Hospitable Imaginations with Christopher González

Chris reviews Talking #browntv: Latinas and Latinos on the Screen by Frederick Luis Aldama and William Anthony Nericcio. Listen to why this book is one of the necessary reads in order to better understand how systemic racism affects the Latinx community as represented on screen. 

Chris interrupts the regularly scheduled podcast with a necessary reflection on the killings of members of our Black community such as George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and so many others that have ignited outrage and protests both in the United States and around the world. This, too, has very much to do with storytelling. Chris discusses how now, more than ever, it is imperative that we read stories by and about less privileged identity positions than our own.

In Episode 3 of Hospitable Imaginations, Christopher takes a look at three films that not only open with a bang, but they do so without the use of a single word. Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick, and Gladiator, directed by Ridley Scott, give us a glimpse of how great stories can have impeccable openings with nary a word--and these openings are all-time greats. 

In this episode of Hospitable Imaginations, Christopher continues to explore how timeless story openings work. The openings of One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, and The Color Purple by Alice Walker, reveal a depth of understanding of how the opening lines of a story can establish everything that follows it. And how does the game of chess relate to the ideas behind narrative? 

In this Hospitable Imaginations book review, Christopher discusses the luminous novel by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’, The Mountains Sing, and why it is likely one of the best novels of 2020.