Chang Diaz Quotes

It's never the changes we want that change everything.

I couldn't help it. I tried to keep it down but it just flooded through all my quiet spaces. It was a message more than a feeling, a message that tolled like a bell: change, change, change.

...her other paramour was a student at the UASD -- one of those City College types who's been in school eleven years and is always five credits shy of a degree. Students today don't mean na; but in Latin America whipped into a frenzy by the fall of Arbenz, by the stoning of Nixon, by the Guerillas of the Sierra Madre, by the endless cynical maneuverings of the Yankee Pig Dogs -- in a Latin America already a year and a half into the Decade of Guerilla -- a student was something else altogether, an agent for change, a quantum string in the staid Newtonian universe. Such a student was Arquimedes. He also listened to the shortwave, but not for Dodgers scores; what he risked his life for was the news leaking out of Havana, news of the future. Arquemides was, therefore, a student, the son of a Zapatero and a midwife, a tirapiedra and a quemagoma for life. Being a student wasn't a joke, not with Trujillo and Johnny Abbes scooping up everybody following the foiled Cuban Invasion of 1959.

1. Each husband’s section opens with an illustrative moniker (for example, “Poor Ernie Diaz,” “Goddamn Don Adler,” “Agreeable Robert Jamison”). Discuss the meaning and significance of some of these descriptions. How do they set the tone for the section that follows? Did you read these characterizations as coming from Evelyn, Monique, an omniscient narrator, or someone else? 2. Of the seven husbands, who was your favorite, and why? Who surprised you the most? 3. Monique notes that hearing Evelyn Hugo’s life story has inspired her to carry herself differently than she would have before. In what ways does Monique grow over the course of the novel? Discuss whether Evelyn also changes by the end of her time with Monique, and if so, what spurs this evolution. 4. On page 147, Monique says, "I have to 'Evelyn Hugo' Evelyn Hugo." What does it mean to "Evelyn Hugo"? Can you think of a time when you might be tempted to "Evelyn Hugo"? 5. Did you trust Evelyn to be a reliable narrator as you were reading? Why, or why not? Did your opinion on this change at all by the conclusion, and if so, why? 6. What role do the news, tabloid, and blog articles interspersed throughout the book serve in the narrative? What, if anything, do we learn about Evelyn’s relationship to the outside world from them? 7. At several points in the novel, such as pages 82–83 and 175–82, Evelyn tells her story through the second person, “you.” How does this kind of narration affect the reading experience? Why do you think she chooses these memories to recount in this way? 8. How do you think Evelyn’s understanding and awareness of sexuality were shaped by her relationship with Billy—the boy who works at the five-and-dime store? How does her sensibility evolve from this initial encounter? As she grows older, to what extent is Evelyn’s attitude toward sex is influenced by those around her? 9. On page 54, Evelyn uses the saying “all’s well that ends well” as part of her explanation for not regretting her actions. Do you think Evelyn truly believes this? Using examples from later in her life, discuss why or why not. How do you think this idea relates to the similar but more negatively associated phrase “the ends justify the means”?

As I read on, however, the prose itself rather than the content became the center of my attention. It was unlike the books they had made me read at school and had nothing to do with the mysteries I used to check out of the library. Later, when I finally went to college, I would be able to trace Vanner’s literary influences and consider his novel from a formal point of view (even if he was never assigned reading for any of the courses I took, since his work was out of print and already quite unavailable). Yet back then I had never experienced anything like that language. And it spoke to me. It was my first time reading something that existed in a vague space between the intellectual and the emotional. Since that moment I have identified that ambiguous territory as the exclusive domain of literature. I also understood at some point that this ambiguity could only work in conjunction with extreme discipline—the calm precision of Vanner’s sentences, his unfussy vocabulary, his reluctance to deploy the rhetorical devices we identify with “artistic prose” while still retaining a distinctive style. Lucidity, he seems to suggest, is the best hiding place for deeper meaning—much like a transparent thing stacked in between others. My literary taste has changed since then, and Bonds has been displaced by other books. But Vanner gave me my first glimpse of that elusive region between reason and feeling and made me want to chart it in my own writing.

