TY - BOOK ID - 80835612 TI - The Cruel Country PY - 2015 SN - 1336095717 9781336095717 9780820347646 0820347647 9780820347639 0820347639 PB - Athens, GA : Baltimore, Md. : University of Georgia Press, Project MUSE, DB - UniCat KW - Cofer, Judith Ortiz, KW - Family. KW - Travel KW - Puerto Rico KW - Social life and customs. KW - Ortiz Cofer, Judith, KW - Mothers and daughters KW - Mothers KW - Grief. KW - Puerto Ricans KW - Transnationalism KW - Authors, American KW - BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs. KW - FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / Death, Grief, Bereavement. KW - SOCIAL SCIENCE / Ethnic Studies / Hispanic American Studies. KW - BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Women. KW - Death. KW - Ethnic identity. KW - Psychological aspects. KW - Trans-nationalism KW - Transnational migration KW - International relations KW - Boricuas KW - Ethnology KW - Mourning KW - Sorrow KW - Bereavement KW - Emotions KW - Loss (Psychology) KW - Moms KW - Parents KW - Women KW - Housewives KW - Motherhood KW - Pregnant women KW - Daughters and mothers KW - Daughters KW - Girls KW - Mother and child UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:80835612 AB - "'I am learning the alchemy of grief--how it must be carefully measured and doled out, inflicted--but I have not yet mastered this art,' writes Judith Ortiz Cofer in The Cruel Country. This richly textured, deeply moving, lyrical memoir centers on Cofer's return to her native Puerto Rico after her mother has been diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer. Cofer's work has always drawn strength from her life's contradictions and dualities, such as the necessities and demands of both English and Spanish, her travels between and within various mainland and island subcultures, and the challenges of being a Latina living in the U.S. South. Interlaced with these far-from-common tensions are dualities we all share: our lives as both sacred and profane, our negotiation of both child and adult roles, our desires to be the person who belongs and also the person who is different. What we discover in The Cruel Country is how much Cofer has heretofore held back in her vivid and compelling writing. This journey to her mother's deathbed has released her to tell the truth within the truth. She arrives at her mother's bedside as a daughter overcome by grief, but she navigates this cruel country as a writer--an acute observer of detail, a relentless and insistent questioner"-- "The Cruel Country is a memoir centered around the author's journey to Puerto Rico after her mother had been diagnosed with late stage lung cancer. The story takes us through Cofer's journey as she sits by the her mother's hospital bed during the last moments of her life, through the grieving process and Catholic funereal rites that follow her mother's death and her return to her life in the U.S. Cofer's writerly talents richly inform this narrative meditation on her family's life in Puerto Rico and the States, her frantic research on cancer, considerations of Catholicism, family, and culture , and much more. The book at the same time is very much a study of cultural differences and the balance that the author must find as a Puerto-Rican American, not wholly part of her mother's culture. We see this come to a head as she communicates with doctors, participates in funeral arrangements and sacraments, and recollects her Anglo husband John's father's death. This very personal story about the author's life will resonate with Cofer's legions of fans including students and those interested in memoir, ethnic and cultural crossings, spirituality, loss, grief, and reconciliation"-- ER -