12 or 20 (second series) questions with Melanie Dennis Unrau

Melanie Dennis Unrau [photo credit: Jason Unrau] is a poet, editor, scholar, and climate organizer of mixed European ancestry from Winnipeg, Manitoba, traditional territory of the Anishinaabeg, Ininiwak, Anishininewuk, Dakota Oyate, and Dene peoples and the homeland of the Red River Métis. She is the author of the literary study The Rough Poets: Reading Oil-Worker Poetry (McGill-Queen’s UP, 2024) and the poetry collection Happiness Threads: The Unborn Poems (The Muses’ Company, 2013). A former editor of The Goose journal and Geez magazine, Melanie also co-edited I’ll Get Right on It: Poems on Working Life in the Climate Crisis (Fernwood, 2025). Her latest title is Goose (Assembly Press, 2025).

1 - How did your first book or chapbook change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?

I don’t know if the first book changed my life—that was Happiness Threads: The Unborn Poems (The Muses’ Company, 2013). I mean, I wrote the book about things that changed my life—almost becoming a parent, then becoming one. And I wrote it while I was doing a one-year MA program, researching and writing about feminist poetry about motherhood, and getting involved with a group of women visual artists I would collaborate with for the next ten years. And then it was published while I was working for a scrappy magazine I loved, but which I would soon leave to go back to grad school again. I suppose that book gave me credibility as a poet. It taught me I could write a book. It marked a shift from more typical prairie lyrics into something more experimental, and after it was published I decided to lean even more into visual poetry, found text, research, and collaboration. I’m super grateful for that book. Also, of course, the chapbooks I have published with you, rob, and elsewhere.

I think it’s funny that my first book was about motherhood and my new one, Goose, is in a sense about fatherhood. Both are feminist books, and this new one is more overtly anticolonial and antiracist. Goose feels different because the first book was very personal. Some of the poems in The Happiness Threads were impossible for me to read aloud because they were still so painful. Goose is intentionally and ironically impersonal. It’s difficult to read aloud for its own reasons—because it’s visual poetry and doesn’t always work that way. Although The Happiness Threads is funny at times, and it’s about a wide range of emotions, the dominant mood is quite sad. With Goose, the silliness is at the forefront, with deep critique and sadness in the background. Both books ask a lot of questions about what we love, and why, and how.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

I honestly don’t remember. It’s just always been that way. I love reading, language, sound, and ideas. I had to memorize a lot of Bible verses as a kid, and I read a lot of flowery and archaic and difficult language as part of a strict religious upbringing. Maybe that? I remember writing playground rhymes, limericks, jingles, and parodies all the time when I was young. I used to believe that I could write pretty much anything, but I don’t think that anymore.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?

I can write lyric poetry quickly. Early drafts of Goose were lyrics, written in the evenings while visiting “father of the tar sands” S.C. Ells’s fonds at the National Archive. Poems like that just come sometimes, and I jot and revise them in my journal, but I don’t really assume that they will turn into anything I would want to publish or turn into a bigger project. I’m glad I wrote those lyrics about Ells, capturing my strong sense of his presence haunting the archive, trying to control it even then. But those poems kind of got digested into the visual poetry, so that eventually I felt the project didn’t need them anymore. And the visual poems developed more slowly. rob, you published early drafts of these poems—the lyrics, then the word-processed found poetry that would eventually lead into the hand-tracing method I eventually figured out. It took a long time to land on what this project—or at least the book version of this project—would be. I don’t usually start writing poems with notes, but for this book I kept a list of concepts for poems on a sticky note inside a copy of Ells’s Northland Trails. It took several years for Goose to come together.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

Until I know I am working on a project or a book, poems begin as words, phrases, ideas that I put in my notebook (which I try to write in every night). I am best at making poems when I am busy doing other things like reading, editing, researching, etc. I am terrible at setting myself the task to create something when I have no idea what I want to write, and I hate doing creative writing on a computer. So I do a lot of rolling things around in my mind before I write them down. With both books, there came a moment when I knew I was making a book, and then things started to make sense. With Happiness Threads I knew at the same moment how I was going to make it—I listed out the titles of all the remaining poems I was going to write, and those would become the main part of the book. With Goose, it took longer to figure that out. Once I know what the project is and how to do it, I make one poem or more every day if I can.

