Joseph F. Delgado

What if they gave a plague and only men came? A mysterious plague hits the southeastern United States. No one can determine its origin, and no cure is available. Only men experience symptoms: severe hypothermia, frostbite, blurred vision, and confusion. As epidemiologists treat the afflicted and public-health researchers investigate the cause, an astonishing fact emerges about the victims of the illness. The malady has a social impact that nobody could have foreseen. Joseph F. Delgado is the author of the novels OUR FATHER TAKES A BRIDE and THE TANGO OF THE SHIPWRECK, as well as the short-story collections MAN OF HIS DREAMS and LIVING IN THE RAW WIND. His nonfiction includes METAPHOR AND CHANGE and THE EVIL BANALITY OF RACISM. His drama CRUSHED AT THE CROSSING was a finalist in the 2019 Downtown Urban Arts Festival in New York.

Una plaga misteriosa azota la parte sureste de los Estados Unidos. Nadie puede determinar su origen y no hay cura. Solamente hay s ntomas: ceguera, sordera, debilidad del lado izquierdo del cuerpo, hipotermia aguda, congelaci n. Solamente se ven afectados los hombres de la regi n. Al estudiar el fen meno epidemi logos y cient ficos, surge un dato cuyo alcance social y econ mico ser permanente y revolucionario.Joseph F. Delgado (1950, Puerto Rico) es el autor de novelas como: EL CURA SE NOS CASA, LAMENTOS BORINCANOS y LAS FRONTERAS DEL DESEO. Sus colecciones de cuentos incluyen: LAS ESTRELLAS INCLINAN, CON TANTA SINCERIDAD y CAUTIVERIO. Entre sus libros de ensayo se encuentran: JALDA ARRIBA, JALDA ABAJO, LA FANTAS A RET RICA DEL ELA y EL ENIMA DEL RACISMO. Entre sus obras premiadas de teatro est HURAC N AFUERA, HURAC N ADENTRO, TRAGICOMEDIA NEGRA. Adem s, escribe ficci n y ensayo en ingl s e italiano. Ha sido catedr tico de literatura y ling stica en las universidades de Minnesota y Puerto Rico.

THE EVIL BANALITY OF RACISM: Puerto Rico Before and After Tapia y Rivera's La cuarterona examines the social tapestry that has resulted from African slavery in Puerto Rico and Cuba since the sixteenth century. Its starting point is the rhetorical space created by abolitionist drama La cuarterona (The Quadroon), by Puerto Rican playrwright Alejandro Tapia y Rivera (1826-1882). The essay is a deep analysis of racist attitudes, documented objectively as well as from the author's own experience, and the heritage of internalized prejudice it produces in the object of racial bias that persists into the twenty-first century equally, if subtly, in the Republic of Cuba, among the Cuban exile diaspora and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, despite affirmations to the contrary. The analysis surveys the use of the quadroon as stock character in American and Spanish American literature to evaluate the contribution Tapia y Rivera made to the subject of racial interaction.

A one-act drama about immigrants and shattered American dreams. An east African taxi cab driver in 2018 in an American city takes a passenger, a Puerto Rican Republican, to a secluded location to clarify points the passenger raised in a complaint he lodged against the driver with the taxi company. During their exchange they find commonalities among them, but not enough to prevent the unfortunate outcome of the meeting. "Illuminating and topical... Reminds me of how far we have fallen from the idea of America." --Jon Tuttle, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, author of DRIFT and THE HAMMERSTONE.

A story about immigrants and shattered American dreams. An east African taxi cab driver in 2018 in an American city takes a passenger, a Puerto Rican Republican, to a secluded location to clarify points the passenger raised in a complaint he lodged against the driver with the taxi company. During their exchange they find commonalities among them, but not enough to prevent the unfortunate outcome of the meeting.

In this comedy full of references to current LGBTQ issues, six mature gay men meet on three separate occasions in the Edmund White Cultural Center to plan social events at their gay retirement community, Rainbow Estates. Hostilies arise unexpectedly while members bring up not just their past experiences but also their participation in incidents in gay history. At the end they find out that their idol, the deceased former chairman of their group whose undying presence is the thread that unites them in their endeavors, led a much different life from the one they all took for granted.

En esta novela corta de tono humor stico, ni Alberto ni Mart n pueden hallar la manera de confesarse, mucho menos desatisfacer, su deseo el uno por el otro. En su lugar juegan al gato y el rat n en los confines de una sociedad machoc ntrica en la que los hombres heterosexuales pueden insinuar el inter s por su propio sexo siempre y cuando lo hagan en greupo y en supuesta broma. Habr n de quedarse sus ansias en solamente eso o llegar n a la larga a cruzar las fronteras que los separan, camino a un amor que se reh sa a llegarles?

El autor presenta la cr nica de los primeros 17 a os de su vida como joven gay en un pueblo peque o al sureste de Puerto Rico. Delgado analiza el contexto social y cultural en el que el activo puede realizar actos homosexuales sin desarrollar una identidad gay mientras se desprecia y se convierte al pasivo en blanco de escarnio y burla. Sobre la versi n inglesa, Coming of queer age in Puerto Rico, the curse of memory: "La etnograf a del hostigamiento... No creo que tengamos en Puerto Rico un libro como ste... Este es un libro importante o, mejor, es un libro que importa." --Efra n Barradas, 80 Grados "Lo cuenta como es. Para cualquiera que haya elegido hacerse miembro de la di spora gay puertorrique a, sta es una lectura dolorosa... Una autobiograf a... diferente a todas las dem s..." --Alfredo Villanueva, amazon.com

The three stories in his collection address the existential perils of living a lie by hiding from others the core of our being or lack a sense of loyalty and commitment. One involves a transvestite who evinces a tendency toward self-hatred, a man who takes advantage of others and aspires to belong to a social state that eludes him, and a New Yorker who lives in a double closet of his own making.

COMING OF QUEER AGE IN PUERTO RICO: The Curse of Memory. The author chronicles the first seventten years of his life in a small town in Puerto Rico. Together with accounts of a childhood riddled with physical and verbal abuse Joseph F. Delgado analyzes the social macho-centric context in Latin America that makes it acceptable for men young and mature to have sex with boys without developing a homosexual identity and objectify passive sexual partners for contempt and ridicule. The author further examines how in Puerto Rico inflexible, religion-based conventions prevail in the debate on LGTBQ rights and political participation.