Spanish & English Reading with Puerto Rican Award-Winning Poet, Mara Pastor!
Join us for a Spanish and English reading of Mara's Pastor's Deuda Natal (2021), followed by Q&A with the author. Mara will be focusing on “Paraísos perecederos / Perishable Paradises.” This event is sponsored by the Department of Languages, Literatures and International Studies, the English Department, the NMU Honors Program, and the College of Arts and Sciences.
Dr. Mara Pastor is the author of six full-length poetry books in Spanish, as well as two bilingual chapbooks. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and is currently a professor and the Academic Leader of The Creative Writing Program and Literature Program at the Universidad del Sagrado Corazón in San Juan. Her book Deuda Natal (The University of Arizona Press, 2021, translated by María José Giménez and Anna Rosenwong) won the 2020 Ambroggio Award from the Academy of American Poets. Deuda Natal takes us from the aftermath of Hurricane María in Puerto Rico to the communal efforts to rebuild, reconnect, and imagine ways to fight “disaster capitalism” (Naomi Klein, 2018). It contains reflections on immigration, returns, debt, feminism, colonialism and ecological devastation while guiding us toward grassroots and intimate alternatives.