Through a new Feature: “Lit in 5!" two authors ask five questions to each other about each other’s book. In our case, I asked Luisa about her new poetry collection, Caulbearer, and she asked me questions about my new novel, The Balikbayan Artist. (The full interview was first published in The Halo Halo Review.)
[For 2024 Holiday gift-giving, The Balikbayan Artist is available through Amazon.]
LIT IN 5!—LUISA A. IGLORIA and EILEEN R. TABIOS
Luisa Asks Eileen R. Tabios:
1.
In your Author's Note, you describe The Balikbayan Artist (Penguin Random House SEA, 2024) as a work of historical fiction that "presents alternate histories to actual events"—a setup also predicated on your deployment of what you call "Kapwa Time," an indigenous perception which sees "no difference between past, present, and future since one is connected to everything in all time periods." Do you think this conception of "Kapwa Time" radically reworks what we've conventionally been taught of literary values like the Aristotelian "unity of time, place, and action;" and how?
I hope so. While I see the advantages of Aristotle’s views—indeed, I believe his ideas more fit the zeitgeist’s limited attention span than my ambitious-and-perhaps-impossible goal of roping everything onto the page—I would not want an Aristotelian constraint on my work. I feel his “unity of time, place, and action” relate more to craft than to art (I use the terms conventionally though they can overlap). I’m a great believer in reader response (from that poetic upbringing) and such exists more in art’s domain than within the bounds of craft’s “how-to-create” standards. Part of reader response’s trickiness—its disadvantage but also its marvelousness—is that I even can combine seemingly random elements and yet somehow the rub of those words can generate a meaning to some reader so that my diction fails at being nonsense. Not all readers would respond this way, but readers also respond differently to works adhering to conventional standards. As well, Aristotle might hold a stricter difference between art and life/reality while I try to eliminate the difference (delete the stage’s proscenium)—this alone can disrupt Aristotelian unities since life is messy. I can’t help but wonder whether the most popular type of work today that best abides by Aristotle’s standards are romantic-comedies, and yet rom-coms may not possess the gravitas for which Aristotle was meditating. Perhaps the serious topics that would concern Aristotle—his “tragedy”—are complicated enough so that convention might flatten how they’re developed. In any event, there’s a place for all types of approaches and I think that’s what creatives should keep in mind. Creatives have a different role from that of philosophers, scholars, critics, and teachers. I once studied Aristotle; I also have since forgotten most of what I learned. Sure, creatives should try to know the rules—e.g., what’s conventional because those standards generally exist for a reason—but not necessarily follow them. Creatives should do what the art requires, even break rules.
2.
Your novel's character Vance Igorta (modeled after Filipino painter Venancio C. Igarta) recounts the differences between the reception he has received from people in his community in Surat barangay in the Philippines (curious, respectful, accepting), and those he has received from people in the art world in New York City (insulting, dismissive, racist). Igorta says he no longer minds, because he is "back where [he] was born: Surat in the Ilocos province, north and blessedly distant from the urban grit and cacophony of the capital, Manila." What does this reflect, if at all, of current thinking about what constitutes originality, relevance, and the "right audiences" for a work of art or literature?
I love this question. Because, yes, my novel could be seen as positing that there is a “right audience” for works of art and literature, and that such right audience is based on one’s community or background. This notion comes up often in works by artists of color in terms of how they are presented as well as received. But I think, generally, that some folks may be extrapolating wrongly from the responses of those who are racist, misogynist, or otherwise compassion-stunted or close-minded. The wrong extrapolation is to consider these responses to belong in the aesthetic realm of creating good work (however “good” may be defined by the artist and writer in creating their works). I may write a work—like The Balikbayan Artist—whose audience would seem to be Filipinos. But if you’re interested in art, history, psychology, the humanities, political science, poetry, and even economics, my novel would have something for you regardless of your ethnicity or community. Note that while, in The Balikbayan Artist, Igorta experiences racism and objectification while he’s in New York City, he also experiences dismissiveness over his abstract art from his fellow Filipinos. Yet Igorta didn’t stop making abstractions because many around him preferred figurative art—he kept true to his vision for his work. Also, for subjective assessments like “relevance,” we should separate the contexts of creation and reception. I may or may not consider audience at the time I’m writing; my writing standards are more directly related to creating the work well rather than hewing it to a preconceived audience even when, later, I may hope for a positive reception from a particular audience.
