Reading Response 10/06

In a reading from Borderlands/La Frontera:The New Mestiza by Gloria Anzaldua and a reading from Fast Speaking Woman by Anne Waldman both writers described the their own process and literary techniques in writing stories and poetries. Both writers described writing as a spiritual, supernatural experience. Anzaldua mentioned, “Though it is a flawed thing – a clumsy complex, groping blind thing – for me it is alive, infused with spirit. I talk to it, it talks to me” (185), she personified the writings being done. Waldman on the other hand wrote, “Powerful demonic visualizations are conjured. Images of rotting corpse, skull cups of blood, wrathful deities of all horrific description haunt and vivify the premises” (176).  Which describes how writing is like being possessed and the brain just projecting images in your head as you write.

Anzaldua reminds me of the narrator of Outside the Bones by Lyn Di Ioro, Fina. Just like Fina, Anzaldua’s writing gives the readers a lot of imagery. She uses metaphors to describe things. Besides the writing techniques used, another similarities both characters have is having spiritual practices and even sacrificing animals, in this case, the chicken is used for its blood.

Waldman on the other hand uses different literary technique, she uses anaphora and symbolism. In her poem the Fast Speaking Woman, each lines started the same.

I’m a shouting woman

I’m a speech woman

I’m an atmosphere woman

I’m an airtight woman

I’m a flesh woman

And it continues on and on with the same theme of I’m a ___ woman. Despite starting each line with an “I”, she just doesn’t refer the woman as only herself, but everyone woman. The “I” symbolize the diversity of women. For example, based on her example she stated, “I saw two cops approaching from the distance. As they closed in I ascertained that they were both women. I immediately sprung to ‘I’m the blue cop woman,’ ‘I’m the woman with the billy club,’ ‘I’m the powerful bust cop lady assigned to close this reading down,’ and so on” (179).  This shows that she’s not writing about herself as the woman, but more of the different women she encounters from her own experiences.