The 2016 Rudolfo and Patricia Anaya Lecture on the Literature of the Southwest
Rigoberto Gonzalez
On Thursday, September 29th, the UNM Department of English will host the distinguished writer Rigoberto González as the featured speaker for the seventh annual Rudolfo and Patricia Anaya Lecture on the Literature of the Southwest. González will speak at 6:30pm in Room 101 of George Pearl Hall (the School of Architecture and Planning), with a reception to follow. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Rigoberto González is the author of fourteen books, including four books of poetry; ten books of fiction, including a novel (Crossing Vines 2003, winner of ForeWord Magazine’s Fiction Book of the Year Award); a collection of short stories (Men Without Bliss 2008); two bilingual children’s books and a series of young adult novels; and three books of nonfiction. His first poetry collection, So Often the Pitcher Goes to Water Until It Breaks (1999), was a National Poetry Series selection, and his recent poetry collection, Unpeopled Eden (2013) was the winner of the Lambda Literary Award and the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. His first memoir, Butterfly Boy: Memories of a Chicano Mariposa (2006) won the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. His most recent book is the chapbook Our Lady of the Crossword (2015). Rigoberto González also edited Camino del Sol: Fifteen Years of Latino and Latina Writing and has been a tireless supporter of Latino/a writing. His awards include a Guggenheim and NEA fellowships, the Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, as well as the Poetry Center Book Award, the Barnes & Noble Writer for Writers Award, and The Bill Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Publishing Triangle in 2015.
About the Author
Rigoberto González was born in Bakersfield, California and raised in Michoacán, Mexico. González earned a BA from the University of California-Riverside and graduate degrees from University of California-Davis and Arizona State University. He currently lives in New York City and teaches at Rutgers-Newark. In addition to his creative work, González is a critic and advocate of Latinx writing, serving as a book columnist for The El Paso Times, the only column dedicated to Latinx literature, which pushes against traditional gender norms in Latino/a literature and culture. He is currently a critic-at-large with The Los Angeles Times.
About the Lecture Series
The UNM English Department established the annual lecture series on the literature of the Southwest in 2010 through a gift from the renowned fiction writer Rudolfo Anaya and his late wife Patricia Anaya. A founder of UNM’s distinguished Creative Writing Program, Rudolfo Anaya is also an Emeritus Professor of English at UNM. His papers are held at UNM’s Center for Southwest Research.
The annual Rudolfo and Patricia Anaya Lecture on the Literature of the Southwest features foundational figures in southwestern literature, such as Acoma Pueblo poet Simon Ortiz (2010), Las Cruces writer and playwright Denise Chávez (2011), Taos writer John Nichols (2012), Kiowa writer N. Scott Momaday (2013), Chicana writer Ana Castillo (2014), and Santa Fe writer Anne Hillerman (2015).
Support the Rudolfo Anaya Fellowship Fund!
The UNM English Department also has the Rudolfo Anaya Fellowship Fund, which is very close to endowment and would then be available for student fellowships. We would like to encourage you to make a contribution to this fund; gifts of $100 or more will receive a poster of this year’s Rudolfo and Patricia Anaya lecture signed by Rudolfo Anaya and Anne Hillerman.
