The ThinkND Podcast

Letras Latinas, Part 21: Poets & Art: Adela Najarro

• Think ND

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 1:02:58

Episode Topic: Poets & Art: Adela Najarro

Listen in to a conversation with author Ruben Reyes, Jr.. interviewed by Notre Dame Ph.D. student Paulina Hernandez-Trejo, that resonates with the pulse of Salvadoran history, illuminating how memory transcends trauma through the architecture of speculative fiction. 

 Featured Speakers:

  • Paulina Hernández-Trejo, University of Notre Dame
  • Ruben Reyes, author

Read this episode's recap over on the University of Notre Dame's open online learning community platform, ThinkND: https://go.nd.edu/25b52b. 

 This podcast is a part of the ThinkND Series titled Letras Latinas. 

Thanks for listening! The ThinkND Podcast is brought to you by ThinkND, the University of Notre Dame's online learning community. We connect you with videos, podcasts, articles, courses, and other resources to inspire minds and spark conversations on topics that matter to you — everything from faith and politics, to science, technology, and your career.

  • Learn more about ThinkND and register for upcoming live events at think.nd.edu.
  • Join our LinkedIn community for updates, episode clips, and more.

Welcome and Introductions

Speaker

Hello, so my name is Paulina Hernandez Rejo. My pronouns are she her Aya. I'm a second year in the PhD program in English at the University of Notre Dame. Today is Tuesday, March 24th, 2026, and we are in McKenna Hall in South Bend, Indiana with us today for our oral history project is Ruben Reyes, Jr. Um, is for the Latinas Oral History Project, which is housed at the Institute of Latino Studies and run by the wonderful Francisco Rag. The project has been going on for over 20 years, so it's been going on really strong and it's truly an honor to have you join our oral history archive Lures Jr. Published his debut Short Story Collection. There is Rio Grande in Heaven in 2024, which was a finalist for the story prize. And long listed for the Penn Falcon Award for fiction, the Carnegie Medal for Ex Excellence, the Aspen Words Literary Prize, and the New American Voices Award. An archive of unknown universes is Ruben's debut novel, published in July, 2025. You can find Ruben's writing in the New York Times, the Boston Globe. The Washington Post Agni Bomb Magazine, Lightspeed Magazine, a Lit Hub among other publications. Ruben is also a Harvard College and IO Writers Workshop alum. Thank you for being here with us today.

Speaker 2

Ah, thanks for having me.

Speaker

Yes. Would you be able to state your name, pronouns, your date of birth, and where you were born?

Speaker 2

Yes. My name is Ruben Reyes Jr. My pronouns are he, him, his,

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

My birthday is December 26th, 1996, and I was born in Fontana, California.

Speaker

Thank you. So for these ikas, I like to start with getting to know our writers on a personal and a craft level, um, and tease out where these like storylines intersect. So, Reuben, to begin, what or where is home for you personally? Uh,

Speaker 2

such a good question. I feel like,

Speaker

of course,

Speaker 2

like the question of a lot of Latino literature, immigrant literature, children of liter

Speaker

literacy,

Speaker 2

immigrant literature.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

so it's a good one to start with. I mean I definitely consider in many ways Southern California home. Uh, it's, you know, where I grew up and, and a place I write a lot about. Um, ironically I couldn't write about it, I think until I left. Um, but my folks are still there and, you know, my siblings, two of them are still there and I go back pretty often. I have a really strong community there. Mm-hmm. Um, so I think Southern California's home and. You know, I've been in New York like four, four years. It's starting to feel like home a little bit more too. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Speaker

Well, thank you for sharing that. I know I mentioned earlier that you're an alum of both Harvard College and the Iowa's Writers Workshop, which are two very prestigious US hallmarks of education and writing, and there is a history of authors of colors in particular, excelling within these institutions while also having to carve their own path forward. I think of folks like Joy Harjo, San Ros, who have like openly written about that.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

So for the second part of my earlier question, what are your artistic home grounds as in the places where you felt the most connected to your craft, perhaps where it all began? Um, are they found in Iowa, new England, or are they not on a map?

Speaker 2

Yeah, uh, that's, I love that question too. I mean, I think a lot of my work is, and I struggle with this actually because it's, you know. I don't know. I mean, it, I don't know why I struggle with it, but like, I think a lot of my work is inevitably informed by the education I've got in. Mm-hmm. Um,

Speaker

sure.

Speaker 2

First at Harvard where I was, you know, I got there thinking like, I wanna make a change in the world and it's gonna be through politics and I'm gonna law school. And like, you know, I was on, kind of on this track that made sense to me then given my interest in high school.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, but when I got there I was like, oh, like I love the humanities and I think I wanna study the humanities. And I actually, in high school was, this is a little side note, in high school, I really was like, I'm gonna go to Stanford. Mm-hmm. Like, I'm from California, I'm gonna go to Stanford. I got in early, I was like, I'm going to Stanford everyone. It's gonna be amazing. Um. And then I got to Harvard and I visited Stanford, and I was like, oh my God, I cannot deal with all these chemistry majors. Like it was just science people all the way. Mm-hmm. The whole time I was there. And I was like, okay. And then I went to Harvard and I was like, oh my God. There's people who are studying like government, which I was interested in, but also like literature and all these other things. Um, and it felt like a good fit. And despite all the issues that I had adjusting to the East Coast and Harvard and the culture there, which was, you know, really difficult in many ways.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

Um, the academic part of it always felt really comfortable and exciting. Um, and so I studied history and literature there with a focus on ethnic studies.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Uh, you know, I, you know, from my, I was a Melon May fellow, right. I was like kind of on the PhD track for a little bit. Um, and a lot of that was, you know. It came from like the Latinx studies tradition of course. Um, and all of that has ultimately informed my work. I think it's, you know, why the stories are so interesting, but also kind of, I have heard from people pretty teachable. Um,'cause I think I was writing in conversation with my, you know, who I was as a student at Harvard. and then Iowa was like my first real education in creative writing. Uh, I hadn't really studied it formally. I'd done like one workshop at Harvard that I didn't love. Um, and so I feel like that's really when I learned how to be a fiction writer, um, and think about craft as its own thing. Before that, I was writing a little bit more intuitively, I'd say. I'd say. Mm-hmm. Um, and I found both of those places like extremely impactful on my work. Um. And then you couple that with like, whatever writer brings Right. Which is personal experience. And I think that's kind of the magic combination for me. Mm-hmm. Um, yeah.

