The Stories We Tell Each Other

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Written By Open Plaza

Stephen Adubato talks to Angie Cruz about the theological themes and imagery in her novel Dominicana

A wedding in Washington Heights, New York City, 1971. Photo: Winston Vargas

A wedding in Washington Heights, New York City, 1971. Photo: Winston Vargas

 

Educator Stephen Adubato talks to Angie Cruz about the Catholic themes and imagery present in her novel Dominicana (Flatiron Books, 2019), recently published in Spanish (trans. Kianny Antigua; Editorial Siete Cuentos, 2021). The discussion also touches on how the migration story of Cruz’s mother served as inspiration for the main character Ana Canción. Adubato and Cruz explore how understanding inherited generational trauma can help us heal, and how media frames our view of the world, including visions of ourselves.

“When people speak about why we need more books being published by people of color, why we need more movies made by people of color,” says Cruz, “it's really because storytelling, narrative — even the stories we tell each other — really expand the possibility of how we can move in the world.”

 
 
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Stephen Adubato

Stephen G. Adubato studied Spanish Literature and Religious Studies at Fordham University and went on to pursue graduate work in Moral Theology at Seton Hall. Since then, he has taught philosophy and theology at both the secondary and university levels. He is currently spending a year working as a Journalism Fellow for Compact Magazine through the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. He is a contributing writer for the National Catholic Reporter and has published with over forty other publications, including Newsweek, The New York Daily News, The Tablet, America: The Jesuit Review, Nylon, and The Hedgehog Review. He also hosts the Cracks in Postmodernity blog and podcast. You can follow him on Twitter @stephengadubato.

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Angie Cruz

Angie Cruz is a novelist and editor. Her novel Dominicana is the inaugural book pick for GMA book club and chosen as the 2019/2020 Wordup Uptown Reads. It was shortlisted for The Women’s Prize, longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction, The Aspen Words Literary Prize, a RUSA Notable book, and the winner of the ALA/YALSA Alex Award in fiction. Cruz is the author of two other novels, Soledad and Let It Rain Coffee, and is the recipient of numerous fellowships and residencies, including the Lighthouse Fellowship, Siena Art Institute, and the CUNY Dominican Studies Institute Fellowship. She has published shorter works in The Paris Review, VQR, Callaloo, Gulf Coast, and other journals. She is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of the award-winning literary journal Aster(ix). Cruz is an Associate professor at University of Pittsburgh, where she teaches in the MFA program and splits her time between Pittsburgh. New York, and Turin.

 
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