Francisco Goldman Presents New Novel to Trin Community

On Friday, April 29,Trinity's Allan K. Smith Professor of English Language and Literature, Francisco Goldman, gave a reading of his newest novel, "Say Her Name." Goldman spoke facing a crowd too large for the (according to my count) sixty chairs in the room. He read at around 7:30 p.m., the sun was on its way down, and Friday's dusk was humid and warm, so the room felt at first a little stuffy, almost too hot, and I worried that I would not be able to pay close attention. 

 

About halfway through Writer-in-Residence Professor Lucy Ferris' introduction, I forgot about the heat and my sweaty discomfort. Ferris knew the subject of "Say Her Name"—Aura Estrada, Goldman's deceased wife. In her introduction she praised Aura's and Goldman's qualities of friendliness, personal warmth, and intelligence; and with sadness she recounted for us her discovery of Aura's tragic death. Following Ferris' intro, Goldman began his reading by saying that hers was one of the nicest he'd heard on his extensive book tour.

 

Ferris, and probably every member of the 60-plus sized crowd, is one of Goldman's friends. If you have taken a class with him, have met him, or are one of his colleagues, you are his friend, not just his student or professional acquaintance. And when a friend like Goldman talks openly with you about a devastating experience, you listen, however hot or cold or otherwise uncomfortable the room's atmosphere may be.

 

The chapter he read consisted of a series of scenes in which Goldman thought he had lost Aura. Once she disappeared in a broken-down elevator; another time he lost her in an airport; and once in New York he lost track of her in a complex network of city subway confusion. These scenes felt like metaphors for what happened on what Goldman called "that final day"—but those moments of temporary absence ended with relief, whereas the "final day" brought none.

 

"Say Her Name" is, in a certain way, Goldman's way to find the relief not offered by the event that took his wife's life. Goldman told us that when writer Joan Didion heard about Aura's death she told him, in an email, "Read lots of poetry, and you're going to go a little mad." The chapter he read implied that Goldman took her advice, and had at least momentarily fulfilled her prediction. I have not yet read the entire novel, but the chapter he read, with images like "whirling litter like frozen bats" and its metaphorical treatment of death, suggests that this novel is a kind of poetic transformation of madness and love. Or an expression that was born out of madness—the despair of losing a cherished love—and one which ends in love, or the memorialization of Aura's life, a story to share with readers, a way to keep a loved one alive in the hearts and minds of readers and the book's writer.

 

When asked about the difference between fiction and nonfiction, or "memoir" and "novel," Goldman told us that he rejected the idea that "memoirs" can ever (or should ever) be nonfictional. For him, fiction helps writers and readers discern the emotional essence of a real, lived experience. "Say Her Name" is fiction, but this does not mean it isn't true. The truth is not in the minor, factual details. Instead, the truth is in the emotions expressed—the madness, despair, and love. At this particular reading, I think all audience members would agree that we felt at least a fraction of what Goldman felt for Aura—both his sadness at her loss, and his love for who she was before an end that came too soon.