The Expository Writing Program inaugurated its Great Writers Lecture Series Wednesday night with a speech by Judith Ortiz Cofer, boundary-defying author and professor of English and creative writing at the University of Georgia. The event, "Writing the Bi-Cultural Memoir," took place in Salomon 001.
Cofer's speech was filled with jokes but had a strong central message. "Your heritage is what makes you unique," she said. "It is what gives you your narrative, your essence. Without it, anything you write serves someone else."
The Latina author and poet's work consists primarily of fictionalized accounts of her personal experiences, rich with feeling and sensory details. It was among the first of its kind: Latina literature that blurred the lines of genre. She is best known for her collections of personal essays and poems, including "Silent Dancing," which was awarded a PEN/Martha Albrand Special Citation in nonfiction; "The Latin Deli," which received the Anisfield Wolf Award; and "An Island Like You: Stories of the Barrio," which was named a Best Book of the Year 1995-96 by the American Library Association.
Cofer spoke of the importance of writing truthfully. All poems are truthful, Cofer said - truth resonates within the poetry itself, even if the accounts are not completely accurate. "If a poem is written honestly, readers are less likely to ask, 'Did the event actually happen?' because it doesn't actually matter," she said. "It's like quantum physics; you just accept it, even if you don't really understand it."
She also found the same sort of relative truth to be dominant when writing narrative pieces. In researching events, she found that subjectivity reigned, especially when it came to the eyewitness records of her relatives. "Not many people remember the truth with accuracy," Cofer said. "Only cameras record objectivity - and even they employ angle and lighting."
A Puerto Rican native, Cofer spoke of how she struggled to find her voice in contemporary American culture when she first moved to the United States at the age of 10. She named Virginia Woolf and her grandmother as her role models. "It was hard for me to make universal the particulars of my experiences as a Puerto Rican girl coming to the U.S.," Cofer said.
Unlike the Puerto Rican writers before her, Cofer's work ran into a great deal of skepticism, she said. Publishers simply didn't think that there was an audience for her work. "I couldn't imitate those before me," Cofer said. "I had to use my own language, I couldn't fake it. I've always wanted to be cool, but I've always been a Puerto Rican nerd," she joked.
The audience took her comments to heart. "I thought her remarks were very funny and informative," said Adam Keller '06.5. "I also found it unusual that she lives in Georgia."
Mireya Loza GS said she liked Cofer's use of personal anecdotes. "They contextualized her work to a degree that would be impossible if she had not spoken here," she said.
Cofer was a natural choice to speak because the series is all about highlighting different genres of nonfiction, said Elizabeth Taylor, senior lecturer in English and director of the expository writing program. Cofer's pioneering works came at a time when women and people of color were finally finding a literary voice. Additionally, the diversity of her genres of poetry and fiction, along with her familiarity to readers, made her the perfect candidate for the series, Taylor said.
The series continues throughout the year. The next lecture will be on Nov. 16 at 6:30 p.m. in Salomon 001, when Alan Lightman will speak about "Writing the Science Narrative."
