Las historias prohibidas de Marta Veneranda (Spanish Edition) - Softcover

Rivera-Valdés, Sonia

Softcover

ISBN 10: 9590400515 ISBN 13: 9789590400513

Publisher: Fondo Editorial Casa de las Américas, 1997

Synopsis

The Forbidden Stories is the author's inspired response to a statement made by a Cuban politician regarding the conflicted attitude towards homosexuality in Cuba. Rivera-Valdés creates the character of Marta Veneranda, a graduate student working on a thesis which aims to graph clinically the discrepancy between an individual’s sense of shame and society’s attitude toward the incidents that inspire self-censorship in a person. But the orderly study becomes unruly as the subjects interviewed reveal their hidden stories.
In "Little Poisons,", the nameless narrator is heavily influenced by pop psychologist Patricia Evans. Through her copious reading, she manages to gain some distance from her co-dependent relationship with her husband. Sharing with Marta the minutiae of her liberation, she recounts: "As the days and months went by, I began feeling proud of myself, strong, free from his subjugation and my neurosis, even when his romance with the young woman began and he told me about it. In the fifteen years of marriage he would tell me everything, even about his sexual escapades— if he couldn't share them with me, who would he share them with? Besides, that way no one could come running to me spreading rumors. In the end, he couldn't live without me: his wife, friend, lover, and mother. Can you believe that I listened to these stories and even felt proud of the trust he had in me?"
Beneath the humor and the deceptively simple surface of The Forbidden Stories is a deadly-serious look at the co-mingling of Anglo and Latino cultures, and an exposé of the comforts and discomforts of that cohabitation.

About this title

Language Notes:

Text: Spanish

From Publishers Weekly:

Originally published in Cuba, this winner of the Casa de las Am?ricas award for Hispanic literature in the United States in 1997 is now available in both this original Spanish version and an English translation from a U.S. publisher. Rivera-Vald?s, a Cuban American resident of New York since the 1960s, has previously published short stories in anthologies in the United States and Latin America and is a professor of Latin American and Hispanic Literature at York College, CUNY. Her book is a series of separate confessions related to a fictive listener and transcriber, Marta Veneranda. After a brief introduction, Veneranda recedes into the background, and firsthand accounts from Cuban American New Yorkers whose lives are interconnected come to the fore. Although Rivera-Vald?s writes that these stories represent distinct human conflicts, they all deal with sexuality or gender issues, and most are narrated by female characters. Almost half concern romantic relations between women. While Hispanic and immigrant issues also surface throughout, this will mostly appeal to those interested in women's sexuality and gender relations. Entertaining and light reading, particularly recommended for readers interested in Latina or lesbian themes; for public libraries and bookstores. [The English translation is available from Seven Stories Press, ISBN 1-58322-047-X. $21.95. Ed.] Anna Youssefi, Rice Univ. Lib., Housto.
- Anna Youssefi, Rice Univ. Lib., Houston
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Fondo Editorial Casa de las Américas
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 9590400515
• ISBN 13: 9789590400513
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 140