I’m sorry,' [Marty] said unexpectedly. “Huh?” “That we never got to perform that duet together. Don’t you remember? For the Spring Concert?” “Oh, yeah. What was that song we were going to sing?” I asked. She placed her right hand on her hip and mock-pouted at me. “James Garraty, don’t tell me you forgot.” I gave her an impish who, me look. When she smiled, I said in a more serious tone: “‘Somewhere,’ from West Side Story.” I hummed the song’s first measure; it sounded a half-octave off key. Marty frowned. “You haven’t practiced lately,” she said disapprovingly. “No, I haven’t,” I said, and as I said it waves of melancholy washed over me like a cold dark tide. Marty saw my expression change; she walked up to me and placed her arm around my shoulder comfortingly. “I know,” she said softly, “how much you were looking forward to it, Jim. I was looking forward to singing that duet with you, too.” “Really?” I asked. “Really. You’re a terrific singer. Who wouldn’t want to sing a duet with you?” “I bet,” I said, “you say that to all the boys.” She laughed. My heart jumped as it usually did when she laughed. A thought clicked in my brain: What was it I’d written just a while ago? You are the one person who has the ability to brighten up a sour day. You have always managed to make me return a smile to someone else.

The other change to the house consisted in converting one of their drawing rooms into a small concert hall. Almost by chance, Helen and Benjamin had discovered that they rather enjoyed concerts. What had started as a compromise—music performances, they learned, were the perfect way for them to be seen “out” without having to engage in inane conversations to fill uncomfortable gaps—grew into a passion. As both developed a taste for chamber music, they translated this principle to their own relationship. They organized private recitals at their home, and on these occasions, they could be together, in silence, sharing emotions for which they were not responsible and which did not refer directly to the two of them. Precisely because they were so controlled and mediated, these were Benjamin and Helen’s most intimate moments.

Darlene rolls her eyes – again – like I’m the stupid one. White-skinned. No accent. Good in school. I’m not her idea of a Latina at all. I could point out that Cameron Diaz is Latina, too, but why bother? It won’t change Darlene’s mind.

My gut sense is that if you’re not experiencing resistance, then you probably aren’t leading change.

Leaders must regularly reassess what’s working as a result of the changes, what’s not working, what still needs attention, and how people are responding to the changes. The vision doesn’t end with implementation; it ends with saturation and acceptance.

All changes, even the most longed for, bring their own nostalgia, for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another

Before I could even think of a suitable retort – hopefully a witty one – I saw, out of the corner of my eye, someone walking with deliberate purpose from the cafeteria entrance toward our table. I turned my head in that direction, and when I recognized who this someone was, my heart leaped to my throat, and I almost forgot to breathe. Speaking of the Devil, I thought, as I beheld the familiar presence of Martina Elizabeth Reynaud, considered by many to be one of the prettiest girls in the Class of 1983. Even dressed as she was – denim jeans and a matching jacket, with a plaid button-down blouse, scuffed girls’ Keds sneakers, and her long chestnut hair pulled up into a simple ponytail that bobbed up and down when she walked – Marty was simply, heart-achingly gorgeous. Wherever and whenever she was in a room – even a busy cafeteria – she almost always got looks of admiration and/or envy from her fellow students. Most of the guys in our school wanted to be with her, while many of the girls wanted to be like her. She was tall, lithe, and naturally sexy; these physical attributes drew a lot of attention to her. Most guys, including me, paid particular attention to them, mainly on the rare occasions when she wore her athletic shorts and T-shirt on the way to change in the girls' locker room after her fourth-period PE class. She was also one of the nicest, sweetest people who went to South Miami. She almost always had a pleasant smile or a cheery 'Hello, there!' – especially early in the morning, when most of us were either grumpy or still groggy from waking up early to get to school.

Before I could even think of a suitable retort – hopefully a witty one – I saw, out of the corner of my eye, someone walking with deliberate purpose from the cafeteria entrance toward our table. I turned my head in that direction, and when I recognized who this someone was, my heart leaped to my throat, and I almost forgot to breathe. Speaking of the Devil, I thought, as I beheld the familiar presence of Martina Elizabeth Reynaud, considered by many to be one of the prettiest girls in the Class of 1983. Even dressed as she was – denim jeans and a matching jacket, with a plaid button-down blouse, scuffed girls’ Keds sneakers, and her long chestnut hair pulled up into a simple ponytail that bobbed up and down when she walked – Marty was simply, heart-achingly gorgeous. Wherever and whenever she was in a room – even a busy cafeteria – she almost always got looks of admiration and/or envy from her fellow students. Most of the guys in our school wanted to be with her, while many of the girls wanted to be like her. She was tall, lithe, and naturally sexy; these physical attributes drew a lot of attention to her. Most guys, including me, paid particular attention to them, mainly on the rare occasions when she wore her athletic shorts and T-shirt on the way to change in the girls' locker room after her fourth-period PE class. She was also one of the nicest, sweetest people who went to South Miami. She almost always had a pleasant smile or a cheery 'Hello, there!' – especially early in the morning, when most of us were either grumpy or still groggy from waking up early to get to school.

