American Chica_ Two Worlds, One Childhood - Marie Arana [0]
AMERICAN
CHICA
Two Worlds, One Childhood
“One of the many reasons the reader can’t put this memoir down is the author’s impressive command of her craft … [displays] virtuosity in the storyteller’s traditional gifts: spareness, clarity and a passion for allegory.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Full of larger-than-life characters and stranger-than-fiction situations … delightful.”
—The Washington Post
“An unusual mix of tone and voice—close and distant, ironic and passionate, deeply spiritual and downright funny … seems right out of Joseph Conrad.”
—The Philadephia Inquirer
“An engrossing plot, insightful cultural reflections, and well-crafted prose … [Arana] shares the tale of her own family with wisdom and compassion.”
—The Miami Herald
“This memoir is worth reading because it transcends self-interest and reveals the world beyond the writer. Its tone is sophisticated and amusing as it captures the nuances of relationships in two clashing cultures.”
—Houston Chronicle
“Marie Arana blends a journalist’s dedication to research with a style that sings with humor.”
—Publishers Weekly
(starred review)
“Reads like a novel … tells a fantastical, spellbinding tale.”
—The Atlantic Monthly
“[A] delightful book … in the passionate telling, in the clever remarks, in the elegant style. American Chica is a fascinating blend of … memoir and meditation.”
—International Herald Tribune
“Within this winning portrait of a bicultural childhood are a host of notable characters…. A rich and compelling personal narrative.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Arana is like [a] bridge. She is North. She is South…. She is both worlds. She is neither. And for all the … dichotomy, her life is richer than most.”
—The Advocate
(Baton Rouge)
Table Of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1 - Ghosts: Pishtacos
Chapter 2 - Fathers: Padres
Chapter 3 - Ancestors: Antepasados
Chapter 4 - Mothers: Madres
Chapter 5 - Gods and Shamans: Dioses y Brujas
Chapter 6 - Politics: La Politica
Chapter 7 - Earth: Pachamama
Chapter 8 - Sky: El Mundo Arriba
Chapter 9 - Power: La Conquista
Chapter 10 - Independence: Sueños Norteños
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
To my parents,
Jorge Arana Cisneros
and Marie Elverine Clapp,
who taught me that there are
two sides to my America,
and two Americas in this world.
I am, seeing, hearing,
with half my soul at sea and half my soul on land,
and with these two halves of soul I see the world.
Estoy, mirando, oyendo,
con la mitad del alma en el mar y la mitad del alma en la tierra,
y con las dos mitades del alma miro el mundo.
(Pablo Neruda)
PROLOGUE
THERE IS LAUGHTER. There is the sharp report of a slamming door and the staccato of high heels crossing the ceramic tiles of the atrium garden. There is the reveille shout to the servants’ quarters, the slap of sandals making their way to the animal pens, the skrawk of chickens as they are pulled from their cages, one by one, into the ink of night. It is three o’clock, before the light of day.
I rub the sleep from my eyes, swing my legs over the side of my bed until my toes touch the llama rug, and then sniff the air of a morning (like all my mornings) redolent of ripe bananas, raw sugar, rum—and the sharp, ferric odor of freshly drawn blood.
I cross the room, hoist myself onto the window ledge, pull back the heavy wrought iron, and lean out into the dark. The second-floor vantage offers me a rich display of the courtyard below. My mother is floating into view, her green dress billowing like a gossamer wing; her long, gold hair throwing light like a tungsten filament; her all-American, Hollywood face alive with expectation. At her side is my Peruvian father—black-haired, handsome, smiling and shouting Spanish over his shoulder, waving a bottle in his fist as if he were a carnival barker on opening day. His friends spill in behind them. Through the kitchen window I see the cook, yawning and plucking feathers from a chicken, letting the blood ooze from its neck into the frying