Speaker

Yeah. No, and again, I can see kind of what you're talking through, especially with your experience at Harvard, um, in your characters.

Speaker 2

Mm-hmm.

Publishing and Writing Balance

Speaker

Um, and how some of them, depending on the timeline are kind of, um, simmering in, in some of those questions. Yeah. So it's, I really like seeing, um, how you were able to put that on the page as

Speaker 2

well.

Speaker

Yeah. Yeah. So in many ways, reading how your work contemplates memory, uh, and also learning about your professional life. Mm-hmm. Um, which someone recently told me you work in this other industry

mm-hmm.

Speaker

Like within a few days. I'm glad I was able to ask about it today. Yeah. But your professional life has reminded me of Toni Morrison in particular.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Uh, one of our great US authors, one of my personal favorites, who had her hand in both shaping global literary imaginaries with her own writing. Um, but also guiding other authors in her editorial work at Penguin. So in addition to being an author, you also work in the publishing industry and have guided many authors through publishing their nonfiction work. I think of Julie says, ES you sound like a white girl. Um, Shalene Gup does the cycle and then of course Elliot Page's bestseller page boy. Um, so what is that like for you? How does it, how does having these roles impact you as a writer and an editor?

Speaker 2

Yeah, that's such a good question. I mean, you caught me at a weird time. I feel like I'm very much at a, like, crossroads with, with that part of, of the double duty. Um,'cause I don't know how Tony Morrison did it for so long because it's really hard to do both. Um, both timewise but also emotionally. Mm-hmm. Um, I think for me, the one thing I have loved is that I've been able to focus in my, you know, publishing day job career on non-fiction. Mm-hmm. Um, and it's really nice to use a separate part of my brain. Yeah. Um. I love, I love, like, I love nonfiction. I think some of the most important things were some of the nonfiction books I read in college. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, both about Salvadoran stuff and also, you know, not, um, you know, as far as, you know, learning about Salvador history, I grew up not knowing anything about our history or our culture really. Um, outside of my family, that's the only version of Salvador in history I knew. Um, and so, you know, books about El Salvador and academic texts about El Salvador really important to me. So I have this really like, I think reverence for non-fiction. Um, and I've enjoyed being able to work in it. Um, and I also think that in general, my writing is really informed by, maybe I hinted at this already, but like by reading and by learning and by studying. Um, and so. I find that at its best when I'm doing my day job, I'm also learning a lot from these authors that I'm working with. Um, and I don't know yet, you know, I haven't written the next book since I've been in publishing, but I'm a hundred percent sure, like I've already noticed it kind of popping up in, in different ways. Um, the same way the academic stuff I was reading as an undergrad popped up in the first book.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, and so it's nice to be in an industry that is really, um, and working in a genre that is very focused on learning and, um, yeah, this transmission of knowledge and information that does feel important to fiction. Um, because I think a lot of people think about fiction. They're like, well, you're making it up. Right. It can come from anywhere, but for me it really has to start. Mm-hmm. You know, you know, I might, you know, bring the emotion or the image, you know, kind of from somewhere. Yeah. But a lot of the basis of the stories, whether that's historical or. You know, whatever does come from, from a real place. Mm-hmm. Um, but yeah, and it's also nice to know how the publishing industry works. Honestly. It makes it navigating it practically for myself a little easier.

Speaker

No, for sure.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

I really like how you kind of bridge, I, for a lot of people that boundary between fiction and nonfiction is so prominent, but mm-hmm. The way you're talking through it, it's something that goes in between and back and forth. The way we learn from both genres and the way they both inform each other is

Speaker 2

Yeah. And I think it's important. I mean, I think my number one tip to writers when I

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Or aspiring writers when I talk to'em is like, like read widely, which is not like, you know, people have said this for a long time and I heard it from people.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, but I reiterate it because it's so important to read, you know, across genres. Mm-hmm. Um,

Speaker

for sure.

Speaker 2

Because you never know what'll inform your work. Uh, and also you're just like a better writer when you realize that, you know, faced with a blank page, you can kind of do anything. Mm-hmm. Um. And so even if you know what you're gonna do or you think you have a sense of what your work is gonna be like, it's nice to know what people have done. Um,

Speaker

for sure.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

And I like, quickly back to Toni Morrison.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Um, I recently read her Introduction to Beloved again. Um, and I think Beloved was the one where she, it's like, I'm not gonna, I'm gonna focus on my writing now. Yeah.'cause doing both is, is difficult.

Speaker 2

I think about that a lot. Like, I think it's, I think it's so, you know, and she is an exception and a

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

She was really, uh, uh, a really special writer. Um,

Speaker

yeah.

Speaker 2

But I do think there's like a part of it. I don't, I don't know if, if she had, if this had to do with it, I actually read, um, recently a biography called Tony at Random. Mm-hmm. It's about her times. It's, it's basically a biography of Tony Morrison. Mm-hmm.

Speaker

Um,

Speaker 2

just about her time at Penguin Random House, or

Speaker

Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2

Yeah. At Random House, I guess at the time.

Speaker

Oh, right.

Speaker 2

Yeah. Um, we had Emerge.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

Um, and it was a really, really just like interesting book. Um, but one of the things that the author talks about is how, you know, beloved is kind of informed by the author, makes an argument basically that Beloved is partially informed by, uh, the many years that she worked in publishing. Um, but, but, uh, you know, it's such a large emotional ambitious project that I do imagine that you need the full head space to try doing it. And that's the hardest part about, you know, doing the day job and writing at the same time. Is that like, sometimes at the end of the day when I want to write, I feel like I don't have the mental capacity for it. Yeah. Because I spent all day working on these great projects with other people.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

Um, and so yeah. I'm you. I'm excited for the future day when I'm just doing my writing and can write,

Speaker

of course,

Speaker 2

something big and ambitious. Mm-hmm. And, um, yeah, I'm sure there'll be one day where the two things will be hard to

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

You know, at least at the same time balance.

Speaker

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Origins of Two Books

Speaker

Well, I really appreciate your responses on that. That was very detailed. It was very heartfelt and I, I appreciated that. Um, I do wanna, I love Toni Morrison and we'll mm-hmm. We'll come back to her for a second, but we should focus on your work. Um, and so I read Archive of Unknown Universes in acknowledgements, um, that your historical basis for the novel came from a research trip to Eldor in 2018, which mirrors Anna's own research trips to Cova, to Eldor as well. So what prompted you to write each of your two works? Um, can you map these journeys for us?

