What Is "Minor" in Latino Literature

Abstract

In memory of my father, Rolando R. Perez, MD (1927-2005), who spoke two languages with one heart. If it is true that, as slogan of 1960s declared, the personal is then this article is personal, ergo political. The fact that it is written in English, of literature, by a native speaker of Spanish makes it politically personal or personally political, right from outset. In 2000 I was invited to submit material for editorial consideration regarding forthcoming Norton Anthology of Literature. It was my induction into world of And oddly enough my work was chosen for inclusion in canon maker anthology because, as one of editors explained to me, it was unlike anything else that bore label Latino literature. Certainly, Spanish plays a very small direct part in my work, and my subjects have little to do with so-called Latino experience. The Odyssey (1990) is a book of Deleuzean fables; The Lining of Our Souls (1995/2002) is prose poetry based on selected paintings of Edward Hopper; The Divine Duty of Servants (1999) is a literary collage. exploring issues of sexuality and power in artwork of Polish writer/artist, Bruno Schulz; The Electric Comedy (2001) is a modern version of Dante's Divine Comedy. And yet there is something particularly Cuban and generally in all of my work, for inscribed in white, empty spaces, between all English words on page is my history, as is undeniable history of all Latinos who write in English. Gail Levin, Hopper's biographer, who wrote Foreword to second edition of The Lining of Our Souls, a bit mystified herself by my interest in such a prototypical painter as Edward Hopper, wrote almost by way of explanation, to herself and to reader: Today Hopper boasts admirers in United States and elsewhere, who agree that his work is very American. Yet Hopper remains quite obscure in Cuba, where Perez was born and raised (viii). What Levin clearly understood, however, was that my interest in Hopper was one of translation--that is to say, of translating images into words, and that English of a non-native speaker who entered the United States at age eleven (viii) was bound to transform Hopper's images, and reader's reception of them. She likened my general interpretation of Hopper to that of Japanese American painter, Ushio Shinohara; our cultural outsideness being tacit link to this Hopper. But she made no mention of The Lining of Our Souls in connection with work of other American (1) poets like Mark Strand, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates, John Hollander, et al., who have been inspired by Hopper's evocative images. What is clear is that regardless of my choice to write in English about an American painter, I remain an outsider, using a which is simultaneously mine and not mine, as did Kafka who wrote in German, and not in his native Czech. And this brings us to question at hand, for I believe that Deleuze and Guattari's idea that a minority can create new linguistic forms a major language (Kafka 16) as happens with Spanglish, for instance, can help us to arrive at a better understanding of way Latino literature as a literature functions within mainstream culture. Apart from vanity, I have begun by citing my own writing because it is particularly problematic with respect to label in a way that work of Junot Diaz, Cristina Garcia, and Oscar Hijuelos is not, and perhaps if we take most difficult, resistant case, we can come to understand what is minor in literature, even through prism of marginally work, such as mine. I begin with a discussion of bilingualism, something that Deleuze and Guattari mention only in passing, but that is central to minor element of What does it mean to be bilingual? …