This week on The Write Question, Lauren speaks with Eloisa Amezcua, poet and author of Fighting Is Like a Wife (Coffee House Press), a collection of visual, or concrete, poetry that spotlights the love story of two-time world boxing champion “Schoolboy” Bobby Chacon and his first wife, Valorie Ginn—a love story that ends in more than one tragedy. Writing through multiple perspectives and in many different forms, in Fighting Is Like a Wife, Eloisa writes about a couple (high school sweethearts!) who punched “holes through each other [and called] it love.” Listeners and readers, a spoiler alert and a note of caution: This story and this conversation includes mention of suicide; please take note and take care.
About Eloisa:
Eloisa Amezcua is from Arizona. She is the author of From the Inside Quietly (2018) and Fighting Is Like a Wife (2022). A MacDowell fellow, Eloisa has published poems and translations in the New York Times Magazine, Poetry Magazine, Kenyon Review, Gulf Coast, the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day series, and elsewhere.
Eloisa Amezcua recommends:
This episode of the Bad Hook podcast; and this one, too!
The Big Smoke by Adrian Matejka (Penguin Poets; Penguin Random House)
Apocalyptic Swing by Gabrielle Calvocoressi (Persea Books)
OLIO and Leadbelly by Tyehimba Jess (Wave Books)
The End of the Alphabet by Claudia Rankine (Grove Press)
Barbie Chang by Victoria Chang (Copper Canyon Press)
Lauren Korn recommends:
From the Inside Quietly (Split Lip Press) and Fighting Is Like a Wife (Coffee House Press) by Eloisa Amezcua
This conversation between Eloisa Amezcua and Lisa Higgs in The Adroit Journal
The Big Smoke by Adrian Matejka (Penguin Poets; Penguin Random House)
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The Write Question team is Lauren Korn, host and co-producer; Peter Hoag, co-producer and editor; and Jake Birch, sound engineer.
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