Speaker 2

Yeah. Let's start with the novel will work backwards.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um. So I don't think I knew it at the time, but I took this research trip in 2018. Mm-hmm. Um, like I mentioned earlier, like I grew up not knowing about El Salvador and there's some great sociological research about this by rego actually. Mm-hmm. Um, who I thank in the acknowledgements and I got to think in person. Um, but I think in 2017 I read this article by her, I think it's called On Silences, and it makes the argument that because the Salvador and Civil War was politically and economically denied, but the United States, Salvador and immigrants came to the US and then, you know, whether they knew or not perpetrated this denial in their own lives. Mm-hmm. Um, by not talking about it, you know, as a war, by not talking about it to their children. It was also a really traumatic thing. Of course, people aren't gonna like really dwell on it or. Bring it up to their young children. But she says the impact is that lots of Salvadorans in the US grew up without a sense of their history. Mm-hmm. Um, and when I read that article, it was like one of those things where it's like, this is empirical, this is sociological, but it also felt extremely true emotionally.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, and so I think that was my starting point, right? This, this, this silence that existed in my life.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

You know, not necessarily purposefully or out of malicious intent, but just because, you know, a civil war and the trauma from that is a kind of impossible thing to look at. Um, at Harvard I started studying. I think the classroom was a great avenue to start studying this history. And in 2018, like I said, I was doing research and I wanted to learn more about the Civil War. And so I went to El Salvador with kind of half a plan. Um. I worked out of an archive like Anna does mm-hmm. Um, in San Salvador. And I also got to collect oral histories from former Gorilla Soldiers who I knew through a family connection that I didn't know. Mm-hmm. My godmother's brother had been a pretty involved, uh, member of the, of the Salvador and left. Um, and that trip was, you know, in retrospect, the start, um, a lot of the details, you know, Netto, forgeries or, uh, the fact that, you know, Netto and Rafael, the two gorilla soldiers in the book go to Cuba. That's something I learned on that trip. Mm-hmm. Um, I didn't actually start writing until probably two years after, once I was at my m ffa. Yeah. Um, and you know, for a while I was like, I was very idealistic and I still kind of feel this way, just not to the same extent where I was like, no one should write a novel. That could be a short story. Like I felt very strongly about that. but when I had this idea of kind of a multiverse novel about

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Different ways the Salvador and Civil War could play out, I was like, that's not a story. Like, that's too big a project.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, and that's basically how the novel started. Um, and yeah, and then the story collection. The story collection was a little bit more organic, I think. I think I was a big short story reader growing up. I love Ray Bradberry. I think his stories in particular were, were really impactful on me. Um, and I applied to Iowa with like a number of stories, like that's all I had written to that point. Um, and then I got to Iowa and the MFA is so story centered that it was easy to keep writing stories. and eventually, you know, I had like six decent stories or something, like some that I had applied to, some that I had written in my first year at Iowa. And I was like, okay, is this a book? Um, and then at that point I got to think about, you know, I was still thinking about stories as an individual pieces, but I was also thinking about, you know, whether they would fit in a book, how they would read with other stories. And in that way it became, uh, a collection. And that's actually a very fun part of writing a collection. I find. I'm trying to write another one now, and it kind of happened in the same way where I was writing a couple of individual stories and now that I've, you know, I think once I had two or three of them I was like, oh, like I'm circling the same themes or questions and now I'm starting to think about like, what, what is this book about? Um, and like, how might I talk about this book when someone asks me about it in the future? Like what connects these stories? Um. And yeah, so there's something about that that I really like, that a story collection is both, um, it's individual pieces and the sum of its parts in some ways, um, way more than a novel, which is very clearly one thing. Um, but yeah, that's kind of how both of the projects started and came together. Yeah.

Speaker

No, and I, I really like your point on how a lot of these concepts, like themes, questions, especially in the short story collection, you kind of see how all of them rise as you're going through.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

I, I really like your connection to Ray Bradbury. He's so middle school coded for me as well. Yeah. I loved reading his stories. A lot of the feelings that his stories brought up to me as a sixth grader was very similar to how I felt reading your short story collection where you're shocked,

Speaker 2

oh, thank you.

Speaker

But you're also like, this is very believable. Like, I could see a future like this. And that's kind of the haunting part of it.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

It's

Speaker 2

such a compliment. He's like. I don't know. I go back and forth, but he might be my favorite.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

American author. It gets harder every year to say that, but like, of course for a long time he was, and mm-hmm. His work is very special to me and informed. I mean

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

I think I use a Bradberry epigraph at the beginning of my stories for a reason. Like I love'em. Um,

Speaker

yes. No, that makes total sense. So on this, I guess, rape, bradberry, um, corollary, um, I wanted to ask kind of about on technology and cyberspace in particular. Um,'cause when we conceive of space now we have to consider like cyberspace, like Instagram, TikTok, even dating apps.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Like among so many other digital spaces. Um, and in addition to digital space, we also have like sci-fi technologies in your work, like the Sink of Life, a colony on Mars, um, and the self-Made Men Cyborgs and the Defactor, all of these, which again. Hauntingly. I'm like, this is weirdly believable and in a way that makes me deeply uncomfortable. But that's the point. Um, and it has just very, like, specifically the Defactor has very eerie similarities and to our societal relationships with generative, generative ai. Um, so all this to say, what did you want to achieve through the use of these creations?

Speaker 2

Yeah, I mean, I think when I'm writing, I'm often thinking about what I can bring to the conversation, um, as someone who's writing right now, um, and from my perspective too, as basically a digital native, right? Mm-hmm. I've been online, if not all my life, most of my life. Mm-hmm. Um, and so I think it's inevitable that's gonna make its way into my work. Um, I think. So I'll answer in a couple ways. I think the tech in general, I'm really interested in it because of how dominant it is in our lives. Um, and also how pernicious accepted it is sometimes. Um, so like, I think mm-hmm. A couple of years ago there was during the pandemic, right? Like I got TikTok like everyone else did during the pandemic

Speaker

of course.

