BGSQDBureau of General Services—Queer Division
BGSQD
Join an all-star lineup for the New York launch of legendary diasporic Puerto Rican writer Manuel Ramos Otero’s Cuentos “completos” in a new Spanish edition published by Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña and Callejón, edited by Arnaldo Cruz-Malavé. With a bilingual reading by authors Giannina Braschi, Gerard Cabrera, Lawrence LaFountain-Stokes, Lina Meruane, Huáscar Robles, and Emanuel Xavier, help celebrate the return of Ramos Otero’s work, after 30 years of being out of print, to the city where he lived, loved, and wrote from his arrival in 1968 at age 20 to his death from AIDS in 1990 at the age of 42.
Planning to purchase a copy of Cuentos “completos” (Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña and Callejón, 2024, paperback, $24.95)? Please reserve a copy by writing to us at contact@bgsqd.com with “please reserve a copy of Cuentos ‘completos'” in the subject line.
This will help us to make sure we have enough copies on hand.
Thank you for supporting the Bureau by purchasing books from us!
Planning to attend in person? Please register here:
Hosted by the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division
Co-Sponsored by:
The New York City LGBT Community Center
The Publishing Triangle, OUTSpoken Series
Instituto De Cultura Puertorriqueña, Ediciones Callejón
Center for Puerto Rican Studies – Hunter College/CUNY
This event will take place in person at The LGBT Community Center, 208 W. 13th St., Room 101, NYC, 10011.
Seating is first come, first served.
Biographies:
Manuel Ramos Otero (1948-1990) influential Puerto Rican diasporic writer who migrated to New York City in 1968 to pursue advanced studies in theater, literature, and film, and life as an openly gay man. A queer, anticolonial, and feminist writer, Ramos Otero cultivated a self-reflexive, gender and genre-bending prose that was both confessional and historic, poetic and philosophical, campy, witty, and street-savvy. He is the author of the short story collections Concierto de metal para un recuerdo y otras orgías de soledad (1971), El cuento de la Mujer del Mar (1979), Página en blanco y staccato (1987) and Cuentos de buena tinta (1992); the experimental novel La novelabingo (1976), and the books of poetry Invitación al polvo (1991) y El libro de la muerte (1985). In 1990, at age 42, he died of AIDS complications, leaving behind a legacy that continues to grow in influence among the younger generations of Puerto Rican writers.
Giannina Braschi is an iconic Puerto Rican poet and Latinx philosopher who writes in Spanish, Spanglish, and English. She is the author of Empire of Dreams, Yo-Yo Boing!, and United States of Banana. Her forthcoming title is PUTINOIKA.
Gerard Cabrera is a Massarican from Springfield, Massachusetts, the birthplace of the first American dictionary, Dr. Seuss, and basketball. His debut novel, Homo Novus, was published in October 2022. An attorney, he lives and works in New York City.
Arnaldo M. Cruz-Malavé is professor of Spanish and comparative literature at Fordham University. He is the author of Queer Latino Testimonio, Keith Haring, and Juanito Xtravaganza: Hard Tails; coeditor of Queer Globalization: Citizenship and the Afterlife of Colonialism; and editor of Cuentos “completos” de Manuel Ramos Otero (San Juan: Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña and Callejón).
Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes is Professor of American Culture, Romance Languages and Literatures, and Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. His published fiction includes Uñas pintadas de azul/Blue Fingernails (Bilingual Press, 2009) and Abolición del pato (Terranova, 2013). He is also the author of Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities in the Diaspora (University of Minnesota Press, 2009) and Translocas: The Politics of Puerto Rican Drag and Trans Performance (University of Michigan Press, 2021). Larry performs in drag as Lola von Miramar since 2010 and has appeared in several episodes of the YouTube series Cooking with Drag Queens.
Lina Meruane is a Chilean writer residing in New York City since 2000. Her well recognized works of fiction include two collections of short stories, five novels, five essay books and two plays. She currently teaches creative writing as Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University.
Huáscar Robles is a Puerto Rican author-journalist-photographer-musician who writes about social justice, economic, and LGBTQ+ issues in Puerto Rico, the Caribbean and the U.S. His 2023 debut novel, Demonios, was published by Secta de los perros in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Emanuel Xavier is the author of several poetry books including Pier Queen, Americano, If Jesus Were Gay, Nefarious, and Radiance. His latest collection is Love(ly) Child (Rebel Satori Press, 2023). He is recipient of a New York City Council Citation Award, an International Latino Book Award, and a Gay City Impact Award. His work has appeared in Poetry, A Gathering of the Tribes, and elsewhere.