Woman in Front of the Sun by Judith Ortiz Cofer
"Woman in Front of the Sun" by Judith Ortiz Cofer is a rich collection of essays and poetry that explores the intricacies of the writing process and the profound influence of memory on storytelling. Cofer, who navigates her identity between Puerto Rico and Paterson, New Jersey, reflects on the complexities of cultural intersection and generational experiences in her life. The work highlights her passion for language and its emotional resonance, revealing how memories shape narratives. Cofer emphasizes the discipline required for writers to carve out time for their craft, asserting that the urgency to express oneself is a driving force that transcends everyday challenges. Her storytelling is characterized by an acute attention to detail and the authentic voices of her characters, illustrating her belief in the power of listening and observation. This intermingling of essays and poetry in her writing creates a unique narrative structure that embodies her vision of literature. Overall, "Woman in Front of the Sun" serves as both a personal memoir and a broader commentary on the art of writing, inviting readers to appreciate the intricate tapestry of language and life experiences.
Woman in Front of the Sun by Judith Ortiz Cofer
Excerpted from an article in Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition
First published: 2000
Type of work: Essays and poetry
The Work
In this potpourri of essays and poetry, Ortiz Cofer reveals what it means to be a writer. It is obvious from her exquisite use of language that she is intoxicated with the wonder of words and with their emotive potential. She is also intrigued by the role memory plays in writing. Writers drift mentally through the full accumulation of experience and pluck from it the elements from which they construct stories.
For Ortiz Cofer, this revisiting of memory involved two distinct cultures, three or more generations, and the equilibrium that she was forced to reach as she moved from her childhood in Puerto Rico to her childhood in Paterson, New Jersey. Hers was not a single adjustment. She and her family left Paterson and returned to Puerto Rico whenever her father was at sea for an extended period, then returned when he returned.
Ortiz Cofer also delves into her later life when, married to an Anglo and raising a daughter, she went to school in quest of two degrees and held various jobs—all of this while she continued to write. For Ortiz Cofer, the excuse “I cannot find time to write” does not hold up. Writers always find time to write because they have something that desperately needs saying; not to say it is the greatest hardship any writer can endure.
Born into a family that loved telling cuentos (stories), Ortiz Cofer began at an early age to construct her own realities through the magic of words. Her story “The Woman Who Slept with One Eye Open,” which resulted in her collaboration with Marilyn Kallet titled Sleeping with One Eye Open: Women Writers and the Art of Survival (1999), reveals the measures that a would-be writer must take to avoid being sidetracked by other responsibilities. In essence, what she talks about in many of the essays in this book is time management, a concept drawn more from the vocabularies of efficiency experts than from the vocabularies of writing instructors.
Both by her advice and by her example, Ortiz Cofer emphasizes the importance of listening, of absorbing not only what people say but also how they say it, and of paying close attention to the small details that create believable worlds for readers. Her own cadences are those of natural speech. She adjusts them from character to character so that much of her characterization evolves from how people say what they say. She also builds atmospheres alive with details that shape them into credible realities.
In this book, as in several of her other publications, the author intermixes genres, using in this case both essays and poems. By doing this, she creates a microcosm that communicates the basic nature of what writing means to her. She does not chalk off some areas as prose, some as poetry. She combines them because she sees genres both as separate entities and as parts of a larger, all-important entity.
Bibliography
Bruce-Novoa, Juan. “Judith Ortiz Cofer’s Rituals of Movement.” The Americas Review 19 (Winter, 1991): 88-99.
Davis, Rocio G. “Metanarrative in Ethnic Autobiography for Children: Laurence Yep’s The Garden and Judith Ortiz Cofer’s Silent Dancing.” MELUS 27 (Summer, 2002): 139-158.
Faymonville, Carmen. “New Transnational Identities in Judith Ortiz Cofer’s Autobiographical Fiction.” MELUS 26 (Summer, 2001): 129-160.
Kallet, Marilyn. “The Art of Not Forgetting: An Interview with Judith Ortiz Cofer.” Prairie Schooner 68 (Winter, 1994): 68-76.
Ocasio, Rafael. “The Infinite Variety of Puerto Rican Reality: An Interview with Judith Ortiz Cofer.” Callaloo 17 (Summer, 1994): 730-743.
Ocasio, Rafael. “Puerto Rican Literature in Georgia? An Interview with Judith Ortiz Cofer.” Kenyon Review 14 (Fall, 1992): 56-61.
Wilhelmus, Tom. “Various Pairs.” Hudson Review 43 (Spring, 1990): 151-152.