Monday, August 24, 1998
‘Chicana Falsa’ writer discovers ups, downs of being true to
‘ethnic’ label
AUTHOR: UCLA alum Serros learns of book business, cultural
stereotypes while moving into national spotlight
By Cheryl Klein
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Author Michele Serros doesn’t think of herself as a "Chicana
falsa" – in fact, she doesn’t believe there is such a thing. But
her poems and short stories reflect a comfort with herself that
might have been tough for alter ego Michael Hill to project.
Decades before Serros wrote "Chicana Falsa and Other Stories of
Death, Identity and Oxnard," she took a cue from the personae that
dominated the publishing world and donned a suitably WASP-y
pseudonym.
"My sister told me to change Michele to Michael. Serros means
hills, so she suggested Hill," Serros recalled. "It took a long
road until I finally got to that place where I knew writers weren’t
always East Coast males writing about life in the skyscrapers."
Namely, it took the death of her mother (who lacked the
confidence to pursue her own artistic inclinations) and a Mexican
American literature class at Santa Monica College, which first
attracted her with its UC transferability.
"I thought, ‘Wow, how many books can we possibly read? What,
three books? It’ll be a piece of cake,’" said the UCLA alum,
munching a sandwich in the shade of a Kerckhoff patio umbrella.
But after eyeing a syllabus packed with Spanish names, Serros
began to recraft her definition of a writer to include herself.
Collecting her semi-autobiographical poems and vignettes into a
reader-friendly 79 pages, she attracted the attention of the tiny
Lalo Press in 1994.
At first, Serros said, "It only went as far as my Honda could
take it." Peddling from the back of her trunk, she combed Los
Angeles’ literary venues. The paperback’s lack of an Industry
Standard Book Number (ISBN) deterred many booksellers, but Serros
credits Westwood’s Sisterhood Bookstore with having faith in
her.
"They ordered 15 copies which, as a beginning writer, is like
‘Wow!’ I remember the owner calling me at home and saying, ‘I think
it’s really good what you’re doing,’" Serros said.
She hadn’t even completed her degree in Chicana/o studies when
professors began using "Chicana Falsa" in classrooms at UCLA –
fellow students would corner the embarrassed author in the library
to mine information for book reports.
Serros also encountered the all-too-common catch-22 of
biculturalism; whereas she once worried her Mexican American
background would discourage publishers, she now heard gripes that
her writing wasn’t "ethnic" enough.
"It didn’t capture that quote-unquote ‘essence’ of Chicano lit.
I’m fourth-generation Mexican. (My book has) references that aren’t
familiar to them," Serros said of her critics. "There’s a lot of
pop culture references. They might see it as very
white-washed."
True, "The Price is Right," KFC, Harlequin romance novels, and
customized black and pink Vans tennis shoes get cameos alongside
chicharrones and the occasional brush with gangster classmates. And
the back cover features a giddy snapshot of a preteen Serros
modeling a red, white and blue cardboard hat.
"I remember someone saying, ‘You didn’t celebrate the Fourth of
July, did you?’ Like it was such a white thing. And I’m like,
‘Yeah, we did. We bought fireworks. They’re illegal, but …’"
The humorous conclusion is signature Serros. Conducting poetry
workshops in schools and prisons has kept her alert to the politics
of injustice, but she has found page-bound irony a more effective
weapon than other traditional forms of activism.
"When people start yelling, I stop listening," Serros said.
Instead she pens just-indirect-enough commentaries such as
"Attention Shoppers," which details racism in the Ralph’s frozen
foods aisle. The short story has two women incite a sort of
vegetarian Boston tea party, protesting the stereotypical subtext
of bags labeled "Latino Style Vegetables," "Oriental Style
Vegetables," "Italian Style," and so on.
The four years since "Chicana Falsa’s" first edition have
endowed Serros with plenty more material. Recently purchased by
Riverhead Books, the collection now boasts a bright new cover and
sought-after ISBN. Serros still considers herself something of an
outsider in the world of literary salons and private readings, but
her grounded attitude enables her to tinge such anecdotes with
trademark wit and insight.
"I’ll go to a lot of these events because I’ll be like, ‘Is
there going to be food?’" Serros confessed with a laugh. She also
laughed at the nonsensical hierarchy of paper vs. hard cover. "On
the East Coast there was a party and I’m like, ‘Oh, can I go?’ And
they’re like, ‘Michele, you’re paperback.’"
At one party, however, she was the featured guest and felt a
little awkward when a high society Montecito resident introduced
her essentially as a quaint, exotic discovery. Other guests
followed suit.
"They had this buffet and I reached for a corn chip and this one
man said, ‘Oh, didn’t get your fill of tortillas this week, did
you?’ I’m like, ‘Do you know me (well enough) to be joking like
that with me?’ Here they were, this supposedly very liberal group,
so into ethnic literature," Serros said.
She can find it funny because she may give them the vegetable
treatment in her upcoming collection of short stories, tentatively
titled "How to be a Chicano Role Model." Like "Chicana Falsa," the
name is intentionally loaded.
Serros tries to encourage other young writers, just as UCLA
professors Vilma Ortiz, Sonia Saldivar-Hull and David Wong Louie
influenced her. But she’s relieved when others are less than
impressed with her recent foray into fame and prestige.
"I came back from this tour in New York, staying in these five
star hotels. I had a private driver, a Lincoln Town Car. I came
back telling my friends, thinking they would be excited. But
they’re like, ‘Don’t let that get to your head. That’s not real
life,’" Serros said.
The same goes for her family. "They’re more interested in how’s
my garden doing or how’s my new marriage (to musician Gene
Trautmann)," she said. "Or how’s my cat."
And perhaps in a final testament to pop culture, keeping it real
and getting the most out of her memories, Serros makes sure to snag
a snow globe wherever she goes.
Her favorite features a little plastic outline of New York’s
Guggenheim Museum. She has more snow-covered Eiffel Towers than she
knows what to do with, and now she’s on a mission to find the
Berlin Wall in a bubble.
It is a fitting hobby for someone whose biggest talent is
observing the world.
BOOK: "Chicana Falsa and Other Stories of Death, Identity and
Oxnard" by Michele Serros is available at BookZone.Riverhead
Books
Michele Serros is the auther of "Chicana falsa, a collection of
short storis and peoms.