Latina Self-Portraits: Interviews with Contemporary Women Writers

Bridget Kevane , Editor
Juanita Heredia , Editor

Embracing Chicana, Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican writers and writers descended from a combined U.S. and Latin American heritage, Latina literature is one of the fastest growing and most exciting fields in fiction. This literature is characterized by revisionist views of recent history, a concern with exile and borders, a blending of genres, and a complex understanding of the term feminist.

In these ten interviews, Kevane and Heredia give writers the opportunity to talk about how they began to write, the craft of writing, the conjunction of life, art and politics, literary influences, and their goals as artists. Readers will meet Julia Alvarez, Denise Chávez, Sandra Cisneros, Rosario Ferré, Cristina García, Nicholasa Mohr, Cherríe Moraga, Judith Ortiz Cofer, Esmeralda Santiago, and Helena María Viramontes. The writers' personal and literary journeys vividly portrayed in these interviews will enrich and enhance the readers' understanding of this exciting field. The volume also includes bibliographies of the writers' work.

"The next best thing to hearing a writer talk about his or her craft is to read a book that informs you in the same way, as this one does." --KLIATT

Bridget Kevane teaches literature at Montana State University.

Juanita Heredia is assistant professor of Spanish at Northern Arizona University.

6 x 9 174 pages