations with Mexico as a vacation destination and the site of some of their fantasies. 

Toni Morrison described this as writing under “the white gaze.” I had no idea how important this was for BIPOC (Black or Indigenous People of Color) writers. I was not writing the “poor farmworker makes good” narrative that was expected of me in the publishing world. As a result, around 25 publishers rejected the novel before Chronicle Books took a chance on it.

C.M. MAYO: Now that some years have gone by, can you describe the ideal reader for this book as you see him or her now?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: The ideal reader is now a generation younger than I am. It is a young professional or student who wants to broaden their perspective to include fore parents who loved the land, fought for it, died for it, and were often discriminated against by their own society. My three novels address the very different parts of my ancestry. I also hope to have this book in particular picked up by the Jewish reader interested in the Jewish diaspora from Spain, someone who realizes that an Eastern European background is not the only one. 

C.M. MAYO: Can you share any surprises for you about the reception of your book’s first edition? (And has it been different in different countries?) Do you expect it to be different in 2021?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: Spirits received a number of awards right out of the chute. From manuscript rejection to publication and great reviews in a year really floored me. I was not prepared for the embrace provided by readers. I have to thank writers like Ursula K. Le Guin and Larry McMurtry, as well as booksellers like Rick Simonsen at Elliott Bay Books and Paul Yamazaki at City Lights for their kind words that helped propel this book out into the world. 

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to bring Spirits of the Ordinary back into print?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: Almost twenty-five years later, crypto-Jews are no longer a secret. When I was researching and writing, no one knew what I was talking about except for a few Sephardic Jews. Now there is a substantial body of writing about the events leading to this condition, as well as critical analysis of both the events and the literature. I feel as though this topic has come full circle now that Spain has offered expedited citizenship to descendants of the Expulsion. This provides a much more complete context for my work.

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you when you were writing Spirits of the Ordinary— and subsequently?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: I have always read science fiction along with mainstream fiction. Some people look down on “genre” fiction as not true literature, but alternate worlds and points of view fit perfectly with my upbringing in the southwest, with cousins on both sides of the border. Our reality has always been alternative.

Other writers will tell you it is comics that sustained them when they were young, but that’s really the same thing, except in pictorial form: narratives willing to address the “what if.”

I studied with Ursula K. Le Guin, Joanna Russ, and Charles Johnson. I read Elena Poniatowska and Juan Rulfo in Spanish, and later my age peers, Ana Castillo, Sandra Cisneros and Denise Chávez, although they were way ahead of me in achievements.

More recent writers who have knocked me dead include Roberto Bolaño, Ruth Ozeki, Sabrina Vourvoulias, Isabel Quintero and NK Jemison.  There are so many more. Books are my vice. 

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: I’ve read a lot of Greg Bear’s books because we are friends and he is very prolific. Nisi Shawl is an up and coming writer even though she has already received a lot of accolades. I have been reading a lot of indigenous writers recently, mostly poets like Laura Da’, but also fiction and essayists like Rebecca Roanhorse and Elissa Washuta. Every time I meet a new writer whose work I like, I try to let them know how great their writing is. I probably scare people at conferences because I am not cool— I am enthusiastic, especially with writers of color or those who otherwise don’t fit into the mainstream narrative. 

This is one reason that, Phoebe Bosché, Philip Red-Eagle and I started Raven Chronicles Press. We wanted to provide a showcase for these wonderful writers. Currently, you can see much of this work in an anthology called Take a Stand: Art Against Hate.  I am also working with Professor Norma Elia Cantú on an anthology of stories, essays and poetry about La Llorona— again, because there is so much talent, so many ideas that need to be published and shared.

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: All of this is terrible. I am so easily distracted. I will start laundry, open a file, take notes by hand, and forget what I had planned to do that day. For me, the best strategy is still the writing residency, away from home, where I don’t have any excuses and fewer distractions. This is especially needed when I am trying to organize large blocks of writing, such as the chapters in a novel.

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: Before submitting anything, research the market. If looking to publish in a magazine, purchase half a dozen or so that seem to be likely venues for your work. Look at them carefully and see if you fit in. This is a good place to start, rather than submitting book length manuscripts to publishers, because book editors read these magazines, too. It also gives you a chance to learn how to work with an editor, to receive suggestions and shape the best possible piece for the magazine. 

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer?

KATHLEEN ALCALÁ: Surprisingly, after all these years, Spirits of the Ordinary and Treasures in Heaven (my third novel, which is about the feminist movement in Mexico) have been optioned for movie and television rights! We will see where that goes. In between distractions, I am foolishly working on two novels at the same time – one is set in 10th Century Spain, and one in a near-future west coast and Mexico. Oh yes, and I owe someone a short story!

> Visit Kathleen Alcalá at www.kathleenalcala.com

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me by simply clicking here.