3.
I'm also intrigued by Igorta's "statement of faith" and belief in his home country's capacity to prosper: "When a country was strong enough to repel a dictator instead of believing his lies while taking his bribes, there's sufficient raw material to mold into a prosperous nation that would persuade its children in the diaspora to return." Do you share the same, or a similar, conviction? What would it take to land such "persuasion?"
Well, that part is clearly fiction (laugh). I don’t know that I have enough faith in humanity to believe that cause-and-effect I describe between not having a dictatorship and creating a sufficiently attractive nation for diasporics to return. Other matters besides dictatorships can create a dismal country—for examples, oligarchies, corporatism, and just general stupidity among, say, politicians. But for purpose of The Balikbayan Artist and the Philippines, it’s legitimate to express this hope. Because there was a dictatorship and there is a political infrastructure that is structured partly on the gap between the wealthy and the economically disenfranchised as well as relies partly on bribery and corruption (and its attendant cynicism).
Since I don’t want to end this answer on such a pessimistic note, I’ll share that against the proven cruelties in human history, Filipino or not, I cope by making a distinction between macro and micro realities. What I call “macro” are the larger and/or systemic contexts in which reality unfolds and which could make us feel helpless. What I call “micro” are the immediate, day-to-day, individual or more personal actions that unfold in our lives. Regardless of the macro and how corrupt and abusive it may be, such direness should not be an excuse for us to not behave well and strive hard towards good effect in our personal lives. If you’re, say, against the incoming President of the U.S. and you live in the U.S., you should still be behaving as a good person, battling injustice, and so on during his administration. If you live in the Philippines during authoritarianism, you should still be behaving well as an individual, taking care of your neighbors, seeking to improve your community’s lives, and so on. No macro element need to disrupt your micro decisions to be a good citizen of the planet. And, ultimately, it’s these micro actions that can change the macro system or environment (or at least aspects of such). Individual or grass roots activities can create exponentially larger effects.
4.
I see the balikbayan box as a physical object and complex repository of wishes for certain ideas (and the fantasy?) of "return"—many of these wishes paired with notions of duty, obligation, and care. These have also been associated with the notion of Kapwa or community. On the other hand, it can't be denied that in the reality of social dynamics, these same ideas of duty, obligation, and care do not always sketch out fully reciprocative flows. What do you think about this?
I agree. That’s why I believe one should never expect a return for one’s gift to others, as well as that one should never be obliged to give. But don’t listen to me—I often break tradition, including long-held traditions for how a family or tribe or community or culture operates. I don’t believe, for example, in “Respect your elders.” I believe respect needs to be earned and the elders aren’t excused. I can cite other examples. This has made me a “bad daughter,” among other things. Note that, for what it’s worth, I’m answering this amidst plenty of bingeing on Asian dramas where parents and elders use family values to take advantage of the younger generation. In the balikbayan context, I’ve heard of certain values being debased by the existence of relatives in the diaspora—for example, those being helped assuming service and heaped-upon sacrifices from those “lucky enough” to have made it to the diaspora. This is frustrating, even as I’m not surprised because of the weaknesses and/or fragility of human nature. I can only hope that for those situations, the existence of love is sufficient to overcome the tensions that arise. One loves by respecting others’ positions, not by creating demands—in this more healthy context, exchanges are more joyously made.
5.
How do you envision this novel in conversation with the current and looming realities faced especially but not only by communities of color, communities in the diaspora, and communities that continue to be wrecked by the violent systems of capital and corruption? Does it offer a vision for a particular type of future, and our role in getting to it?
