Something to declare

Something to declare / Julia Alvarez.— Chapel Hill, NC : Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 1998.
x, 300 p. ; 23 cm.
Contents: Something to Declare to My Readers -- Part One: Customs -- Grandfather's Blessing -- Our Papers -- My English -- My Second Opera -- I Want to Be Miss America -- El Doctor -- La Gringuita -- Picky Eater -- Briefly, A Gardener -- Imagining Motherhood -- Genetics of Justice -- Family Matters -- Part Two: Declarations -- First Muse -- Of Maids and Other Muses -- So Much Depends -- Dona Aida, with Your Permission -- Have Typewriter, Will Travel -- A Vermont Writer from the Dominican Republic -- Chasing the Butterflies -- Goodbye, Ms. Chips -- In the Name of the Novel -- Ten of My Writing Commandments -- Grounds for Fiction -- Writing Matters.
ISBN: 1565121937

1. Alvarez, Julia -- Authorship. 2. Dominican Americans in literature. 3. Dominican Americans -- Intellectual life. 4. Dominican Republic -- In literature. 5. Women and literature -- United States --History --20th century.

814.54

This thoughtful and illuminating collection of essays by the self-described “Vermont Writer from the Dominican Republic” is divided into two groups the first, “Customs” are memories of growing up in the Dominican Republic under the last years of the Trujillo dictatorship, her family’s escape to New York, and the difficulties of assimilating into a not altogether welcoming foreign Anglo culture. The second part, “Declarations,” collects her thoughts on writing, how she turns her experiences and imaginings into poems, novels and essays. One, “Goodbye, Ms. Chips,” is about her difficult choice between the vocations of writer and teacher.