Q & A with Jan Cleere on Military Wives in Arizona Territory:
A History of Women Who Shaped the Frontier

Why Translate? The Case of the President of Mexico’s Secret Book

In Memorium: 
William C. Gruben and his “Animals in the Arts in Texas”

Find out more about
C.M. Mayo’s books, articles, podcasts, and more.

From the Archives: “A Traveler in Mexico: A Rendezvous with Writer Rosemary Sullivan”

A TRAVELER IN MEXICO:
A RENDEZVOUS WITH WRITER ROSEMARY SULLIVAN
C.M. MAYO
Originally published in Inside Mexico, March 2009

Mexico City’s Coyoacán neighborhood has become inextricably linked with the Surrealist painter Frida Kahlo, so what better place to rendezvous with poet, writer, and biographer of Surrealists, Rosemary Sullivan? A professor of English at the University of Toronto, Sullivan had just alighted in Mexico City and would soon be on her way to meet with Surrealist painter Leonora Carrington, when we met over cappuccinos at the sun-drenched Café Moheli to talk about her latest book.

Villa Air-Bel: World War II, Escape, and a House in Marseille is a page-turner of a deeply researched history about the rescue of artists and intellectuals trapped as the Nazis closed in. The effort, fomented by the New York-based Emergency Rescue Committee and led by their agent in Marseilles, Varian Fry, managed to save André Breton, Marc Chagall, and Max Ernst, among others, and found refuge for them in the United States. But some came to Mexico. These included the Russian novelist Victor Serge, and his son Vlady; and most famously, Surrealist painters Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo, who (along with Frida Kahlo), are today among Mexico’s most revered artists. For this reason, Villa Air-Bel is a work important to the history of modern art in Mexico.

But the book’s connection to Mexico goes deeper.

“Villa Air-Bel started here,” Sullivan said. She explained that, back in 1995, she had come to Mexico City to write about the intense friendship of three women artists Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo, and the Canadian poet P.K. Page (also known as the painter Pat Irwin), which commenced in 1960 when Page, already the author of several books and a winner of Canada’s prestigious Governor General’s Award, arrived with her husband, Arthur Irwin, then Canada’s ambassador to Mexico. 

Sullivan, then two years out of graduate school, met Page in Victoria in 1974. As Sullivan recalls in the essay “Three Travellers in Mexico,” “For me P.K. is one of the searchers, ahead of the rest of us, throwing back clues. She encouraged me to believe I might become a writer.” Varo had died of a heart attack in 1963. But thanks to an introduction from Page, Sullivan met Carrington in Mexico City. 

The English-born Leonora Carrington had a harrowing but triumphant story. She was living in France when the Germans invaded. Her lover, the Surrealist painter Max Ernst, was arrested, first as an enemy alien and then a second time as an enemy of the Nazis. Leonora fled to Spain, where she had a mental collapse and was put in an insane asylum, a searing experience she wrote about in The House of Fear: Notes from Down Below. Her family got her out, but thinking they wanted to put her in another asylum in South Africa, she escaped in Lisbon en route. Ernst, miraculously, reappeared in Lisbon, but the pair parted ways, Ernst going to New York with Peggy Guggenheim, and Leonora, in a marriage of convenience to her rescuer, Mexican diplomat-poet Renato Leduc, to Mexico. Here she remarried, produced two sons, and an extraordinary body of work as a painter, sculptor, poet and writer. (Still active in her 90s, last month [February 2009] Carrington attended an event in her honor at Mexico City’s Museo José Luis Cuevas.)

In 1995, Carrington showed Sullivan some of Varo’s playfully dreamlike and delicately-rendered paintings. Later, while reading Unexpected Journeys, Janet A. Kaplan’s biography of Varo, Sullivan came upon the story of Varian Fry and the Villa Bel-Air, a château outside Marseille where so many of the outstanding figures involved either lived or visited. For a time, though they were in terrible danger and lacked such basics as coal and meat, with André Breton hosting a Sunday open house and leading Surrealist games in the drawing room, Villa Air-Bel had all the joyous spirit of an artists colony. 

While in Mexico City that time, Sullivan also wrote the short story that became the nucleus of Labyrinth of Desire, an exploration of the myths women live out when they fall in love, from Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara (“Don Juan / Doña Juana”), to Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo (“Self-Portrait with Mirrors”). In that short story, Sullivan said, “The man is named Varian, but just because I loved the name. I never imagined I’d write this book! He just sat at the bottom of my mind…”

While reading The Quiet American, Andy Marino’s biography of Varian Fry, Sullivan saw the image that made her decide to write about the refugee artists and intellectuals and their rescuers. In the photo, like a pair of children, Fry and Consuelo de Saint Exupéry perch high in the python-like branches of an plane tree.

“This was war-time France!” Sullivan exclaimed. “What were they doing in the tree?” They were hanging paintings. “That refusal to be cowed by Fascism… “

But how to tell such a huge and sprawling story? In a flash, Sullivan realized that she could organize it around a year in the life of Villa Air-Bel.

