Fronteras: Cherríe Moraga Memoir 'Native Country Of The Heart' Is 'A Portrait Of A Relationship'

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Cherríe Moraga is an internationally recognized poet, playwright, essayist and memoirist. She is also a founding member of La Red Xicana Indígena, an advocacy network of Xicanas working in education, the arts, and indigenous women’s rights.";s:

Daniella Rossell

One of the leading voices in Latino literature centers her latest work on her close relationship with her mother. Cherríe Moraga aims to preserve her mother’s stories and memories in her literary memoir, Native Country of the Heart.

Credit Courtesy of Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Moraga, professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, traces her mother’s past and explores how it later shaped relationships in her life. Moraga and her mother, Elvira, are then woven together when she reflects on her mother’s experiences and connects it to her own journey of discovering and embracing her queer Chicana identity.

Elvira suffered from Alzheimer’s disease for many years before it took her life, and her memories, in 2005. Moraga’s book, Native Country of the Heart, provides an insight into intergenerational trauma and, at its core, serves as a love letter to her mother she will never lose.

Norma Martinez can be reached at norma@tpr.org and on Twitter @NormDog1 and Lauren Terrazas can be reached at lauren@tpr.org and on Twitter @terrazas_lauren.