Goose poems start as an idea about Northland Trails—like I’m going to find every adjective used to describe geese, or I’m going to make a deconstructive reading of this one poem that highlights how sexist it is. Then I start tracing words and images and see how my poem shapes up. If I make a mistake, or change the procedure/method for the poem, I start over. Each poem gets remade several times. Depending on how complex the poem is, each version can take an hour or longer.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

I’m honoured to get to do readings, but I am a quiet and private person, and readings are challenging for me. I do like being part of a community of writers and readers, so I do them. And I do them to honour the work.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?

Yes, always, but I try to keep these in the background—I’m not interested in writing theoretical or philosophical poetry. I would say I wrote Goose with literary-critical and environmental concerns. It is a reading or interpretation of Ells’s Northland Trails that does its work by making poems with and about Northland Trails. The questions it asks are questions like: What if Sid Ells liked to think of himself as a goose? How would I use his creative works to “prove” that, and what could I do with that evidence? What would it say about him? Do the geese or the land or the northern peoples in Northland Trails exceed or undermine what Ells tries to make them say, and how might I highlight those voices? What values and ideas and land relations were foundational to the tar sands industry, and are they still at work in the industry and in Canada today? What do we do with the legacies of “founding fathers” like Ells in the time of decarbonization and decolonization? Who speaks for the land? How can the image of this honking founding father serve as a warning or a corrective to the “great men,” grandiose plans and “nation-building projects” that are being sold to us today?

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?

It’s a writer’s job to pay attention, to reach for ways of expressing things that are happening right now in the world and in our cultures, and, while resisting silly or grandiose ideas about the impact of art or literature, to try to write ethically and in ways that matter. 

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

Both, but more essential than difficult. I would not publish a book without being edited, and I’m so grateful for the editors who have worked on my books with me—who have helped me see and fine-tune what the books are doing, and who have taught me so much. Much gratitude and love to you, Catherine Hunter, Clarise Foster, Jordan Abel, Andrew Faulkner, and Leigh Nash. And thanks to the other editors who alternately encouraged my projects along and rejected them when they were half-baked.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

Jordan Abel said something in a mentorship session at a Banff Centre writing residency—something like “I would never take on a project that I couldn’t enjoy.” That advice changed Goose and my perspective on making poetry, even so-called experimental or visual or difficult poetry.

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to critical prose)? What do you see as the appeal?

Easy. For me, poetry was an unintended byproduct of grad school and scholarly writing, editing, and publishing. I would write the scholarly version of what I was working through, but I would also be compelled to write the poetry version. Eventually, I learned to let the poetry infect the scholarly writing, and I wrote some neat creative academic work as a result. I think I’m finished being an academic now, and what I’m most proud of about my scholarly work is that I did it like a poet.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

I don’t really have one. I have never been only a writer—always an editor or student or scholar who also made time to write. I usually wait until I have an idea before devoting much time and attention to my creative writing. I used to go for a run to figure out writing tangles, and now walking every day is good for me and my writing. And I know it helps to write in my journal every night. I’m a neurodivergent person, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to focus only on one project. I will probably always do lots of other things, and those other things will somehow also help me write.

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

Hmm. The everyday? The world? Environmental activism? Or I read, or I throw myself into some other project or editing someone else’s writing. I don’t worry very much about this. 

13 - What was your last Hallowe'en costume?

I bought a box of cheesy, vintage homemade costumes at a yard sale, then wore the one my kids didn’t want to wear. I think it was a lion.

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art? 