Other than Carrington, however, few of those who had been at Villa Air-Bel were still alive. 

One of the most important sources had to be Vlady Serge, the painter who, as a young man had been rescued from France along with his father. From Canada, Sullivan made an appointment for an interview in Cuernavaca, where he had his house and studio. She then flew to Mexico. She settled into Las Mañanitas hotel, and when she telephoned that she was on her way, she was informed he was not there. It turned out Serge had been rushed to the hospital with a fatal stroke. Sullivan had missed him by a matter of minutes; nonetheless, he had left her detailed instructions on whom to meet and where to find archives.

Here in Coyoacan’s Café Moheli, the snortle of the cappuccino machine interlaced with birdsong, conversations, and the occasional passing car, I said, what had most struck me about Villa Air-Bel was the way she described the confusion at the time, and how, throughout the 1930s, people had a sense of normalcy, until—I quoted her—”in a moment, the world collapsed like a burnt husk.”

“I meant people to read this book in terms of now,” Sullivan said. “Because it can always happen.”

I welcome your courteous comments which, should you feel so moved, you can email to me by simply clicking here.

Q & A with Álvaro Santana-Acuña on Writing Ascent to Glory: How One Hundred Years of Solitude Was Written and Became a Global Classic

From the B. Traven Conferences in Berlin / Plus Cyberflanerie

Carolyn E. Boyd’s The White Shaman Mural

My new book is Meteor

Find out more about
C.M. Mayo’s books, articles, podcasts, and more.

Q & A with Susan J. Tweit on Her Memoir, “Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying”

“My ideal reader is someone who recognizes that someone they love will die, and wonders how to make that journey with them in a way that is honest and open, supportive and loving.” —Susan J. Tweit

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

My writing students have often asked me if I think it worth the time, expense, and trouble to attend a writer’s conference. The older I get the less certain I am about what would be best for other writers, but I can say that for me the writers conferences I’ve attended have all been well worthwhile, and for many reasons, one of the most important being the chance to meet other writers and become acquainted with their work. One of these wonderful writers, whom I met some years ago at Women Writing the West, is Susan J. Tweit. I relished her splendid essays about the Chihuahuan Desert collected in Barren, Wild and Worthless. Her new memoir, Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying, out this week from She Writes Press, promises to be a beautiful, mind- and heart-opening read.

Susan J. Tweit, author of Bless the Birds

Here’s the publisher’s catalog copy for Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying:

“Writer Susan Tweit and her economist-turned-sculptor husband Richard Cabe had just settled into their version of a “good life” when Richard saw thousands of birds one day―harbingers of the brain cancer that would kill him two years later. This compelling and intimate memoir chronicles their journey into the end of his life, framed by their final trip together, a 4,000-mile-long delayed honeymoon road trip.

“As Susan and Richard navigate the unfamiliar territory of brain cancer treatment and learn a whole new vocabulary―craniotomies, adjuvant chemotherapy, and brain geography―they also develop new routines for a mindful existence, relying on each other and their connection to nature, including the real birds Richard enjoys watching. Their determination to walk hand in hand, with open hearts, results in profound and difficult adjustments in their roles.

“Bless the Birds is not a sad story. It is both prayer and love song, a guide to how to thrive in a world where all we hold dear seems to be eroding, whether simple civility and respect, our health and safety, or the Earth itself. It’s an exploration of living with love in a time of dying―whether personal or global―with humor, unflinching courage, and grace. And it is an invitation to choose to live in light of what we love, rather than what we fear.”

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write Bless the Birds?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: The subtitle explains it: Living with Love in a Time of Dying. Bless the Birds is a love story about the journey my husband, Richard, and I took with his brain cancer. Those two-plus years of “bonus time” after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer were our time to live, laugh, love, create, rail at fate, grieve, and travel—literally and metaphorically—through the tierra incognita of life’s ending. I wrote the memoir with the idea that our journey could be useful to others.

What I find compelling about memoir is that it is a way to make use of my life experiences, “composting” them, as it were, into stories that inspire, inform, or guide others, whether or not they will ever encounter similar situations. At its best, memoir proves the truth of the saying, “The personal is the political.” Meaning how we live offers wisdom to illuminate national and world events, whether the generational trauma of racism, the struggle to live through the COVID-19 pandemic, or the long-term planetary crisis of climate change. 

After this year of COVID-shutdown, with elders isolated in care homes and the acutely ill isolated in ICUs, we desperately need to return personal contact and loving care to life’s ending. And we must learn to accept normal death as a part of life, a turn in the cycle that carries us to whatever is beyond this world, and recycles the elements of what was “us” into other existences. Learning to embrace life’s ending in an open way frees us to live more fully in whatever time we have, to love more, and to be more compassionate citizens of this numinous blue planet. 

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: Not really. When I write, I work first at finding the deepest parts of the story, and weaving a tight narrative. Then I think about who might read it. 