Speaker 2

And it was great. And that algorithm was so powerful and it was giving me the funniest videos I'd ever, it was like, this is perfect. I love this. This is like, so me. Mm-hmm. Um, and then after like a year or two I was like, wow, I am spending so much time on this app. Mm-hmm. I'm like, whenever I have like a moment of silence, I'm trying to fill it with a short form video, and I have to delete it and I have to be like, okay, I need to like, think seriously about my relationship with technology because if I don't, it's just gonna weedle its way in without me even realizing it. Yeah. And I think there's something about. There's like a, I have a fear of that. And so in my work, I think I like to grapple with, with how technology kind of creeps its way in. Um, it's something that's obviously involved in the stories and in the novel with the defactor especially. Um, and I think a question I keep returning to, including in my, the kind of new stuff I'm, I'm working on now is kind of the limits of tech technology. Mm-hmm. Um,'cause I do think that people turn to technology for things that ultimately can't give them, and that's a really interesting basis for, for fiction. Mm-hmm. Um, the other thing I'd say, I really like your point actually about the digital landscapes, or I don't know how you phrase, you phrased it much more elegantly. Um, because I think I, I think about that a lot as, as, as like the digital world, as this space that we spend a lot of time in. But that isn't a physical place. Um, and I think in my. Writing. I, I struggle sometimes in trying to figure out how to represent that. Um, and I think the, the most interesting way I found it is just by kind of, you know, not necessarily like transcribing my own text messages or anything, but by, you know, trying to give the reader a mediated experience of what it's like to be on a screen. Mm-hmm. Um, so the novel has these sections, right? Where we actually see, uh, the characters interact with the defactor. Um, and it was really important to me based, uh, how it looked on the page. Um, and I find that in a lot of my work actually, um, not always just with technology, but also with like letters and

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, book excerpts and this kind of metadata stuff, um, uh, or meta textual stuff that shows up in the work. Um, and I think for me it's just important that, you know, it's such a, I like. Technology is such a big part of our lives and a lot of the reading we're doing is online. And if the book doesn't

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

I mean, maybe write something, I'll write a book that doesn't need to address that. Um, but often I find that like I want to capture what that experience is like, even if it's not the exact same experience. Um,

Speaker

yeah.

Speaker 2

Yeah. So this is stuff I'm always kind of working around and working through,

Speaker

and I think that really represents a big moment we see right now in like both poetry fiction, like across genres, is how are we, how are our authors like encapsulating, what does it mean to inhabit digital space? And then come right back. Yeah. I think of specifically like the way that no theorist is quoted, this is something I probably got from TikTok actually, but the way that our algorithm feeds us, like a funny cat video and then we scroll and we're like witnessing genocide.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

In Gaza or something like that. So then it's, and then we come back and it's another like. It's just another video. And so the way we're kind of like switched back and forth between like these very specific effects is very powerful. And seeing how folks like yourself are trying to kinda capture those moments and those feelings on the page, I can imagine must be challenging. Um, but I think you're quite successful with that.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Um,

Speaker 2

that's such a good point. Yeah, I think I've always felt that my work is always trying, like a big task of my writing is actually trying to fit everything that I wanna fit in into one package. Um, you know, this is like, there's always a blend of genres and tones and uh, like I said, meta textual stuff. So kinds of writing that all happen mm-hmm. Like kind of fit in one story or in the novel. Um, and I do think it probably is partially informed by having grown up on the internet, but it's just full of stuff in this way. Um, the task is that how do you. Because I do think that books are very particular and special technologies, and so it's like, how do you capture the feeling of being online, right. Or the feeling of this too muchness without, you know, I don't know, making a website or like, you know, doing something that, that, that your phone can't do. Mm-hmm. Um, is always a challenge. But, but I think, I guess the positive spin on it is like, yes. Like I try, you know

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Books can, you know, the internet is limitless in a very obvious way. I think books can be too, and it's kind of a fun puzzle to figure out how do I make a book feel limitless, limitless or expansive? Um, and it is ultimately 250 physical pages. Yeah. Um, yeah.

Speaker

Yeah. No, I love the way you're, you work through those things.'cause like you said, books are also technologies. They have been historically technologies and the way that we have a lineage of authors across. Not just the hemisphere, but just globally work with those aesthetics is really, yeah. Interesting. Yeah, for sure. So again, I know I said we're gonna come back to Tony Morrison for just a second.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Um, but so both of your texts touch upon the topic of memory. Um, beloved, um, gave us the concept of re memory through a mother-daughter conversation and remembering has been such an important lens for folks working with the after lives of chattel slavery. Of course, yeah. Not just in the US but beyond as well. In archive of unknown universes, there's a scene where Ana considers how Felicia, her mother, does not want to return to its al because of the quote, ghosts of the old days end might still be haunting that place and perhaps will terrorize Anna after all those years. Uh, when I read that, I immediately just thought of Seth and Denver and that conversation they're having in Beloved. So how do you approach memory with their setting characters, other devices? What is Salvador and literature. And perhaps with the speculative genre teach us about memory?

Speaker 2

Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, I love, you know, like I said, I come from the, like within ethnic studies, I think like the literary

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Studies side of things. So rememory and these kind of like, intersection of literature and history and memories is a lot of what I'm concerned with in my work. Um, and just nerd over as a person.

Speaker

Yeah. Same.

Speaker 2

Yeah. I, so many, I mean, there's so many, I don't even know where to start with memory. I think it's a really powerful theme for me because I mean, to start, and I think this is partially, you know, part of Beloved, right? Mm-hmm. Um, I'm really interested in the power of. Of me of personal memory as kind of historical archive, right? Mm-hmm.

Speaker

Yes.

