Happy
Valentine’s Week!
The
Latina Book Club is doing mini interviews with Latino / Latinx authors about
Latin Lovers, favorite couples, and best presents to give this week.
We are
pleased to welcome award-winning author, model, poet, editor, and teacher Chris
Campanioni.
LBC: Welcome, Chris. Valentine’s Day is upon us, and nothing says romance more than a
Latin Lover, or does it? What do you think of the Latin Lover— is he a
Macho Man, Eye Candy or other?
CHRIS: I feel uncomfortable about prescribing to or even reproducing that
cultural stereotype; however, when I think about romance, and about my
background and experience, I tend to often equate love with food--the way to
your loved one's heart, then, is through their mouth, the tongue, and into the
belly.
LBC:
Describe the ideal Lover— Latino or otherwise.
CHRIS: Someone curious and willing; someone open and considerate--they
don't hesitate to take great leaps; they constellate around uncertainty and a
certain silence. Perhaps most of all, someone who excites themselves with the
miracle of every day.
LBC: Who’s your favorite couple and why?
CHRIS: My parents--duh! Everything I've learned
about love--and so much more--has been through their own love and guidance.
LBC: What’s the
best present to give your Valentine?
CHRIS: A book dedicated to them, written for them.
LBC: Describe your
novel, DRIFT, in 5 words.
CHRIS: Time, memory, exile, death, excess.
 |
| King Shot Press |
The
Latina Book Club thanks author Chris Campanioni for participating in our
Valentine’s Week Special.
BIO: Chris
Campanioni was born in Manhattan and raised in New Jersey, the son of
immigrants from Poland and Cuba. He is the author of the novel Going Down (Aignos, 2013),
named the Best First Book at the 2014 International Latino Book Awards. His
poem “Transport (after ‘When Ecstasy is Inconvenient’)” was a finalist for the
Zócalo Public Square Poetry Prize. Campanioni’s
hybrid works include the internet is for real (C&R
Press, forthcoming 2019), Drift (King Shot Press, 2018), and the experimental
memoir Death of Art (C&R Press, 2018). Campanioni’s work can
include multimedia aspects, including the piece This
body’s long (& I’m still loading), an official selection of
the Canadian International Film Festival in 2017. Campanioni’s honors and awards include an
Academy of American Poets College Prize. His creative writing, criticism, and
journalism have appeared widely in journals such as Brooklyn Rail, Gulf Coast, DIAGRAM, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and the San Francisco Chronicle. The editor of PANK, Tupelo Quarterly, and At Large magazine, he earned an
MA from Fordham University and is currently a Provost Fellow and MAGNET Mentor
at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, where he is pursuing
a PhD. He teaches at Pace University and Baruch College. Learn more about him
at www.chriscampanioni.com.
#HappyValentinesDay
#HappyReading
#ReadLatinoLit