C.M. MAYO: Now that it has been published, can you describe the ideal reader for this book as you see him or her now?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: My ideal reader is someone who recognizes that someone they love will die, and wonders how to make that journey with them in a way that is honest and open, supportive and loving. Not fearless, but without being paralyzed by fear. Perhaps they’re a caregiver for an aging parent, a friend who tends to the ailing, or simply a person of any age who wants to learn a healthier relationship with life’s ending time, what the German poet Rainier Maria Rilke called, “life’s other half.”

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you? And for Bless the Birds in particular?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: I am drawn to writers who understand landscape and the other lives, human and moreso, we share this planet with, and how those relationships shape our humanity. Those writers include the late and much-missed Barry Lopez, plus Tempest Williams, Kathleen Dean Moore, Craig Childs, Louise Erdrich, Linda Hogan, Robert Michael Pyle, Denise Chávez, Anne Hillerman, Robin Wall Kimmerer, and Priscilla Stuckey. 

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now? 

SUSAN J. TWEIT: I am re-reading Barry Lopez’ Winter Count and other short stories for their magical realism, David Abrams (The Spell of the Sensuous), and Kati Standefer’s new memoir, Lightning Flowers.

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

SUSAN J. TWEIT: When I am writing, I am in another world. I turn off notifications on my phone and computer, so that I’m not distracted by the bing of email coming in or the ding of texts or news alerts.

My daily routine is pretty simple: I post a haiku and photo on social media every morning (Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram), and answer any comments on my posts. After half an hour on social media—I set a timer—I read the news online. When I’ve finished with the news—which is research time for me, as news stories, especially those about science, are raw material for my writing—I write until the well runs dry. And then, usually at two or three in the afternoon, I allow myself to go back to social media, answer other comments, check the news. Then I close my laptop and go outside into the real world and walk for a mile or two on the trails around my neighborhood to clear my head. Getting outside into the “near-wild” of the greenbelt trails in my high-desert neighborhood keeps me sane in turbulent times, and refills my creative well. Nature is my medicine, inspiration, and my solace.  

C.M. MAYO: Another question apropos of the Digital Revolution. At what point were you working on paper? Was working on paper necessary for you or problematic?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: I still work on paper. I write first on my laptop, and then when I’m ready to edit, I print a copy out, read it aloud, and edit as I go. The next round of editing is on screen, and then after that, I go back to paper and reading aloud, and so on. That way I “hear” my piece in different ways on the different media. 

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish a memoir, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: In the writing stage, be honest. When you get to a scene or place or event you want to skip over, stop and ask yourself, what am I afraid of? And then go there. Find the universal threads in your personal story—memoir works when it reaches beyond the personal into the territory that anyone can learn from. And when looking for an agent or publisher, be perseverant. Memoir is a crowded field these days, and yours has to be the best it can possibly be to stand out, and it also has to be so compelling that an editor or agent simply cannot put it down. 

C.M. MAYO: What important piece of advice would you give yourself if you could travel back in time ten years?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: Believe in yourself. Don’t compromise. You can survive this (Richard, my late husband, was beginning his journey with terminal brain cancer ten years ago). 

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer?

SUSAN J. TWEIT: Right now, my writing is mostly answering interview questions related to Bless the Birds! When I have time for other work, I will start on the next book, which I call Sitting with Sagebrush. It’s a memoir about the native plants I have loved and worked with my whole life, and what these rooted, green beings can teach us about being human. 

Visit Susan J. Tweit and learn more about her work at susanjtweit.com

Q & A with Sergio Troncoso, Author of 
A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant’s Son

On the 15th Anniversary of Madam Mayo Blog

Biographers International Interview with C.M. Mayo: 
Strange Spark of the Mexican Revolution

*

My new book is Meteor

Newsletter (Texas Books, Workshop Posts, Q & As, Zooms & Cyberflanerie)

This blog posts on Mondays. Fifth Mondays, when they happen to arrive, are for the newsletter. Herewith the latest posts covering Texas Books, workshop posts, Q & As, selected other posts and news, plus cyberflanerie.

TEXAS BOOKS
(Look for posts about Texas Books on the first Monday of the month throughout 2021).
The Texas Bibliothek’s Digital Doppelgänger: My Online Working Library of Rare Books
March 1, 2021
From the Texas Bibliothek: The Sanderson Flood of 1965; Faded Rimrock Memories; Terrell County, Texas: Its Past, Its People
February 1, 2021
A Trio of Texas Biographies in the Texas Bibliothek
January 4, 2021
> View all Texas posts here.

WORKSHOP POSTS
(Look for these every second Monday of the month throughout 2021)
Recommended Literary Travel Memoirs
March 8, 2021
Recommended Books on the Creative Process
February 8, 2021
Recommended Books on the Craft of Creative Writing
January 11, 2021
Shake It Up with Emulation-Permutation Exercises
December 14, 2020
> View all workshop posts here.