Memory as Fiction Fuel

Speaker 2

You know, the fact that if we're not able to share our memories or write them down, especially of these traumatic, difficult, you know, violent experiences, you know, it's another form of violence. Right? Um, and so I think that's why my characters, especially in the novel, but also in some of my other stories, are always struggling with how to remember or how to remember correctly. Yeah. Um, and why, you know, Anna and Luis in particular are desperate for their family's memories. Um, because to me it feels like, you know, that's the stakes kind of, right? Like this is one way of, of preserving history, um, even if it's a personal memory. Mm-hmm. Um, so I guess that's one thing I would say. And I think that's, you know, there's been a lot of great writing about that. I'm also really interested in memory as. S you know, bringing it back to myself, like as a, as a creative, well, um, I think the great, the great and terrible thing about memory is that it's really fragile and tenuous and shifting. Um, and for fiction, you know, in my own, I have a terrible memory. Like it's really frustrating to me. But if I fiction, it's actually really great because, you know, you can take a memory, I, I can take a personal memory and then like blow it up in fiction. Mm-hmm. Um, and I still get to the truth of whatever has made that thing stick, right? Mm-hmm. Either because it's a memory of a really difficult moment I had with a family member or a friend. Mm-hmm. Um, or because it's a memory, you know, that I associate with growing up a diasporic Salvadorian kid, right? Mm-hmm. Um, and then when I, you know, I. Apply it to a story, I can really push the memory to some kind of truth, whether that's emotional or political or personal. Mm-hmm. Um, and so I find it that it's like a very fruitful, you know, source for fiction. Um, also, you know, memories being fragile and contested over and fought over also make them a good source of tension for fiction. Um, so yeah, I think I'm like really drawn to the idea of memory and also the pitfalls of memory as both, you know, this kind of literary and thematic thing that I return to. Yeah. But it's also on a very practical level, I find it a good, a good source for fiction writing

Speaker

for sure. There's also, and I love all the different points you touched upon with memory in your own work, but also what does it mean for memory in the archive?

Speaker 2

Mm-hmm.

Speaker

Um, especially in conversation with Beloved, but there's also the concept of. And this is something I was thinking of as I was reading your work, the concept of memory with like technology.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

What, what is for a lot of people, like you've been kind of hinting in your work and today, um, people use technology or rely on technology for things that perhaps they feel they can't do themselves or they're not able to do themselves. And so I think the, especially in the novel, um, memory and technology are very linked in ways that the characters are like, well, the defactor surely will help me find this or seek something that we can't humanly do.

Speaker 2

Yeah, totally. Mm-hmm. And I think you asked specifically too about, I didn't quite answer, so I'll answer it now. Um, about like the Salvadoran like memory in, in Salvador literature or, or kind of thinking about that angle. Um, you know, I think memory feels like a very powerful way of preserving history or of even building history, of building an archive of. Telling our story and our history and what happened in El Salvador in some way. Mm-hmm. Um, because like I said, there's the, all these kind of gaps that are both historical and cultural and political. Mm-hmm. Um, and so when I was writing the novel, I was very aware, especially the parts that are more kind of historical fiction, um, that, you know, I was trying to contribute or that I was writing in the context where there's very little history about Salvador and written. Um, maybe that's not totally true'cause there is quite a bit written. It's just like access is access.

Speaker

Yeah. Is

Speaker 2

the thing that's limited. and so I think I was thinking about how do you write that history faithfully? Mm-hmm. Um, as a way of remembering the events of the Civil War. Um

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

That also doesn't overstep.'cause it is fiction, right. So its like, I don't know, it's, it's like the, uh, Sadi Hartman thing of like, um.

Speaker

Oh my God. What's critical? Fabulation?

Speaker 2

Yes. There you go. Thank you. Ah, see, this is, I need to, I need to re get into all that, that theory I was reading. Um, but yeah, exactly. Like, I think I was thinking about the, the, the fiction and the novel in particular in that way. Um, you know, this fictional story mm-hmm. Based partially on historical research and partially on personal memory.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

How does that contribute to kind of a, a version of Salvador and history mm-hmm. Um, that can help fill the gaps. Um, yeah, I think memory and, and constructing something out of memory is part of that work for me.

Speaker

Yeah. And then last little tag onto that question, but the speculative genre too. I know we, we've like kind of been like dancing around it as well. Um, but what is. Why, because you're, you're combining so many things, the historical like fiction component where we have like research that goes into it. We brought in Sadia Hartman, but where does the speculative genre fit into all of this? What, what does that puzzle piece do?

Speaker 2

Yeah, such a good question. I mean, I think I, from the beginning, like going way, way back, I've just always loved the speculative. I find, you know, as a reader, as like some of the, I mean, so much children's literature I'm realizing now is in that space and it's so was what I was reading when I was learning to be a reader. Um, I mean I think it's, no, it's no coincidence that I was a big reader of the magic Treehouse books as a kid.

Speaker

Yes.

Speaker 2

And like, essentially it's like I'm writing adult versions kind of of those books or wanting to. Um, and so yeah, there's something about that. Um, but I think for me it's also just like. I'm always using the speculative to try getting to some kind of truth. Mm-hmm. Whether that's historical truth, political truth, emotional truth. Um, I'm not super, super interested. I think there's a aspect to this of the work that makes it, it makes it fun to write, but I'm not really trying to use the speculative for escapism. I'm trying to use it to kind of loop back to our world.

Speaker

Like the opposite.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

It's a, it's a way for me to, of cutting through the noise in some ways. Mm-hmm. Um, and so that's, that's part of it. I also think like, you know, if fiction's power compared to like non-fiction right? Is that it's so imaginative, like the imaginative possibilities are endless. Um, I want to use that to its full extent possible and for me, the speculator often lets me do that. Um, I think it's also why I refuse to stick to one genre or I find sticking to one genre a little bit stifling personally. Mm-hmm. Um. But yeah, I think, you know, as this conversation has probably shown, I'm always working through a lot of kind of high level questions.

Speaker

You are,

Speaker 2

um, at least at the start of the project.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, and I often find that the speculative genre or speculative conceit can help me hold all of that, um, a little better than a quiet realist novel would, even though I love reading that stuff. Um

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

I don't know how I would write just that. Um, it seems kind of hard.

Speaker

Yeah. And I, I really like what you said, um, with your interview with Tommy Connors on the Latinx project about, um, how El Salvador, an immigrant might understand how Princess Leia felt when they destroyed Alderon. Yeah. Um, and I think that really kind of puts together what you're, what you're phrasing for us here, um, because we're not using it as escapism the way many people associate a lot of these, like sci-fi or speculative like media forms. Mm-hmm. Um, you're bringing us right back and like having a stare. At what's going on.

Speaker 2

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I think that's right. I think for me it's a way of, and I don't know, life is long, careers are long. Maybe one day I'll write something that feels a little more escapist. But for me, I think I kind of like working through the very real feelings and the real politics and the real systems. Um, even in the speculative, I think.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Borders Beyond Geography

Speaker 2

I dunno. I just find it really fruitful. Yeah. I keep returning to it. Mm-hmm. Um, as a starting point.

