For this week’s reading, I picked Giannina Braschi’s, Yo-Yo Boing!
It was a very interesting read that had a very original aesthetic and design to the novel. It felt like different conversations between a single person over the anxieties of life and its own designs but overall, it is safe to say that it was a book of which I have never read anything similar to it.
There were a lot of cross cultural references that were hard to contemplate in the moment since I didn’t have much of a references to it, but along with the mix of the Spanish and English language, the text became a sort of meandering cultural loophole that didn’t seem to have an end, nor a start. There were some lines that really made an impression on me because I had never heard them before and also because some lines just jump out at the reader especially if the reader gets lost along the narrative path. One line was: “You know why? Because when women have sons, they think it’s their turn to be men. Or to exercise power over these men,” (128). Probably liked that line because I grew up with a single mom and we didn’t have the best of relationships throughout my teen years. But there was also another quote before the one above that triggered my attention just a tad bit sharper: “The man bolted, coward, but the woman, brave woman, did not run, she stopped-gathered one, two, three crying children and then ran off. Where was the father? Gone. It showed me how much stronger women are./ Some and some not./ Maternal instinct/ Some and some not.” (127).
This narrative that seemed to be a grand combustion of self exploration through language and cultural reference, creating a narrative that consumed thought and leaving the reader to ponder more than maybe the could at face value. At least, that was how I experienced this book. I feel like I’ll have to give it another read to further grasp some of the narratives that persisted to make a point.
The question I would like to ask is about the narrative. What do you think was being constantly asked in this book?
“This narrative that seemed to be a grand combustion of self exploration through language and cultural references”. Didn’t you feel that the number of references became overwhelming? The conversation between Braschi and Dr. Beasley-Murray may provide some clues: it is a reflection of the culture of the Clinton era. At that time you were not born. What I remember is that the coordinates were different and there was a feeling of excess, to call it something. The exercise of reading the novel in our time, with different eyes, is interesting. (Some passages have even become cryptic.)