Q & A with Tim Heyman about B. Traven in Literal Magazine

Timothy Heyman on the Incomparable Legacy of the German-Mexican Novelist B. Traven

MORE Q & As ON THIS BLOG
(Look for these every fourth Monday of the month through 2021)
Q & A with Jan Cleere
on Military Wives in Arizona Territory: A History of Women Who Shaped the Frontier
March 22, 2021
Q & A with Solveig Eggerz
on Sigga of Reykjavik
February 22, 2021
Q & A with Christina Thompson
on Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia
January 25, 2021
Q & A with Álvaro Santana-Acuña
on Writing Ascent to Glory: How One Hundred Years of Solitude
Was Written and Became a Global Classic
December 28, 2020
> View all Q & As here.

SELECTED OTHER POSTS AT MADAM MAYO BLOG
Melanie Kobayashi’s Champagne Kegger —
Plus From the Archives: Ruth Levy Guyer’s A Life Interrupted: The Long Night of Marjorie Day
January 18, 2021
Top Books Read 2020
December 7, 2020
> View the Madam Mayo blog archive here.

OTHER NEWS
Ignacio Solares’ “The Orders” in Gargoyle Magazine #72

Ignacio Solares


Ignacio Solares, one of Mexico’s most outstanding literary writers, appears in English translation by Yours Truly in the fabulous new issue #72 of Gargoyle. Edited by poet Richard Peabody, Gargoyle is one of the Mid-Atlantic region’s most enduring and prestigious literary magazines. Check it out! Solares’ short story is entitled “The Orders” (“Las instrucciones”). My thanks to Ignacio Solares for the honor, to Richard Peabody for accepting it and bringing it forth, and to Nita Congress for her eagle-eyed copyediting. (My previous translation of Solares’ work, the short story “Victoriano’s Deliriums,” appeared in The Lampeter Review #11.)

The cover of Gargoyle #72, which includes my translation of a short story by Ignacio Solares, features spoken word poet Salena Godden.


Earlier this month I gave a Zoom talk on my book Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero and His Secret Book, Spiritist Manual (as translated by Agustín Cadena, Odisea metafísica hacia la Revolución Mexicana, Francisco I. Madero y su libro secreto, Manual espírita) for the Centro de Estudios de Historia de México. If and when this talk becomes available as a recording I will be sure to post a notice in my newsletter. If the subject interests you, some of my other talks and interviews are here.

By the way, if you don’t subscribe to Madam Mayo blog but would like to receive my very occasionally emailed newsletter (via Mad Mimi, my email letter service) just send me an email at cmmayo (at) cmmayo.com and I’ll add you to my mailing list.


MARFA MONDAYS PODCASTING PROJECT
Ongoing! I’ve let the Marfa Mondays podcast sit for a while as I am working on the (related) book, World Waiting for a Dream: A Turn in Far West Texas. That said, I’m almost…almost… done with podcast #22, which is an unusually wide-ranging interview recorded in Sanderson, a remote town that also happens to be the cactus capital of Texas. Podcasts 1 – 21 are all available to listen for free online here.

COOL STUFF ON MY RADAR ( = CYBERFLANERIE = )
The brilliantly brilliant Edward Tufte is offering his course on video. I took his in-person workshop twice, that’s how big a fan I am. I wish everyone else would take it, too, for then our world could be a little less fruit-loopy.

My amigo the esteemed playwright and literary translator Geoff Hargreaves has a most promising new novel out from Floricanto Press, The Collector and the Blind Girl

Heidegger scholar and Typewriter Revolutionary Richard Polt offers his thoughts on typing a novel.

Poet Patricia Dubrava shares a beauty on her blog, Holding the Light: “Hearing the Canadas”

Cal Newport on “Beethoven and the Gifts of Silence.” Newport has a new podcast by the way, which is ultra-fabulous. Newport’s new book, A World Without Email, is a zinger of clarity. More about that anon.

Allison Rietta

Allison Rietta, artist, designer, yoga teacher, sound healer, and founder of “Avreya” offers a new series of digital books on contemplative practice that each, I am honored to say, include a writing exercise by Yours Truly. (These writing exercises are from my “Giant Golden Buddha & 364 More Free 5 Minute Writing Exercises” which you can access here.) Rietta’s digital books are so refreshingly lovely, and filled with wise and practical ideas for anyone seeking to improve the quality of their health and creative life. Here’s her introduction:

A series of five Contemplative Practice books based on the elements of nature: air, earth, fire, space and water. Each book is designed specifically to enhance that particular element and offers holistic, contemplative practices that include yoga asanas, pranayama, meditation, creative writing and visual art. 

What’s in each book:
Warm up and yoga asana-s (postures)
Pranayama – a breath technique
Meditation practice
Creative writing prompt
Art journaling prompt
Practice pairings – Just as pairing food dishes with wine enhances the dining experience, this book offers pairings designed to complement each element such as, music, crystals, essential oils and mantras. 

The books are designed to help yoga practitioners cultivate a personal home practice. The practices offered in these books may be done sequentially or separately.