I am not a bird-watcher, but I have paid more attention to geese while making Goose. I LOVE them, in a very unscientific and silly way. And I have visited the Athabasca River several times while making this book, also the Assiniboine River almost every day, so I think of my writing as being in relation or conversation with these beloved rivers. Visual art, especially by the artists I have collaborated with through Mentoring Artists for Women’s Art (MAWA) in Winnipeg (Yvette Cenerini, Brenna George, Sandra Brown, Carolina Araneda, to name a few). Other influences for Goose include COVID-era Zoom meetings and podcasts, and lots of music (two songs to highlight: Tanya Tagaq’s “Retribution” and John K. Samson’s “Vampire Alberta Blues”). And the other forms I want to mention are DIY and amateurish aesthetics—zines, comics, the self-published, the protest poster or slogan or song.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

Where to begin? And end? Books: Kate Beaton’s Ducks, Alvena Strasbourg’s Memories of a Métis Woman, Lindsay Bird’s Boom Time, Lesley Battler’s Endangered Hydrocarbons, M. NourbeSe Philip’s Zong!, K.B. Thors’s Vulgar Mechanics, Layli Long Soldier’s Whereas, Kazim Ali’s Northern Light, Douglas Walbourne-Gough’s Crow Gulch, Richard van Camp’s Godless but Loyal to Heaven, Evan J’s Ripping Down Half the Trees, Joanna Lilley’s Endlings, Matthew James Weigel’s Whitemud Walking, Owen Toews’s Stolen City, Max Liboiron’s Pollution Is Colonialism. And writers: Jordan Abel, Madhur Anand, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Jenna Butler, Dionne Brand, Di Brandt, Moni Brar, Warren Cariou, Rina Garcia Chua, Ariel Gordon, Stephen Collis, Marvin Francis, Samantha F. Jones, Katłıà, Kaie Kellough, Sonnet L’Abbé, Christine Leclerc, Cecily Nicholson, Jamie Paris, Shane Rhodes, Kelly Shepherd, Kate Siklosi, Dani Spinosa, Jennifer Still, Michael Trussler, Katherena Vermette, Joshua Whitehead, Rita Wong, Syd Zolf.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done? 

I would like to be a writer in residence. I will do that this fall at the University of Manitoba’s Centre for Creative Writing and Oral Culture. With that happening, and two books launching this fall, I honestly haven’t thought much further ahead.

17 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

When I was young I said I wanted to be a librarian. That would work. I don’t know, I have already done a lot of things—communications work, university student services, magazine editing, journal editing, poetry editing, copy-editing and proofreading, teaching, research/scholarship. I’m focused now on attempting primarily being a writer for a change.

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else? 

I write and do something else. But my something else is often pretty close to writing.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film? 

I’m reading Kate Briggs’s This Little Art right now. It’s fantastic. Before that it was Smokii Sumac’s Born Sacred: Poems for Palestine, which is powerful, beautiful, and heartbreaking. I recently attended a screening of the film YINTAH and was blown away. Everyone in Canada should watch it, and it’s now on Netflix.

20 - What are you currently working on? 

I’m preparing for the launches of Goose and the poetry anthology I co-edited, I’ll Get Right On It: Poems on Working Life in the Climate Crisis. I have a little chapbook project with one more sequence of poems about S.C. Ells. It didn’t fit with Goose so I set it aside to finish later (now). There is an ongoing research project with the McMurray Métis and Emily Eaton at the University of Regina that is related to Goose. I’m continuing my work as part of the Manitoba Energy Justice Coalition, including a public-art collaboration with visual artists Natalie Baird and Toby Gillies where we have been facilitating poster-making workshops that document the experiences of “wildfire season,” evacuations, smoke, and ongoing climate denial and delay in our province. And I’m getting ready to facilitate workshops on visual poetry and work-and-climate poetry as part of my upcoming writing residency.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Carmen Rodriguez

Chilean-Canadian bilingual writer Carmen Rodríguez (carmenrodriguez.ca) is the author of Guerra Prolongada/Protracted War (poetry); a body to remember with/De cuerpo entero (short stories); and Retribution (a novel). Rodríguez also has an extensive career as an educator and journalist, including work in adult literacy and popular education, particularly with Indigenous Peoples and other marginalized communities in the Americas.

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?

