A01=Carolyn Alessio
Author_Carolyn Alessio
Category=DCQ
Category=DN
Category=DNT
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eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_fiction
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_poetry
Product details
- ISBN 9780809324767
- Dimensions: 152 x 203mm
- Publication Date: 06 Jun 2003
- Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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Collected and translated by Carolyn Alessio, this bilingual anthology of poems, stories, memories, and philosophies was written and illustrated by the children of La Esperanza, Guatemala. Drawing upon the fortitude of their mothers, who began hand-sewing crafts to sell in the United States in order to survive the hardships of this war-torn, impoverished country, Alessio's students, aged four to sixteen, reveal amazing survival skills, fertile imaginations, and dreams of attaining better lives. The resulting work is a collection of poems and drawings that are terse, funny, sometimes sad, but always humanly, gloriously alive. As Alessio explains, "At first, I thought I might be imagining the echoes of magical realism, but as I continued to read the students' writing and study their drawings, I found similar themes. Witches killed children who didn't respect the spirits; women abused by their husbands sought refuge in trees with magical doors. People who didn't have money or jobs lived on the road and in forests, where they alternately fought and partied with the animals."
Carolyn Alessio teaches English at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. She has taught creative writing and literature and has worked as an editor and writer for the Chicago Tribune and as a prose editor for the Crab Orchard Review. Her work has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, TriQuarterly, Boulevard, and several anthologies.