Visit Allison Rietta here and find her new books here.

My new book is Meteor

My amigo poet, playwright, literary translator and writing reacher Zack Rogow was interviewed by Jeffrey Mishove for New Thinking Allowed on “Surrealism and Spontaneity”: A most informative and charming video.

Anne Elise Urrutia’s Pechakucha on her grandfather Dr. Aureliano Urrutia’s “Miraflores”—something very special in San Antonio, Texas history.





“Traven’s Triumph” by Timothy Heyman (Guest Blog)

Duende and the Importance of Questioning ELB

Notes on Artist Xavier González (1898-1993), “Moonlight Over the Chisos,”
and a Visit to Mexico City’s Antigua Academia de San Carlos

Q & A with Jan Cleere on “Military Wives in Arizona Territory: A History of Women Who Shaped the Frontier”

“I was actually working on another project when I stumbled across a handful of journals written by women who had come west with their military husbands in the mid to late 1800s. I became fascinated with what these women endured crossing the desert and settling in Army forts ill-prepared to accommodate women. I also wanted to present their stories as they wrote them which means in today’s climate their words are not always politically or socially acceptable, but I felt they needed to tell their stories”—Jan Cleere

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

Jan Cleere’s Military Wives in Arizona Territory tickled my curiosity for two reasons. First, as those of you who follow this blog well know, I am at work on a book about Far West Texas, and its post-Civil War US military conquest is closely connected to that of Arizona. Early on in my researches I came across the writings of Lt. John Bigelow, Jr. on both Texas and Arizona, and—also essential for anyone looking at Far West Texas history— The Colonel’s Lady on the Western Frontier: The Correspondence of Alice Kirk Grierson, edited and introduced by Shirley Anne Leckie. Historians, among them, Cleere— already the celebrated author of several works on women’s history in the West— are doing important work to bring forth these long-neglected women’s letters, diaries and more. I salute Cleere and sincerely hope that her work inspires others. (And by the way, if you have inherited such papers— whether pertaining to the West or any other time and place—please consider finding a home for them in an historical society or library.)

Secondly, I’m always interested—and I assume many of my writerly readers are as well—in how historians, biographers, nonfiction writers of various stripes and writers of historical fiction work with and manage books, articles and digital materials. My own experience I would describe as an ongoing slog up the learning curve, so I’m always game to ask about that and learn what I can from other writers.

From the copy catalog for Military Wives in Arizona Territory:

When the US Army ordered troops into Arizona Territory in the nineteenth century to protect and defend newly established settlements, military men often brought their wives and families, particularly officers who might be stationed in the west for years. Most of the women were from refined, eastern-bred families with little knowledge of the territory. Their letters, diaries, and journals from their years on army posts reveal untold hardships and challenges. They learned to cope with the sparseness, the heat, sickness, and danger, including wildlife they never imagined. These women were bold, brave, and compassionate. They became an integral part of military posts that peppered the West and played an important role in civilizing the untamed frontier. Combining their words with original research and tracing their movements from post to post, this collection of historical narratives explores the tragedies and triumphs that early military wives experienced.

Jan Cleere, author of Military Wives in Arizona Territory, and many other histories of women in the West

C.M. MAYO: What inspired you to write Military Wives in Arizona Territory?

JAN CLEERE: I was actually working on another project when I stumbled across a handful of journals written by women who had come west with their military husbands in the mid to late 1800s. I became fascinated with what these women endured crossing the desert and settling in Army forts ill-prepared to accommodate women. I also wanted to present their stories as they wrote them which means in today’s climate their words are not always politically or socially acceptable, but I felt they needed to tell their stories with little interference from me. 

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

JAN CLEERE: Not specifically an ideal reader but one who enjoyed reading women’s history and who had an interest in how women coped during the early days of western development and expansion. 

C.M. MAYO: Of the military wives, is there one who especially impressed you, surprised you, and/or frustrated you in some ways?

JAN CLEERE: A couple women stood out for different reasons. 

One woman was so determined to accompany her husband into the territory that she defied her husband, sold all their belongings to pay passage for her and her infant son and joined him on the long march across the desert from California to Arizona’s Fort McDowell. 

Another woman, fearing for her children’s lives during an Indian uprising at Fort Apache, lined her children up against the fireplaces in her home, hoping the resilient breastwork would protect them from flying bullets. 

I was impressed with how these women reacted quickly to whatever the situation demanded.

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you?

JAN CLEERE: Because my books concentrate mainly on early Arizona, Tom Sheridan and C.L. Sonnichsen’s books are a mainstay in my library. I also find myself picking up old Arizona history books such as Thomas Farish’s 1915 History of Arizona and James McClintock’s 1916 3 volume set Arizona. 

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now? 

JAN CLEERE: Since my books require my delving into so much history, I like to read fiction for pleasure although the books that have stood out for me are historical. Jim Fergus’ 1000 White Women and The Wild Girl stand out as exceptional novels. But right now I am reading Pat Conroy’s memoir The Water is Wide.