My first book was GUERRA PROLONGADA/PROTRACTED WAR, a bilingual (Spanish-English) volume of poetry (Toronto, Women’s Press, 1992). Until then, the professions and activities that had defined my place in the world were “educator,” “journalist” and “activist.” This book expanded that repertoire to include “poet and writer.” Also, its publication allowed me to become a member of The Writers’ Union of Canada. Since then, I have been an active member of the organization, serving twice on its National Council (an elected position), participating in its Governance and Membership Criteria Task Forces, and chairing or co-chairing its Minority Writers’ Committee and Social Justice Task Force.

My most recent book is the novel ATACAMA (Halifax/Winnipeg, Roseway/ Fernwood Publishing, 2021). My two previous books are RETRIBUTION, also a novel (Toronto, Women’s Press Literary, 2011), and the short story collection AND A BODY TO REMEMBER WITH (Vancouver, Arsenal Pulp Press, 1997).

AND A BODY TO REMEMBER WITH introduced me to bilingual writing. While GUERRA PROLONGADA/PROTRACTED WAR offered me the opportunity to collaborate with Heidi Neufeld-Raine in the translation of my poems from Spanish into English, the short stories in AND A BODY TO REMEMBER WITH triggered my interest in writing in both languages. This resulted in two books authored entirely by me: one in English and one in Spanish, which were published simultaneously in Canada and Chile.

RETRIBUTION was my first novel, which I wrote using what I now call “my teeter-totter methodology.” This involves going back and forth between English and Spanish, an approach I have continued to use until now. Unfortunately, EL DESQUITE, RETRIBUTION’s Spanish counterpart has yet to be published, but Juritzen Forlag translated the book into Norwegian and released it in Oslo as CHILES DǾTRE in 2013.

It took me fourteen years to complete this novel -- the story of the Martinez family, as told in the voices of Soledad and Sol, a mother and her daughter, with book-end interventions by third-generation Tania. At times I struggled with the scope of the narrative, which spans seven decades and unfolds in two countries, while exploring the intersection between catastrophic political events and the personal lives of the protagonists. Furthermore, the main theme of the novel did not become evident to me in the early stages of my writing it, which meant that once I decided on it, I had to reformulate the story and practically start all over again. While I am happy with RETRIBUTION, in hindsight I think that a slightly different structure would have yielded a better result.

I’m very satisfied with ATACAMA. With the invaluable help of Linda Little, my editor, I believe that I succeeded in telling an important story and telling it well. I studied literature for many years and taught it for many more, so I think I know how to recognize good fiction when I read it. Modesty apart, I believe that ATACAMA is a good piece of literary work: it tells the story of and delves deep into the psyches of two lovable, interesting characters, while examining the interplay between their personal lives and the crucial historical events that define their journeys in this world. Their voices are well defined and reflect their temperaments and interests. The plot is dynamic and entertaining. The structure works. The settings are compelling. All in all, I feel that the ten years I spent working on ATACAMA yielded a good result.  

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

I did not come to poetry first. From an early age and along the years I wrote both poetry and short fiction. My first attempt at getting published professionally was in 1972, when I sent my short story “Acuarela” to the Paula Magazine literary contest (Paula was a very popular women’s magazine published in Santiago by a collective that included Isabel Allende). My short story won an honorary mention and appeared in the March-1973 issue of the magazine.

A United States-sponsored, Canada-supported military coup was executed by General Augusto Pinochet and the Chilean Armed Forces on September 11 of that same year. Democratically elected President Salvador Allende was assassinated, bringing his “Peaceful Road to Socialism” to an end and unleashing a brutal wave a terror throughout the country. The coup marked the beginning of a seventeen-year dictatorship.

As supporters of the Allende government, my family and I were persecuted by the regime. We feared for our lives. Thanks to the help of generous friends and the hard work of Canadian churches, unions and human rights organizations, we were able to leave Chile and settle in Canada in 1974. I dedicated the next ten years of my life to support the resistance movement against the dictatorship. Then I became involved in educational work with First Nations communities across Canada.  

