The legacy of Professor Helena María Viramontes, novelist and foundational voice in Chicana feminism, will be honored in “Lest Silence Be Destructive,” a two-day celebration of Chicana feminism and Viramonte’s creative work and influence, Oct. 20-21. Scholars, former students, and Viramontes herself will present and give readings Oct. 21 in the A.D. White House starting at 9:30 a.m.
The collaborators who created the concert “Riding the Currents of the Wilding Wind”: (seated l-r) playwright Virginia Grise, novelist Helena María Viramontes, and composer Martha Gonzalez. Standing is Kendra Ware, the production’s director.
“Helena María Viramontes has mentored dozens and dozens of writers and scholars who are now in universities all over the country. Her writing has been foundational to the emergence of Chicana feminism, which comes into its own in the mid 1980s,” said Mary Pat Brady, professor of literatures in English and director of the American Studies Program in the College of Arts and Sciences (A&S). “To honor Helena is to honor this influential movement. In some ways this conference is recognition of Cornell’s commitment to transformative scholarship and transformative creative opportunities.”
Viramontes’ 1985 collection “The Moth and Other Stories” is sometimes taught in medical and nursing courses for its empathy, Brady said. Her first novel, “Under the Feet of Jesus,” centers on Latino migrant workers working in the California grape fields, and “Their Dogs Came With Them,” is widely studied.
The many voices in “Their Dogs Came with Them,” which is set in 1960s East L.A., inspired playwright Virginia Grise to create first a play and then a musical album based on the book, in collaboration with Viramontes and Martha Gonzalez, a scholar, activist and Grammy-winning songwriter. The first public performance of that album, “Riding the Currents of the Wilding Wind,” will open “Lest Silence Be Destructive,” on Oct. 20 at 7:30 p.m. in Risley Hall Theatre. (It will premiere at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco in April.)
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