The novel encourages never giving up on the fight for justice, no matter how long and hard the battle—in the novel, the people do eventually overthrow the dictatorship. But, I repeat: the fight can be long and hard—in the novel, the primary protagonist dies before the dictatorship is overthrown. But because he kept up the good fight, he achieves his goal of reaching his deathbed with no regrets.
The novel encourages self-education, which is critical and reminds me of the debate over whether everybody needs to go to college. Institutions of higher learning are not just for determining future jobs—education is also a vitamin for the brain to create better-thinking citizens, including better voters. The more ill-educated the populace, the more likely they’d fall for poor leadership due to elements like fake science and other fake facts, as well as overrely on manipulated impressions versus reality (Hello, social media). Education, of course, need not just be what occurs in schools and should continue beyond schools—the novel’s artist protagonist is self- instead of institution-educated.
The novel is a cautionary note against repeating cycles of abuses by knowing one’s history and by maintaining priorities that do not sacrifice one’s culture and resources to others.
There are, I hope, other lessons that would make the novel relevant to those forced to live within the bounds of capitalism and corruption. But certainly a clear one is the effectiveness of art in making sense of our world. Art-making and poetry—there is poetry in the novel—are inherently anti-capital.
I’m not sure, though, that I intended the novel to offer a vision for a particular future (perhaps it does, but that would be up to and enacted by readers for the circumstances of their lives). What I wished for the novel to offer is how “Kapwa” makes everything related across all time. From that understanding, I believe the odds for a better future arise. But I believe the novel encourages increasing the odds for, but without guaranteeing, this better future. Because—as discussed by the novel’s characters—human history itself shows how human nature is flawed. For example, as is mourned more than once in the novel, “Power corrupts.” And yet, we live. The novel asks, How do we live? Hopefully, the novel will move the reader to respond, Let’s live better.
~~
Eileen Asks Luisa A. Igloria:
1.
Caulbearer (Black Lawrence Press, 2024) strikes me as a hefty poetry book, which I personally welcome since I’ve long decried how capitalism makes many poetry books so slim. If I counted correctly, there are 73 poems in this 110-page book. Please discuss how you formed and organized it. For example, I know you write at least one poem a day—did you then “harvest” the 73 poems for a particular theme, or?
That’s a great question, and I love how you use the word “harvest” —which does in part describe some of the process of putting a book together out of my daily writing practice. In fact, I’ll add it to my process vocabulary! Whenever I write my daily poem, I’m not at the moment thinking about what it’s going to be “for.” When I’m writing my daily poem, you could say I’m simply processing what I’m living through, thinking through, and perceiving (in the simultaneous dailiness and extraordinariness of our daily lives), using the language and structures and image- and metaphor-making capacity. Putting Caulbearer together, I looked back through almost a year of writing during a time of intense personal grieving and questioning. I write about that some more in a “What Sparks Poetry?” feature I was invited to write for Poetry Daily. Those kinds of experiences can’t really be rushed, nor contained. You can’t say, I have 25 poems on that now, time to stop.
2.
I sort of amused myself with my reaction to your poem “The Dogs of Appetite.” At first, I thought you knew nothing about dogs—I speak from my no doubt snobby position of having three German Shepherds. I thought this because I somehow doubt that any dog curbs its appetite so much as, as a more direct effect of its environment, hones its behavior to behave defensively when the dog’s occasion warrants it. But I think the poem ends up being brilliant because of its last three lines: “The others, whipped to frenzy, will do / the bidding of faceless gods for an arm, / a tooth, a throat, an excavated heart.” It seems to me the lesson in those three lines can be presented in a variety of ways. So how did you come to focus on dogs for this poem? Feel free to go beyond dogs—I’m just obsessed with them.