Speaker

That makes a lot of sense. Uh, we're kind of also touching upon the concept of borders a lot in our conversation. And, uh, you just had a great point earlier about how. You cannot find yourself just in one genre. You're kind of crossing into different, um, I guess what we would call genre border. That's what I'm calling right now. Yeah. Um, and there's so many other borders in your work from like literal nation state borders between like us, Mexico, Guatemala, and Al Honduras, Nicaragua. And by extension, Guba is also kind of in that, in that framework as well. Um, and you also contemplate a lot of gender en normativity. Mm-hmm. And what kind of binaries and borders those are, and technological borders. I, I think of like even, um, obviously with the defactor, but even just Luis's access to wifi, like in guba, like things like that. Um, and historically Mexican American and Puerto Rican studies are associated with border studies and theories, but I really believe, and I, I know a lot of other folks, this isn't just my idea. Uh, right now it's Central America's challenging a lot of our concepts of borders and these in between spaces, even further in very fruitful ways. So from your perspective, what is Central American and more specifically Salvador and artist authors, studies tell us in Latinx studies about borders?

Speaker 2

Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right. Um, I do think that Central Americans and maybe Salvador specifically, are pushing, you know, the conversation forward. I mean, like I said earlier, I come from this like Latinx studies tradition, right? So, you know, something like, I mean, anals, borderlands, like for all its pitfalls is such a foundational text and will forever be a really important text for me because it kind of verbalized this int betweenness, right? The, the experience of being this hyphenated American. Yeah. Um, and but the difference in her work, right, is that it's so physical. It's so by the fact that the US Mexico border is this kind of, mm-hmm. Geographic location with shifting edges, right? Um, the open wound, right? This very like, physical geographically, you know, it's emotional and all these other things too, but like it is based on this kind of land mass, right? Mm-hmm. In the, in the southwest. Absolutely. Um, Salvadorians don't quite have that because there are a couple of countries between us and the us. Um, but there's also this kind of like, I mean, it's a transnational thing. It's the, uh, ano thing, right? The faraway brother. This, this, this sense that, you know, especially after the eighties, but even before then, like Salvadorans in the US and Salvadorans in the homeland are not so separate, and they're connected by, uh, both histories of US intervention and El Salvador, but also things like remittances, which make up like, I don't know what. That is right now, but I know more than 20% of the Salvador economy. Um, and in that way, right, that's the, you know, the border, the borderland there isn't physical, but it's very, very real. Mm-hmm. Um, and intense. Uh, and for me, that really opens up the conversation that Anza and others, you know, in her time started, you know, with border theories and border studies mm-hmm. Um, to think about borders in a non-physical sense. Mm-hmm. Um, in my work, it is often actually going back to the digital, like it's about this digital borderland. I, I think about a detail in, um, uh, a story called variations of my migrant life. Um, where this child who's left by his parents who migrate to the US has to interact with them over WhatsApp and these kind of glitchy like video calls and don't quite work. and it's obviously not the real thing. But it's also a thing. Um, and that is just the way many Salvadorans interact with, with the homeland, right? Once they're separated by distance. Um, and so yeah, I think like the, the border theories, the question of borderlands has always been a relief, fruitful one to me again, because it feels very true to my experiences. Um, but I think Salvadorans are forced to think about it in very broad ways, um, and not just in the sense of like geographic location. Um, which is probably why it bleeds into genre and sexuality and, um, form too, right? Like I think that's probably partially why I'm interested in, in blending form too.

Speaker

Yeah.

Speaker 2

Um, yeah.

Speaker

No, I, I really like how you're kind of explaining that. Um, and I like the sense that the border. Like it an set us with that like geopolitical kind of like concept of the border. But now we're thinking beyond that and really enveloping the tech, like the, the technological as well, I think of, and in the novel with letters. Like that's a form of technology in of itself. Um, their codes and everything to communicate what they're really feeling. Um,'cause they can't really do that 100%

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

Because of all of these other borders that are in your work as well. Um,

Speaker 2

and I guess in general, like what I hope and know that my work does is like really question borders as a whole concept. Um, I think that's something I was really conscious about, um, because I, you know, I grew up in the public school system here too, so I was hearing about these borders and like the nation starts here and you know, the other nation starts there. Mm-hmm. And then eventually I was like, wait, it's not that. Straightforward. It's a lot more complicated. Mm-hmm. Um, and I think that's always something I'm reaching to. I think it's also why the novel is so hemispheric, right?

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Because I wanted to write about the Civil War, but I wanted to write about it as it was a Cold War conflict, which meant, you know, it felt really important to me to put into conversation with Nicaragua, which is why Rafael is from there, and Cuba, which is why a lot of the novel takes place in Cuba. Um, it felt like, you know, a way of pushing the conversation around the Salvador and Civil War, um, into this kind of global transnational conflict, which is what it was, right?

Speaker

Yeah.

Interconnected Histories

Speaker 2

Um, and so I think in general, I am often skeptical of neat borders, and I'm like very actively trying to be like, guys, I promise it's more complicated than that. We are all more interconnected than we are, and these lines in the sand are less permanent than we've been taught to believe.

Speaker

Absolutely. Um, one of my colleagues recently was talking about how, um, and kind of in connection with your, like what you're talking about with your experience in the public school system, but it's like, we can't teach Latin American country histories in isolation. Mm-hmm. Um, it's like, well, that's a coincidence. Why do a lot of these countries have dictatorships around the same time? Like, we have to bring in how us, the US intervened in very like violent ways into a lot of countries' histories. And so we cannot, it's difficult and it's an injustice to have these borders like present even in our historical retellings of

Speaker 2

Yeah. And I, I'm really interested in the way that history is never like, I think we want for the sake of like understanding and ease to be like. Here's why this happened. And it's like these series of events are localized to a specific place.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, and time period. Mm-hmm. And it's like, it's really hard to actually tell history, like you can, and there's benefits to telling mm-hmm. Kind of concise histories like that, but it also leaves a lot out. And like the most interesting histories are the ones that can really span and make connections that are important and, and maybe not as obvious. Yeah. You know, going back to my day job, one of the projects I was really excited to have signed that will be out in some years, um, is by the historian who's gonna, who's writing about, uh, Japanese incarceration during World War II in the internment camps. Mm-hmm. Um, and you know, she's gonna write at some point a very, like big. Kind of definitive, um, quote unquote history of, of that history. Um, but the thing that I loved about talking to her about this project and that the book's gonna explore is how, uh, Japanese incarceration is part of broader histories of racial exclusion from Mexican repatriation to settler colonialism, um, to these things that I think in our popular conceptions we're like, well, that's separate. That's like a different thing. It's about a different group of people. Mm-hmm. Um, but her point and, and what she has explained to me, the scholarship in the field is pointing to now, is that these things are all interconnected. Um, and so I'm really interested in that kind of history that can, you know, make these connections, um, between places and between time periods. Absolutely. Um, that's why I collapsed place and time in my work a lot, I think. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Speaker