C.M. MAYO: Researching a book like this requires extraordinary organizational skills. Can you talk a little bit about your working library and how you keep track of the books you read / consulted for Military Wives? 

JAN CLEERE: I am certainly not an organized researcher or writer. I dedicate an area on my bookshelf for the books I use for a particular project and am scrupulous about documenting my sources but I have no strict method of organizing my materials. I am trying out the References feature in Word now to see if that will help me in future projects to maintain a record my sources.

C.M. MAYO: How do you keep track of articles, both on-line and on paper?

JAN CLEERE: I started this book before the pandemic and completed it during the crisis. Online research became more important than ever. I gave each women considered for the book an online as well as physical file. Research notes on each woman were cataloged under her name. General information about the military forts and how women were treated and perceived at the time was kept in separate files.

I utilize both digital and paper records for my research and am sometimes redundant with what I collect. One tool that I find very useful is a timeline detailing the life of each person I am researching as well as a timeline of historic events that occurred during her lifetime.

C.M. MAYO: Any other tips to share / hard-earned lessons in organizing one’s research?

JAN CLEERE: I am always looking for a better way to organize my research and am open to any suggestions. I have tried several types of software but have not yet found one that answers all of my needs. One thing I will emphasize is to back up your work constantly. In the past, I have lost valuable material and learned my lesson. I have both a physical backup on my computer as well as using the iCloud for storage. Redundancy can be a saving tool.

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

JAN CLEERE: While digital sources have made a writer’s job more efficient when it comes to finding pertinent sources, it has also taken away that spontaneous delight of uncovering a long lost letter or hidden journal that has not yet been digitized. 

I try to focus on the business of writing separate from the hours I spend actually writing. Not always possible but I have found by trying to compartmentalize the creative from the business end of writing, I am more productive. The trick is to balance these activities so that by the end of the day, you feel you have put out all the fires as well as progressed with your writing.

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

JAN CLEERE: Do your research before querying publishers and agents. You will save so much time if you know whether the publisher or agent you are querying accepts the type of book you are writing. There are several good websites that list publishers and/or agents and describe what they are looking for.

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer?

JAN CLEERE: I am researching the lives of women who ran boardinghouses in the early west and have run across some remarkable stories of why and how these women started taking in boarders, how the business changed their lives and those of their children. The majority of the book will be about respectable landladies but I have also run across a handful of women who operated bordellos and might include some of them.

And I continue to write my monthly column, “Western Women,” for Tucson’s Arizona Daily Star newspaper. 

Excerpt from Military Wives in Arizona Territory by Jan Cleere:

Ellen Biddle and Martha Summerhayes had already lived on a variety of military posts before meeting each other in Ehrenberg, Arizona, where Ellen experienced an incident that would stay with her long after she and Martha parted.

On her way to Fort Whipple in 1876, Ellen traveled up the Colorado River from Fort Yuma toward Ehrenberg with her husband and young daughter aboard a small steamer called “The Cocopah.”

“We reached Ehrenberg just before sundown four days after leaving Fort Yuma,” she wrote in her journal. “It was only a depot for supplies that were shipped to the forts in all parts of the Territory; and here, entirely isolated from the world, lived Lieutenant and Mrs. Jack [Martha] Summerhays [sic]. . . . They were very glad to see us and gave us the warmest welcome, though we had never before met.

“We had a very good dinner, notwithstanding it was so far out of the world, for most army women learned to cook and make the best of everything that came within reach. I was somewhat surprised when a very tall, thin Indian came in the dining-room to serve the dinner, which he did quite well.

“There was much to talk about before I thought of putting my little one to bed, and I asked Mrs. Summerhays if I might have a tub of warm water to give Nelly a bath.

“In a little while she told me it was ready in my room (which I soon learned was her own she had given up to me). We said good-night, and going to the room I undressed the child and gave her a refreshing bath, the first that she had had since leaving San Francisco. She soon fell asleep and after I had straightened the room a bit, I decided I would get in the tub. I had just sat down in the water when my room door was silently opened and in walked the tall Indian carrying a tray filled with silver before him. I scarcely breathed so great was my fright. He walked over to the table, put the tray down, and as silently walked out, looking neither to the right or the left. It is useless for me to attempt to describe what I felt, it would convey nothing.”

Martha was not as distressed with half-naked Natives as was Ellen. She described her servant Charley who interrupted Ellen’s bath as appealing “to my aesthetic sense in every way. Tall and well made, with clean-cut limbs and features, fine smooth copper-colored skin, handsome face and features, heavy black hair done up in pompadour fashion . . . wide turquoise bead bracelets upon his upper arm, and a knife at his waist—this was my Charley.”

> Check out Jan Cleere’s webpage and read more about her works, including Military Wives in Arizona Territory.