You’re right, I don’t know anything really about dogs— we never had pets at home, not even back in the Philippines, except for around a dozen lovebirds (budgies) we kept in a large wire cage on the porch, and which we took great pleasure in, until one by one they succumbed to some kind of illness... Also, everyone in my family is allergic to animal dander. I think writing this poem came partly out of that time when many of us were watching with great anger and frustration the reinstatement of corrupt power in so many governments—not the least of all in the Philippines, with the violent Duterte administration and the bloodlust unleashed on some of the most vulnerable in society (children, women, the elderly); how crushed I was when Leni Robredo was stripped of the opportunity to rebuild from good; and when in a banal as well as horrifying way, the Marcoses came back to power. While perhaps there may be more metaphorical reference to dogs in my poem, those last three lines you quote are also my favorite, and I’m glad they come through with the kind of force I intended. When we anthropomorphize animals, or anything else, what we’re really describing is ourselves.
3.
Please share more insight on your poem “Theory & Praxis”?
THEORY & PRAXIS
A cento
You, you are a factory
above the waves, those lost years I drifted
Let me explain how nothing ever changes—the scenery, sure
More and more now I do things alone—
I keep a spur under my pillow to ward off nightmares.
You will find me, God
furnace child, goblin child, pulse
god of multiple tongues all sacred lick me
In some prisons, you can’t have a last cigarette, but Valium is
permitted.
There was a gate and we walked through
there’s no unenduring it
It’s got a killer last line, as they say: “there’s no unenduring it”. Relatedly, what is “unenduring” to you? It’s such a resonant word…
“Theory & Praxis” is a cento—and so each line is “sourced” from as many poets as there are lines in the poem (Sally Wen Mao, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Hieu Minh Nguyen, Richard Jones, Eduardo Corral, Ilya Kaminsky, Ilyse Kusnetz, Kazim Ali, CD Wright, Catherine Barnett). The cento, as an exercise in poetic collage, is infinitely interesting to me, because while I draw from existing language (and wisdom), I feel I must also push beyond the constraint to shape something new, something that was born out of my sensibility both as a reader and as a writer.
Rereading the poem today—and especially its last 2 lines— in the aftermath as well as the daily unfolding of yet so much grief and laceration of public consciousness, one of the things I’m reminded of is how all of this is both so old, and so new; and yet there’s no way through it except to go through it (and by “it” I refer also to so much that is morally repugnant that we are being made to normalize). I hope that we can keep drawing strength from one another, for our mutual survival and good.
4.
Congratulations on Caulbearer becoming published as a winner of Black Lawrence Press’ Immigrant Writing Series. Would you discuss please your view on entering poetry contests. I’m not talking so much about the reductive topic of whether contests are generally a good or bad practice. But I refer to how you might view it as a tool or something else. I don’t know if you remember but you once mentioned to me years ago how some folks in academia didn’t think highly of one of your books because its publisher was a *too small press*. So I wonder if poetry contests—winning or placing in them—was something for which you conceive a particular role in your life as a poet.
Thank you so much for the perceptive way in which you’ve written this question, and invited me to view the contest submission practices we have in the literary (and art) world “as a tool or something else.” Also, you have a great memory! What you referred to was an experience I had when I was coming up for tenure at my university. One of the (white, male) members of my committee had a lot of questions about the book I’d published that year, and which was included in my tenure review portfolio. He’d actually expressed the opinion that my book was not appropriate for a tenure credential, implying somehow that it was merely a “vanity publication.” That was a time when small, independent literary presses/poetry presses had just started turning to the POD (print on demand) production model, because it just makes sense when you’re not a “big 5” publisher and have a smaller budget, you know? My publisher at that time was indeed a small, independent poetry press; but it has a proud roster of both emerging and established poets, and a rigorous process of review. The publisher, too, has a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature, so you’d think people could feel confident he knows what he’s doing, right? So yes, in some ways, I’ve come to see putting my work forward for consideration either just for publication, or for contests—and not only placing in them but also winning—as validation not so much just for me, but for them too, haha, if you get my drift?
5.
