Long Stories Cut Short: Fictions from the Borderlands
by Frederick Luis Aldama foreword by Ana María Shua
University of Arizona Press, 2017 Paper: 978-0-8165-3397-8 | eISBN: 978-0-8165-3611-5 Library of Congress Classification PS3601.L3444L66 2017 Dewey Decimal Classification 813.6
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | TOC
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Xbox videogamer cholo cyberpunks. Infants who read before they talk. Vatos locos, romancing abuelos, border crossers and border smugglers, drug kingpins, Latina motorbike riders, philosophically musing tweens, and so much more.
The stories in this dynamic bilingual prose-art collection touch on the universals of romance, family, migration and expulsion, and everyday life in all its zany configurations. Each glimpse into lives at every stage—from newborns and children to teens, young adults, and the elderly—further submerges readers in psychological ups and downs. In a world filled with racism, police brutality, poverty, and tensions between haves and have-nots, these flashes of fictional insight bring gleaming clarity to life lived where all sorts of borders meet and shift.
Frederick Luis Aldama and graphic artists from Mapache Studios give shape to ugly truths in the most honest way, creating new perceptions, thoughts, and feelings about life in the borderlands of the Américas. Each bilingual prose-art fictional snapshot offers an unsentimentally complex glimpse into what it means to exist at the margins of society today. These unflinching and often brutal fictions crisscross spiritual, emotional, and physical borders as they give voice to all those whom society chooses not to see.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Frederick Luis Aldama is Arts and Humanities Distinguished Professor of English and University Distinguished Scholar at The Ohio State University. He is founder and director of LASER, a mentoring and research hub for Latinos (ninth grade through college), selected as a 2015 Bright Spot in Hispanic Education by the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics. An expert on Latino popular culture, Aldama is the author, co-author, and editor of twenty-six books, including Your Brain on Latino Comics: From Gus Arriola to Los Bros Hernandez and The Cinema of Robert Rodriguez.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
All Possible Borders / Todas las fronteras posibles by Ana María Shua
PRELUDE: A LA Tito Monterroso
The Hunger Pangs / Gruñidos de hambre
The Message / El mensaje
The Fear / El miedo
Destroy, They Said / Destruir, eso dicen
Planning to Teach / Misión de enseñar
Love / El amor
Love, Again / Amar de nuevo
Is Love Possible? / ¿Realmente existe el amor?
Ends / El final
Beginnings
Tila Tequila / Tila Tequila
Knock, Knock.../ Toc, toc…
Unended Story / Historia sin fin
Lexicon / Lexicon
The Day I Was Born / El día en que nací
In Your Dreams / En tus sueños
Dirty Old Man / Viejo rabo verde
Tummy Aches / Dolores de barriga
Middles
Breaking Bad / Que te salga lo cabrón
Motorbike Guy / El chico de la motocicleta
Family Man / Un hombre de familia
Hell to Pay / Te vas a condenar en el infierno por regatero
Frank / Frank
The Americano Way / A la americana
White Picket Fences / Cercas blancas
Gómez . . . Alfonso Gómez / Gómez… Alfonso Gómez
Upside Down and Inside Out / Al derecho y al revés
Nueva Americana / Nueva americana
Hello . . . Kitty™/ Hello… Kitty™
Ego Sum Qui Sum / Ego sum qui sum
All in the Goddamn Pinta Family /Todo en la pinche familia pinta
Cell 113 / Celda 113
The Father . . . in Three Parts / El padre... en tres partes
Spinoza on the Matter / Spinoza sobre el asunto
No Hair, No Fun / Sin pelo no hay gloria
Those 45s / Los discos de 45 RPM
A Mouth to Feed / Una boca que alimentar
Ricky & Co. / Ricky & Co.
She Loved Her Malandrino / Ella amaba su Malandrino
Señor Xbox / Señor Xbox
Un Día / Un día
Lifer / A perpetuidad
Five Things S/he Can’t Live Without /Cinco cosas sin las que él/ella no puede vivir
Ends
Notes to a Father . . . I Once Thought I Had / Cartas al padre... que una vez creí tener
Shit Smell of the Old / Entre más viejo más hediondo
One in Four They Say / Una en un millón suelen decir
Six Feet Under / Dos metros bajo tierra
Hurry Up . . . and Die / Muérete… de una buena vez
Life in the End / Al final de la vida
Swimming to Exhale / Nadar hacia el último suspiro
A Long Story Cut Short / Una larga historia amputada
Long Stories Cut Short: Fictions from the Borderlands
by Frederick Luis Aldama foreword by Ana María Shua
University of Arizona Press, 2017 Paper: 978-0-8165-3397-8 eISBN: 978-0-8165-3611-5
Xbox videogamer cholo cyberpunks. Infants who read before they talk. Vatos locos, romancing abuelos, border crossers and border smugglers, drug kingpins, Latina motorbike riders, philosophically musing tweens, and so much more.
