Writing Groups and Fame and Spoken Words

Odilia Rivera Santos

After three semesters of creative writing courses in college, i was spent. although i learned a lot, i also knew that for me, writing could not continue as a group sport and reading a poem with my body as poets did at the writers' conference in Cuba was also out of the question.
the joy was in writing, in finding ingredients for a story and sitting in front of a blank screen or page to connect the dots and mix the ingredients. in some groups, people wanted to compete or focus on superficial things to avoid going deeper - the mundane becomes a comfort.

lectures are beautiful to me still. a person speaking about some nature of the world that makes him or her wildly excited about life: medieval paintings, Hip Hop, etc.
the subject not being as relevant as the speakers' love for some ideas

The reality show world in which we find ourselves inspires people to seek fame and even if a person chose a life of asceticism, they would want their piety celebrated and televised.

i speak my words as i have always done wherever i may find myself - with you, with an audience, alone

fame and seeking it has got to be some contagious form of insanity that once acquired would cure the sufferer of their desire for fame.

that said, i realize the time has come for a new intellectual adventure and this is one of those things Puerto Ricans do: we seek philosophical and intellectual adventures.

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