In 1989, the Chilean military dictatorship was replaced by a lukewarm democracy. The neoliberal economic system and the 1980 Constitution imposed by Pinochet were left intact and the dictator himself remained as Head of the Armed Forces and Senator for life. It was a change, but not the one that I and many others had wanted. The socialist Chile we had fought for so fiercely had eluded us once again.

I turned to my writing. I collected the poems and stories I had written along the years and also began to write new material. In the early nineties I decided to take a stab at publishing my work. That’s how my poetry collection GUERRA PROLONGADA/ PROTRACTED WAR was launched into the world, followed by my book of short stories AND A BODY TO REMEMBER WITH and the novels RETRIBUTION and ATACAMA.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?

It depends on the genre. Poems and short stories tend to come quickly, but are often followed by days, weeks or months of rewrites. In the case of my novel RETRIBUTION, the concept came quickly, but the execution took many years and the final product had little resemblance to the early drafts. ATACAMA, my most recent novel, involved considerable field and archival research, which resulted in copious notes and attempts to incorporate such research into the story. The first draft and the final product ended up looking similar, but closer scrutiny reveals that I made important changes to the book, mainly regarding character development and some parts of the plot.

4 - Where does a poem or work of prose usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

Again, it depends on the genre. A poem or a short story are discrete units that in time may become part of a book. A novel is a book from the very beginning.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

I love doing public readings and preparing for them – choosing the poems, story or novel excerpts I will read, practising by reading aloud and timing the presentation. Sometimes I add singing to my readings because I love music and I love to sing. Also, I believe that a bit of singing here and there helps to keep the audience engaged. Preparing for and doing a public reading helps my writing as the process forces me to stop and look at my work from a different vantage point.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?

To me, writing is a political act. I came to understand the connection between language and power early in life through both my work in basic literacy education with marginalized communities and through my readings. From Paulo Freire and the Popular Education movement I learned that language is not a neutral means of communication, but rather a powerful tool and at times, a loaded weapon. That the oppressors have used it since time immemorial to keep large sectors of the population subdued and to explain and justify their actions. That the oppressed can and do use it as a tool for liberation: to name the world, reflect upon it, exchange stories and ideas, and articulate the actions they can take towards building a better world for all.

From Eduardo Galeano, Pablo Neruda, Gabriela Mistral, Alfonsina Storni, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Luisa Valenzuela, Gabriel García Márquez and many others, I learned that meaningful and affecting stories (and poems) can also depict and denounce the realities of an unjust society, while presenting visions of a different, more equitable one.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?

For me, to write is to protest. To write is to remember. To write is to bear witness. To write is to denounce. To write is to provoke and to propose. To write is to use the tool, the weapon called language in pursuit of justice; so that horror can turn into beauty, shame into dignity, and deceit into truth. This is particularly true in these times of unfettered neoliberal capitalism, when the one per cent continues to accumulate riches, while a good part of the world’s population lives in abject poverty; when half the world is on fire and the other half, under water; when exported and internal violence and wars, in addition to climate catastrophes, are pushing millions of people out of their territories and into unwelcoming, desperate situations.

This may sound like an enormous responsibility for a writer to bear. It is. It may also sound like a burden. In my case, it is not because I enjoy the challenge of translating-transposing the chaotic nature of Life and The World into the linear, orderly nature of language; of exploring the dialectical relationship between my characters and the places/circumstances they live in; of telling their stories in the context of the societies and realities in which they are inserted.  

I come from a country and a continent where writers have been killed, imprisoned and tortured for what they write; where their books have ended up in a pyre; where their publications have been banned. For the last forty-seven years I have lived in a country where the stories and cultural practices of the original inhabitants of the land were banned for decades. I applaud their resistance to assimilation and their determination to keep their traditions alive; their skill at mastering the colonizers’ tools – their languages and their literary forms, to release their stories into the world.

Silence is also a language – the language of imposed or internalized oppression. In my opinion, the role of the writer in today’s world is to break that silence.  