No, that's, that, that was so eloquent. I, I really love. Um, and for my final question to kind of end us on a, on a familial and a, on a, a note of love, um, one of the most, to me, one of the most emotionally difficult themes that Latinx literature explores, um, and we've been touching on a lot of these things in the conversation Yeah. But, um, are the complexity of parental and multi-generational relationships within a home, especially when we consider how immigrant generations are socialized in and out of and in between the United States, queerness how, um, and of course, like considering familial and romantic love as well, your stories add additional layers to these phenomena. And there's a in heaven, the story try again is about, is about a bisexual son resurrecting his father's consciousness through a device called to sink a life because he craves a genuine and accepting, accepting relationship with his father. Postmortem in the story, he eats his own. The Salvadorian main character is essentially cannibalizing his own family in exchange for mangoes. Then in your novel, uh, archive of Unknown Universes, we read about an alternate universe where the FMLN succeeded the Salvadorian Revolution succeeded of Salvador and Revolution, meaning that characters survive and that some are born as a result. So could you tell us more about your work and its additional layers of technological complexity and complicity, um, and how that these further explore the classic Latinx and central American literary themes around family and love?

Speaker 2

Yeah. Uh, such a good question. We could do a whole class on the kind of immigrant novel truly that is about intergenerational trauma and families. Truly, truly, um, maybe many, many semesters worth of courses. Um, so I think I'm drawn to it on two levels. Mm-hmm. First, because it's like personally true, like I think the reason a lot of. Like Latino writers have written about families because it's this kind of like, socially and personally mm-hmm. Just massive thing. Like there is this kind of, I mean, even like the la like the, the thing that's common throughout Latin America and a lot of like the quote unquote global south, right? That like, once your parents get old, they live in your house. Right. And like, there's multiple generations living in one house, like, which we don't have in the States. Um, but when we do, it's often around immigrant communities. In immigrant communities. Mm-hmm. Um, and so it's like this kind of like reality that I think, obviously literature captures, our literature captures. Um, and so, you know, I, I've also felt the expectations of family and the, you know, struggles that come with that and all that stuff. So that's one reason. And I think the other reason is, like you mentioned, it's such a big. Artistic kind of staple or thematic staple in Latino literature. And here is actually I think where the technology or my approach comes from. Mm-hmm. Um, I think, and, and I feel really, I've said like versions of this, and I feel complicated when I say it too, but like, I am really grateful to be writing when I'm writing because I have, like, I'm writing after this kind of boom of quote unquote multicultural nineties literature. Right. Which a lot of these books are foundationally important to me. I love them. They're really well-crafted and really beautiful books. Mm-hmm. Um, but a lot of them talk about family in a way that, like now I'm like, okay, we've discussed family in that way, right? Mm-hmm. Um, often in really kind of dire traumatic terms, um, often the books being solely about a kind of complicated family. Intergenerational conflict. Um, and so I think when I was thinking about like, okay, well what do I want to do in my work? It's like, well, how do I push that conversation? Right? Some of these themes and dynamics are gonna be universal. I think that's why they're so compelling. Um, but I was like, what can I do to kind of explore them in a new way? And for me, it was often through the speculative or the absurd. Absolutely. Um, or thinking about how our relationships are shaped by technology, which is a thing that I feel like I, you know, can contribute and think about now because technology is so different now than when these novels were, were created. Um, and so I'm seeing it actually in the new work also coming up a lot. I'm writing a lot about siblings because I wrote

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Not too much about siblings in the first book. Um, but yeah, for me it's like obviously like, you know, none of my stories take place in. Our world as we know it. Um, I would say, maybe one, but that's different. Um, mostly they don't, and you know, but again, I'm always reaching for the very real thing. And in the context of writing about families and intergenerational conflict, I am often thinking about the role of technology and how it's shaping it. Um, so when, try again, right? It's about this kind of eternal, like, on the surface it's like not that interesting. Like it's not that interesting a dynamic because it's so common. Like, oh, a homophobic father and his son, right? It's like whatever. But the, the way that story I gave that story life was by being, but like, but what if the son really wants the relationship and has the technology that promises him a way to have it right. And that was really interesting to me. Mm-hmm. Um, and, you know, or, or the, um, he eats his own the Mango story, the first story in my first full story in the, in the story collection. Um. It's like, you know, at its on the surface a story about a family member exploiting a poor family member. Mm-hmm. And like, what was I gonna say about that? Right. Like, other than that fucking sucks. Don't do that. but because I have this absurd element of these like mangoes that he must have and that he flies on a commercial flight to the us, like it added this kind of little mm-hmm. Element that, that let me get to the, you know, to those dynamics and explore them in a way that felt fresh and new and interesting to me. Um, and yeah, so I guess I'm like really interested in writing about family and families and intergenerational conflict because it's really fruitful and personally important to me. Um, but I'm always looking for a new way of doing it. Um, I think it's also probably why the novel is a multi-generational family saga, but not in mm-hmm. The way that, that phrase has been applied to a lot of books. Um, yeah. It's also a multiverse novel and, um, many other things. Um.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

But yeah, I think, I think it's a very fruitful concept that I approach with caution because of how much has been written about it already.

Speaker

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

And I think that's one of the beauties of being like, within the lineage of like, we know what's, we know what multiculturalism wrote about the nineties. Yeah. That was a moment. Yeah. We are past the moment. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um,

Speaker

and how can we further? Well,

Speaker 2

some of us are, some aren't. That's the other thing, like,

Speaker

that's also true,

Speaker 2

like, I'm not gonna miss name names, but like, there have been novels published in the past 10 years that I'm like, they're beautiful, they're interesting and like whatever. I'm all for people writing books if they want to, but some of these novels I feel like, don't feel that interesting because they're hitting the same kind of notes. Mm-hmm. Or approaching. The topic of families in the same way.

