Description
Book SynopsisJosé David Saldívar offers a critical examination of Junot Díaz, showing how his influences converged in his fiction and how his work radically changed the course of US Latinx literature and created a new way of viewing the decolonial world.
Trade Review"This is an engaging, important contribution to understanding of Junot Díaz’s work and life. Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers." -- A. A. Edwards * Choice *
Table of ContentsPreface xi
Acknowledgments xix
Introduction 1
1. “Wrestling with J. R. R. Tolkien’s
Lord of the Rings”: How Junot Díaz Thinks About Coloniality, Power, and the Speculative Genres 27
Part I. Junot Díaz’s MFA Program Era at Cornell University and Beyond
2. Díaz’s Planet MFA: “Negocios” 47
3. Díaz’s Planet POC (People of Color):
Drown 73
Part II. Understanding Imaginary Transference and the Colonial Difference
4. Becoming Oscar “Oscar Wao” 99
Part III. A Legacy In-formation
5. Junot Díaz’s Search for Decolonial Love 151
Conclusion and Coda: “Monstro” and
Islandborn 179
Notes 191
Bibliography 225
Index 239