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

I don’t find the process of working with an outside editor difficult, but I do find it essential. In my experience, respectful, skilled and sensitive editors have helped me to identify aspects of my manuscripts in need of attention and have also guided me through revisions.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

The best piece of advice I give myself and offer to my creative writing students is a lesson I learned through my own experience: if you feel like what you just finished writing is a masterpiece, set it aside for a few days and read it again. Most likely, you will find out that it is not a masterpiece and that it will need to be revised over and over and over and over again… and again…

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to short stories to journalism to the novel)? What do you see as the appeal?

Most often, I am engaged in several kinds of writing at the same time. Poems and short stories may “happen” impromptu, even when I’m in the middle of another project. Most often, I put those initial drafts aside until I get around to deciding whether it is worth my while to work on them or not.

As not all content fits the same form, it has not been hard for me to move between genres. Elsewhere I have said that my poetry is mainly inspired by elements such as memories and/or sensory stimuli which, in my experience, befit poetic language. Similarly, depending on the scope and depth of a narrative, my prose will become a short story or a novel. In general terms, journalistic reporting and analysis deal with socio-political or cultural affairs, while essay writing explores the world of ideas; and so on and so forth. This means that if I’m working with different content, I must move between genres. This is a challenge that I enjoy as it keeps me alert.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

When I’m working on a long-term project, I go through periods of uninterrupted writing (if I have been fortunate enough to get a grant or a residency). During those periods I write every day for about six hours, take a break and then do revisions for about two more hours. If I’m not in the financial position to write uninterruptedly, I adapt my routine and work around my other jobs (most often teaching and journalism).

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

If I’m working in English and my writing gets stalled, I begin to transpose what I have written into Spanish; or the other way around. Inevitably, this switch in languages opens my brain and body to new sensitivities, ideas and forms of expression.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

The aroma of burning firewood. I was born in Valdivia, a city that Pedro de Valdivia, the Spanish conqueror, founded in 1552 on the banks of a wide, blue river in the south of Chile. I grew up surrounded by ancient forests and in the company of patient rain. Just like everyone else in Valdivia, my mother cooked on a woodburning stove, which also provided heat to the rest of the house. So, to me, from an early age the scent of burning firewood became synonymous with “home.”

14 – David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?

My inspiration for writing poetry comes mainly from images, smells, flavours, textures, memories, words, feelings and thoughts. Personal stories and their interplay with socio-historical issues and events inform most of my prose. I love certain types of music, dance and visual art, all of which have found their way into my writing.

15 – What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

I love reading literary fiction and poetry. Once in a while, I also read memoirs and literary non-fiction. I particularly admire and enjoy the work of the following writers and poets (in no particular order): Arundhati Roy, Eduardo Galeano, Gabriela Mistral, Julio Cortazar, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Alfonsina Storni, Pablo Neruda, Cristina Peri Rossi, J. M. Coetzee, Elizabeth Hay, Jumpha Lahiri, Richard Wagamese, Rita Wong, Monteiro Lobato, Jorge Amado, Luisa Valenzuela, Miguel Hernandez, Alice Munro, Nancy Richler, Wayson Choy, Margaret Atwood (except for her science fiction), Margaret Laurence, Rohinton Mistry, Sandra Cisneros, Joy Kogawa, Michael Crummey, Canisia Lubrin, Oscar Hahn, Clarice Lispector, Omar Lara, Miguel de Cervantes, Virginia Woolf, Jorge Luis Borges (particularly his poetry and realist short stories), Doris Lessing, Nicolas Guillen, Gillian Slovo, and too many others to list.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?

Write and choreograph a ballet based on music and dance from an array of cultural traditions.

17 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

I have done many things in my life. I have been a teacher, a professor, a popular educator, a basic literacy instructor, a workshop facilitator, a journalist, a radio host, a secretary, a social and political activist, a janitor, a cleaning lady, a cook, a musician, the script writer, narrator and director of a video on basic literacy instruction, a writer of educational materials, a dancer, a theatre actor… and a writer. I am also a mother and a grandmother. To me, one occupation or activity does not exclude the others.

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?

Please read my responses to questions 2 and 17.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?

Book: Medicine Walk by Richard Wagamese.

Film: Carlos Saura’s Tango.

20 - What are you currently working on?

A bilingual collection of poetry.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;