The stories in this dynamic bilingual prose-art collection touch on the universals of romance, family, migration and expulsion, and everyday life in all its zany configurations. Each glimpse into lives at every stage—from newborns and children to teens, young adults, and the elderly—further submerges readers in psychological ups and downs. In a world filled with racism, police brutality, poverty, and tensions between haves and have-nots, these flashes of fictional insight bring gleaming clarity to life lived where all sorts of borders meet and shift.
Frederick Luis Aldama and graphic artists from Mapache Studios give shape to ugly truths in the most honest way, creating new perceptions, thoughts, and feelings about life in the borderlands of the Américas. Each bilingual prose-art fictional snapshot offers an unsentimentally complex glimpse into what it means to exist at the margins of society today. These unflinching and often brutal fictions crisscross spiritual, emotional, and physical borders as they give voice to all those whom society chooses not to see.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Frederick Luis Aldama is Arts and Humanities Distinguished Professor of English and University Distinguished Scholar at The Ohio State University. He is founder and director of LASER, a mentoring and research hub for Latinos (ninth grade through college), selected as a 2015 Bright Spot in Hispanic Education by the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics. An expert on Latino popular culture, Aldama is the author, co-author, and editor of twenty-six books, including Your Brain on Latino Comics: From Gus Arriola to Los Bros Hernandez and The Cinema of Robert Rodriguez.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
All Possible Borders / Todas las fronteras posibles by Ana María Shua
PRELUDE: A LA Tito Monterroso
The Hunger Pangs / Gruñidos de hambre
The Message / El mensaje
The Fear / El miedo
Destroy, They Said / Destruir, eso dicen
Planning to Teach / Misión de enseñar
Love / El amor
Love, Again / Amar de nuevo
Is Love Possible? / ¿Realmente existe el amor?
Ends / El final
Beginnings
Tila Tequila / Tila Tequila
Knock, Knock.../ Toc, toc…
Unended Story / Historia sin fin
Lexicon / Lexicon
The Day I Was Born / El día en que nací
In Your Dreams / En tus sueños
Dirty Old Man / Viejo rabo verde
Tummy Aches / Dolores de barriga
Middles
Breaking Bad / Que te salga lo cabrón
Motorbike Guy / El chico de la motocicleta
Family Man / Un hombre de familia
Hell to Pay / Te vas a condenar en el infierno por regatero
Frank / Frank
The Americano Way / A la americana
White Picket Fences / Cercas blancas
Gómez . . . Alfonso Gómez / Gómez… Alfonso Gómez
Upside Down and Inside Out / Al derecho y al revés
Nueva Americana / Nueva americana
Hello . . . Kitty™/ Hello… Kitty™
Ego Sum Qui Sum / Ego sum qui sum
All in the Goddamn Pinta Family /Todo en la pinche familia pinta
Cell 113 / Celda 113
The Father . . . in Three Parts / El padre... en tres partes
Spinoza on the Matter / Spinoza sobre el asunto
No Hair, No Fun / Sin pelo no hay gloria
Those 45s / Los discos de 45 RPM
A Mouth to Feed / Una boca que alimentar
Ricky & Co. / Ricky & Co.
She Loved Her Malandrino / Ella amaba su Malandrino
Señor Xbox / Señor Xbox
Un Día / Un día
Lifer / A perpetuidad
Five Things S/he Can’t Live Without /Cinco cosas sin las que él/ella no puede vivir
Ends
Notes to a Father . . . I Once Thought I Had / Cartas al padre... que una vez creí tener
Shit Smell of the Old / Entre más viejo más hediondo
One in Four They Say / Una en un millón suelen decir
Six Feet Under / Dos metros bajo tierra
Hurry Up . . . and Die / Muérete… de una buena vez
Life in the End / Al final de la vida
Swimming to Exhale / Nadar hacia el último suspiro
A Long Story Cut Short / Una larga historia amputada