TENNESSEE WILLIAMS WRITING CONFERENCE

In March I attended the Tennessee Williams Writing Conference in New Orleans. I drove there from Atlanta, and Larry flew there to meet me the following weekend so we could drive home together.

I am trying to get my writing published, so this seemed like a good venue to learn about the art of writing. Many of my favorite writers were presenting, so I was thrilled to me there.

ARMISTEAD MAUPIN signed my first edition copies of TALES OF THE CITY. I spoke with him at length after his presentation. He is a brilliant speaker. The conference room was packed. I skipped a session beforehand so I could get a front row seat. He told stories about his difficult life choices but with great humor.

He had the audience in stitches. I met so many amazing men who love his work and thanked him for validating their lifestyle. I met a young guy from Thibodeaux, LA whose family owns a grocery store business. We talked about growing up in LA and shared stories about experiences in big cities. He has traveled to San Francisco and is personal friends with Mr. Maupin.

ROBERT OLIN BUTLER, a former McNeese professor who now teaches at Florida State won the Pulitzer Prize in 1993 for A GOOD SCENT FROM A STRANGE MOUNTAIN. Butler served in Viet Nam from 1969 to1971, first as a counter-intelligence special agent and later as a translator. He received the Tu Do Chinh Kien Award from the Vietnam Veterans of America for outstanding contributions to American culture by a veteran.

The New York Times praised the book’s “startling, dream-like stories about the lives of Vietnamese immigrants living in Louisiana.” I was mesmerized by the verisimilitude in this text. Butler manages to write so realistically that this fiction text seems like real life. He autographed my books, and we spoke about Lake Charles since Larry and I lived there in 1976 when I taught at Iowa High School.

JASON BERRY, a New Orleans resident and an investigative reporter wrote CrUp From the Cradle of Jazz, Earl Long in Purgatory, Last of the Red Hot Poppas, and Vows of Silence [about abuses in the Catholic Church].  He delivered an amazing presentation about his investigative work and about the nature of writing about Louisiana politics.

DR. DARRYL BOURQUE, Professor Emeritus at ULL and a resident of Sunset was the highlight of this conference for many Louisianians and conference attendees from all over the country. 

Dr. Bourque was named Poet Laureate of Louisiana in May 2007 by Governor Kathryn Blanco. But because of an oversight, his name was not submitted to the Senate for confirmation that year. In 2009 Governor Bobby Jindall named Dr. Bourque Poet Laureate of Louisiana.

Dr.Bourque spoke about his writing and served on several panels with other prominent national writers. He is the author of six books of poems:  Plainsongs, The Doors Between Us, Burnt Water Suite, The Blue Boat, Call and Response: Conversations in Verse and In Ordinary Light: New and Selected Poems. He has a new book forthcoming in 2011: Holding the Notes.

You will recognize in his writing the hum of the bayous, the accordion melodies, the sounds of the swamp, the nature of the Cajun soul, and the beauty of our unique region. His poetry will move you as does the flight of an egret, the sounds of the swamp, and the smell of sugar cane at grinding.

You will connect with it because of its humanity, voice, and truth. If you have not read his work, you must. I used his poetry in my classes when I taught World Literature, and I invited students to bring in poetry from their cultures as well.

Dr. Bourque’s poetry has inspired me to write about my memories of growing up in Loreauville, Louisiana. Larry and I were delighted to meet him in New Orleans and to discover his contributions as an ambassador for our Cajun culture

I have attended writing conferences throughout this country, and I was elated to hear a fellow Cajun discussing the art of writing with such intelligence, conviction and ease.

I say that because my Atlanta friends keep asking me if my relatives are stars on SWAMP PEOPLE. I would not be embarrassed to admit that if it were true; however, I believe that television sensationalizes everything.

I tell them that my dad hunted and fished, and I always asked our domestics what type of meat we were eating before I took a bite of anything. Our protein could have consisted of rabbit, squirrel, deer, rabbit, fowl like duck, doves, or endangered robins; seafood such as alligator, crawfish, crab, catfish, oysters, etc. Hogs Head cheese and brains are served as delicacies in Europe, but it is a commonplace food in Louisiana.  You get the picture.

 When my sister and I found a dead armadillo on Main Street, we removed the carcass and threw it in the bayou in fear that it would show up on our dinner plates. Our dad raised a goat that became our family pet. We were served that goat at a meal, and we cried for days.

I left Louisiana in 1970, but it did not leave me.