Somewhere, the radio was playing—WCRB again, soft classical. I didn’t register it at first. I was too busy putting my keys down, toeing off my shoes, breathing into the hush. But then the melody changed. Piano. Slow. Familiar. It was Adagio cantabile. Not Joel’s version, with its doo-wop backbone and lovesick harmonies. Beethoven’s. The real thing.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the heavy door to the chorus room creaked open. We all looked to see who was entering the room. It was a girl. She was of average height, clad in new 'first day of the semester' jeans, a white blouse that peeked out from under a navy-blue jacket, and clean new Keds girls’ sneakers. Her chestnut-colored hair was pulled up into a ponytail, and her cheeks were rosy against her pale skin, partly because it was cold outside, partly because she thought she was interrupting the class. 'Can I help you?' Mrs. Quincy asked. The girl hesitated at the door, clutching her backpack tightly. She looked at Mrs. Quincy nervously and fumbled for a piece of paper in her pocket. She walked up to the teacher, holding out the class schedule change form with both hope and a bit of fear. She bit her lip and waited for Mrs. Quincy’s reaction, hoping she wouldn’t be turned away or scolded.

It was a country of slavery, where human beings were sold like cattle, and its native peoples, the Yaquis, the Papagos, the Tomasachics, exterminated through deportation, or reduced to worse than peonage, their lands in thrall or the hands of foreigners. And in Oaxaca lay the terrible Valle Nacional where Juan himself, a bona-fide slave aged seven, had seen an older brother beaten to death, and another, bought for forty-five pesos, starved to death in seven months, because it was cheaper this should happen, and the slave-holder buy another slave, than simply have one slave better fed merely worked to death in a year. All this spelt Porfirio Diaz: rurales everywhere, jefes políticos, and murder, the extirpation of liberal political institutions, the army an engine of massacre, an instrument of exile. Juan knew this, having suffered it; and more. For later in the revolution, his mother was murdered. And later still Juan himself killed his father, who had fought with Huerta, but turned “traitor. Ah, guilt and sorrow had dogged Juan's footsteps too, for he was not a Catholic who could rise refreshed from the cold bath of confession. Yet the banality stood: that the past was irrevocably past. And conscience had been given man to regret it only in so far as that might change the future. For man, every man, Juan seemed to be telling him, even as Mexico, must ceaselessly struggle upward. What was life but a warfare and a stranger's sojourn? Revolution rages too in the tierra caliente of each human soul. No peace but that must pay full toll to hell.

So, Jim, are you going to sing a solo at the Christmas concert?" Bruce Holtzman whispered to me as we sat in our usual seats in the back of the crescent-shaped dais, strategically placed between the basses and the tenors. “I know you’ve been saying you don’t want to, but you still have a few days to practice – if you change your mind, that is.” “I don’t think so,” I muttered back as quietly and firmly as possible. Class was still in session, and even though Mrs. Quincy was easygoing and not as strict as some of the other teachers at South Miami High School, she still expected us to focus on learning our songs for the concert and behaving like mature young adults. Not like “a bunch of undisciplined hooligans,” as she once put it. “But it’s an easy way to get extra credit,” Bruce persisted. “I don’t get it. You’ve been a Singing Cobra for what? Nearly a year now? And we only get a few chances to shine per semester, you know.” “Bruce,” I said, trying to keep my voice low and calm so as not to draw attention. “I don’t mind singing in a group, as part of a larger unit. Singing a solo? That’s another story altogether.” “Why? What’s the difference?” “I don’t know,” I confessed. “Safety in numbers, maybe? I’m perfectly happy to sing the songs in the program and let others who want to sing a solo strut their stuff. I get nauseous at the thought of going on stage and singing all by myself in front of everyone in the auditorium.” “Why, Jim,” Bruce exclaimed with a surprised, puzzled tone, “don’t tell me you still get stage fright!” “Hey,” I snapped, “pipe down, man. Do you want us to get in trouble with Mrs. Quincy? I’m not doing a solo. End of story.” “Okay, okay,” Bruce said in a placating tone. “But that extra credit sure will look good on your transcripts come next year. Especially if you want to get a scholarship.