WRITING FROM EXPERIENCE: THE ASIAN-AMERICAN POINT OF VIEW
I write from my experience, but I distill and shape events so that they add up to coherent stories. My sources are memories, life situations and occasionally dreams, all having to do with growing up as the child of mixed-race parents in rural America and later moving to New York City. I work hard to keep the voice consistent in my fiction pieces, because an energetic, edgy tone is a unifying element. I test my work by reading it aloud–I believe this brings an extra dimension to the text on the page. [Thaddeus Rutkowski] www.thaddeusrutkowski.com
THE ASIAN EXPERIENCE IN AMERICA
I write on the experience of being in an alien culture; my work explores such themes as the search for identity, cultural and religious relativism, and the sense of ancestry. I don’t write from my experience alone, but I borrow the voices and stories of other Asian immigrants — mostly those from my childhood and my family. In the event in January, I will be reading from my book length poem “In Thailand with the Apostles” as well as a new poem “The House of Happiness” about my grandmother. [Joanna Sit]
Joanna Sit has taught literature and creative writing at Brooklyn College, NYU and Medgar Evers College. Her work has appeared in Pearl, Context South, The Ledge, Mudfish, and other literary journals. Her long poem, “Bitten by an Unusual fly,” was recently included in the anthology Monologues From The Road, published by Heinemann Press in New Hampshire. She has read at the Knitting Factory, Teachers and Writers Collaborative, Dixon Place, La Mama La Galleria, the 11th Street Bar, and other venues in New York City. She is currently looking for a publisher for her new book of poems, East to East.
Thaddeus Rutkowski is a graduate of Cornell University and The Johns Hopkins University. His novel, Roughhouse (Kaya Press, New York), was a finalist for the Members¹ Choice of the Asian American Literary Awards. His work has been anthologized in Sweet Jesus: Poems About the Ultimate Icon (Anthology Editions), Help Yourself (Autonomedia), The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (Thunder¹s Mouth), and The Bits (Three Rivers/Crown). His stories have appeared in Fiction, American Letters and Commentary, Asian Pacific American Journal, Columbia Review, CutBank, Pleiades, Artful Dodge, The Laurel Review and other magazines. He teaches at Pace University and the Writer¹s Voice of the West Side YMCA. He has been a resident at Yaddo, MacDowell and other colonies and has written book reviews for The New York Times and other papers.