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Um, I love the idea that I can, you know, again, yeah. Build on the tradition and try something new. And always, I'm always aiming for the thing that is very me. Like I really

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

And this is hard to do, but like, I always hope that I can write a story and someone reads it and they're like, oh, that's, that's Ruben. Like being himself, like being weird and like approaching things sideways. Um, and I think in general, I am aware, again, another class we taught about this, but I am aware about like, the pitfalls of like Latino literature as a genre that has, you know, existed. Right. Um, and I think my work is actually really benefited by the fact that I'm so aware of those trends

Speaker

mm-hmm.

Speaker 2

Or archetypes or, you know, traditions and that I don't really wanna fall into them if I can avoid it. Mm-hmm. Um. Yeah, like even like, I don't know, I'm just riffing now, but like food even, right? Like I'm not, I'm aware that there's a mango on my cover, right? But the reason there's a mango on the cover is because the story that that image comes from is about like the role that mangoes and fruit have played in dad's work literature, right? Mm-hmm. Like I'm really aware of that stuff and I'm trying, trying to play with it. Um, and in general I find that fruitful for my work, actually. Like, it's, yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

Speaker

Yeah. And that was my final question, but I have a little bit of an add just'cause I think this, our, your comments have been great. Um, you play with, and, and you play with a lot of, like, these, not just like icons, like we, the mango or like the tropical fruit and a lot of archives, work literature. Um. But it shows like your Latino studies training definitely shows.'cause you also challenge a lot of the concepts from not just like nineties multiculturalism, but a lot of the conversations we have and challenges we have in Latinx studies today, um, with our at or not Ular, um, the first story and, and the collection with, with the mangoes that we keep referencing. Um, it's, we always talk about family like being united, maybe the crevices that, like the secrets, the silences that kind of piece the family apart, but then it, you know, it comes back together, it flows apart. Um, but the way you talk about that story is like the extractivism tendencies of our families. Once someone has immigrated, made more like money or something like that. Like what are the, um, not just like class divides, but also just how do we replicate a lot of these violences that our communities have felt within our own families, which I think, um, we only touch upon. We don't, we haven't had like a lot of like, um, media interactions with that. And then. Um, you also have like Mexican American, um, oh my goodness. Diaz manufacturing. Mm-hmm. Right. Which I'm like, I want it comes out in like your short stories also comes out in the novels, and that's based off of like this super like, horrifying concept of like, well, the Mexican American studies labor movement, um, did this and now someone, you know

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker

From that labor movement is making the self-made man, which is like horrifying.

Speaker 2

Mm-hmm.

Speaker

Um, and essentially replicating the violences that were done onto the labor movement. So you have, you take things that we know and you kind of push it off the edge or push it off.

Speaker 2

Yeah. I mean, I wanted Latino villains as much as I wanted Latino heroes in, in my, in my first book. But I think in my writing in general, and yeah, at some point, you know, at first I think it was a little more intuitive, but at some point I was really aware that, uh, so much of Latino literature has been about the white gaze and American

Speaker

Yep.

Speaker 2

Like. White America's impact, which again, I felt in my life, right? It's a very real thing that I still feel really often. Um, but for my work I was like, well, let me like write about inner Latino conflict because it's real and it's interesting and it hasn't been explored as much and not in the way that I'm inherently gonna do it because I love the weird and wacky, um, in fiction. Yeah.

Speaker

Yeah, for sure. Well, we're almost at time, and I don't know if I, I don't think I emailed you about this, but I did want you to do a quick little reading. Okay. If that was possible. I brought the books.

Speaker 2

Yes. I would need that.

Speaker

Yes.

Speaker 2

Yes. I will bring them, them

Speaker

out. Let's, um. I have both of them, but

Speaker 2

here, oh my God. The sticky notes.

Speaker

Love it. I, I am a English PhD student, so, so of course they will be tab up

Speaker 2

all, what should I reach from? Does it matter?

Speaker

Oh, it's whatever calls to you in this moment. If there's something that keeps coming back to you from our conversation, that would be great.

Closing Thanks

Speaker 2

Let me, let me read a little bit from, you know what, let me read the title story'cause it breaks my heart, but I love to read it. I, um, all right, so this is an alternate history of El Salvador or perhaps the world for Valerio and Oscar Alberto Martinez Ramirez. There is a Rio Grande in heaven. Oscar and Valeria must cross a million times. It is beautiful. Much more beautiful than the river on earth. The water is crystal clear. The stones in the riverbed shine like amulets, the cattails dance, bending down to touch the warm water, moving side to side, so the dragon flies and blew. Its can zip through. It is so beautiful. And when migrants arrive at the river's edge, they think to themselves, oh, how muddy and cold, how thundering and contemptuous, how ugly and cruel the other river was. How beautiful this one is. There is a Rio Grande in heaven. It is so wide, wider than the ocean, wider than a soul. The sky and water are one. The angels are dragonflies and bluets or cattails, dancing on the tiny bit of earth where the migrants stand. Ska crosses the river many times, but every time it's effortless. He backstrokes across the warm water. He builds a boat out of mud and buffalo grass and places his daughter against the hu. She laughs. Fizzy sparks of joy. Osca and Valeria grow wings, sleek and strong like in albatrosses and fly across all the other migrants. Follow in strokes in boats with giant wings, there is a Rio Grande in heaven. It is abstract, too abstract to describe. The water is like spools and spools of cheap tool. The birds and butterflies are like memories, dreams, desires. The stones dance like drunkards. The current flows like time. It is so abstract. And when the migrants arrive, they don't say anything. OCA and Valeria stare at the reflections and see the million people. They are dry cheek Ophelia humble, Icarus victorious Captain Ahab un drowned immigrant. They float on far above the water, far beyond the river's edge. There is a Rio Grande in heaven. It is barely a creek. The trickle doesn't sustain much. Though loose strands of wild grass poke out from the dry earth. Lady bugs and harvester ants scurry through the dirt, avoiding the migrant's footsteps, Ogar steps over the river, stretching a foot over the soft ripples. It is effortless. His daughter is perched in his arms, and they cross so easily that the river shriveled up. Everyone shuffles over the river bed. The soles of their feet are dry and they continue onward to their final destination. The river is an empty wound they leave behind.

Speaker

Thank you. Thank you, Ruben.

Speaker 2

Yeah, and

Speaker

with that it concludes our oral history today. Thank you. Hmm.