Q & A with Sergio Troncoso, Author of 
A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant’s Son

The Marfa Mondays Podcast is Back! No. 21: 
“Great Power in One: Miss Charles Emily Wilson”

On Seeing as an Artist or, Five Techniques for a Journey to Einfühlung

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My new book is Meteor

Q & A with Solveig Eggerz on “Sigga of Reykjavik”

“My interest in the 20th century history of Iceland led me to write. I wanted to show how Iceland struggled for independence from Denmark, how isolated Iceland was from the rest of the world until May 10, 1940 when Churchill’s occupation force arrived, and how Iceland’s independence hung in the balance during World War II.”—Solveig Eggerz

This blog posts on Mondays. Fourth Mondays of the month I devote to a Q & A with a fellow writer.

One of my very favorite writers is Solveig Eggerz. Waaaay back in 2011 I interviewed her about her novel The Seal Woman for my Conversations with Other Writers occasional podcast series (listen in to that interview anytime here.) Although she has been living in the Washington DC area for many years, Solveig Eggerz is from Iceland, so of course she speaks Icelandic and she writes about Iceland in a knowing way. Her work is so fresh, like a sea breeze and it will carry you right to the shores of that far, fantastic isle. Her novel Sigga of Reykjavik is recently out in a new edition from Bacon Press Books, apropos of which she agreed to answer some questions. But first, here is the catalog copy for Sigga of Reykjakik:

Meet Sigga, a spirited young woman who flees the abusive conditions on an Icelandic farm, only to face grinding poverty in Depression-era Reykjavik. Her struggle for independence runs parallel to Iceland’s quest for freedom from Danish dominance. Born a century before the Me-Too movement, Sigga supports her family, working among men who learn never to touch her without her permission. Adventurous, optimistic, and always practical, Sigga is thrilled when World War II brings Iceland out of centuries of isolation. Thousands of Allied forces occupy the country, bringing money and work. But moral dilemmas abound as Sigga seeks to financially exploit the occupation while at the same time protecting her young and beautiful red-headed daughter from soldiers.

C.M. MAYO: In brief, what inspired you to write Sigga of Reykjavik?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: My interest in the 20th century history of Iceland led me to write. I wanted to show how Iceland struggled for independence from Denmark, how isolated Iceland was from the rest of the world until May 10, 1940 when Churchill’s occupation force arrived, and how Iceland’s independence hung in the balance during World War II.

C.M. MAYO: As you were writing, did you have in mind an ideal reader?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: My ideal reader would be excited about little known history and charmed by quirky characters.  

C.M. MAYO: Now that it has been published, can you describe the ideal reader for this book as you see him or her now?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: An ideal reader loves my protagonist despite her flaws and sees the logic in gaining one’s personal independence through sewing corsets.

C.M. MAYO: Can you share any surprises for you about your book’s reception? (Andf has it been different in different countries?)

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: I have been surprised when readers do not discern Sigga’s anger as a cloak for the intense love she felt for those closest to her.  

C.M. MAYO: Which writers have been the most important influences for you?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: The writers that set me free from the ordinary are Annie Proulx (The Shipping News) and the Icelandic writer, Halldor Kiljan Laxness (Independent People).

C.M. MAYO: Which writers are you reading now? 

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, even better on second reading; Survival on the Edge: Seawomen of Iceland by anthropologist, Margaret Willson; and a trilogy about a brave and wise woman of the Viking era, Auður Djúpúðga by Vilborg Davíðsdóttir

C.M. MAYO: How has the Digital Revolution affected your writing? Specifically, has it become more challenging to stay focused with the siren calls of email, texting, blogs, online newspapers and magazines, social media, and such? If so, do you have some tips and tricks you might be able to share? 

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: Actually I love writing on the computer. I am not one to long for life in a cabin on a mountaintop where I write on a yellow pad free of technology. I don’t like to be surprised by “emergencies” days after they occur. I resolve the issue of disturbances by keeping my phone next to me, so I can glance at a message without shutting down my story. Maybe I am exaggerating my equanimity!

C.M. MAYO: For those looking to publish, what would be your most hard-earned piece of advice?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: Don’t waste years seeking an agent, a large publisher, a small publisher, or anything. Instead invest time and money in getting your work read and vetted 1) by your favorite writers group and 2) by an excellent developmental editor or mentor. Once you feel confident that you’ve written a good book, do what feels right regarding publishing.

C.M. MAYO: What’s next for you as a writer?

SOLVEIG EGGERZ: I’m returning to my toughest task, assigning coherence to my collection of personal stories, so that I might honestly call them a memoir.

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Visit Solveig Eggerz and learn more about her novels at solveigeggerz.com

Q & A with Álvaro Santana-Acuña on Writing Ascent to Glory: How One Hundred Years of Solitude Was Written and Became a Global Classic

Donald M. Rattner’s My Creative Space

Q & A: Sara Mansfield Taber on Chance Particulars: A Writer’s Field Notebook

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My new book is Meteor