I love the last stanza of the last poem in the book, “Outrigger”:
O outrigger. I am an island and you are
An island and everyone else is an island
And we could be an archipelago.
I like at least two things about this stanza. First, it doesn’t present a binary between the individual and the collective. Second, the mention of “O outrigger” presents a forward momentum, it seems to me, of the poem’s persona continuing to move—progress—forward, and with the admirable curiosity of a traveler, despite perhaps all that the persona has experienced and learned. I’m glad you positioned it as a last poem since I feel it’s life-affirming. But those are my thoughts—as its author, could you share more about the poem please, as well as how you chose it to be your collection’s last poem?
Again, I love what you say here about the last poem in Caulbearer—the forward momentum, the “admirable curiosity of a traveler” (which I hope is something that I can keep, even as I’m growing older), and the movement away from those usual binaries “between the individual and the collective.” I wanted to underscore also how the nostalgias we experience, especially but not only as a result of living in diaspora, can sometimes feel overwrought, over-romanticized, or even too familiar (as in, Oh are you writing about the past again?). I say in the poem, “...the undercurrent of all/ nostalgias turning into something// we only think we understand”— which I mean as a reminder to myself, too—What else can we do with our nostalgia? I’d like to think, we have the capacity to turn it towards a larger canvas of meanings, defined on our own terms. I’m also so pleased about the way this poem came together for me on a sonic level.
*****
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Poet, writer, and translator Luisa A. Igloria is the winner of the 2023 Immigrant Series Prize for poetry (Black Lawrence Press) for Caulbearer (2024). She is the author of Maps for Migrants and Ghosts (Co-Winner, 2019 Crab Orchard Open Poetry Prize, Southern Illinois University Press, 2020), The Buddha Wonders if She is Having a Mid-Life Crisis (Phoenicia Publishing, Montreal, 2018), and 12 other books. She was the inaugural recipient of the 2015 Resurgence Poetry Prize, UK—the world’s first major award for ecopoetry (now known as the Ginkgo Prize), selected by a panel headed by former UK Poet Laureate Andrew Motion. She is lead editor, along with co-editors Aileen Cassinetto and Jeremy S. Hoffman, of Dear Human at the Edge of Time: Poems on Climate Change in the United States (Paloma Press, September 2023). Luisa is a Louis I. Jaffe Professor of English and Creative Writing in the MFA Program at Old Dominion University; she also leads workshops for and is a member of the board of The Muse Writers Center in Norfolk. During her appointed term as 20th Poet Laureate of the Commonwealth of Virginia (2020-22), Emerita, the Academy of American Poets awarded her one of twenty-three Poet Laureate Fellowships in 2021, to support a program of public poetry projects. Author Links: www.luisaigloria.com and https://linktr.ee/thepoetslizard
Eileen R. Tabios has released over 70 books of poetry, fiction, essays, visual art and experimental prose from publishers around the world. Recent releases include the novel The Balikbayan Artist; an art monograph Drawing Six Directions; a poetry collection Because I Love You, I Become War; an autobiography, The Inventor; and a flash fiction collection collaboration with harry k stammer, Getting To One. Other recent books include a first novel DoveLion: A Fairy Tale for Our Times which was subsequently translated by Danton Remoto into Filipino as KalapatingLeon and two French books, PRISES(Double Take) (trans. Fanny Garin) and La Vie erotique de l’art (trans. Samuel Rochery. Her body of work includes invention of the hay(na)ku, a 21st century diasporic poetic form; the MDR Poetry Generator that can create poems totaling theoretical infinity; the “Flooid” poetry form that’s rooted in a good deed; and the monobon poetry form based on the monostich. She also has edited or conceptualized 16 anthologies of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, including HUMANITY, Hay(na)ku 15, BABAYLAN: An Anthology of Filipina and Filipina American Women Writers, and BLACK LIGHTNING: Poetry in Progress. Translated into 13 languages, she has seen her writing and editing works receive recognition through awards, grants and residencies. More information is at https://eileenrtabios.com
