Ruben Quesada, Ph.D., is an American poet and critic. He was born and raised in
Los Angeles, California.
In 2022, Dr. Quesada published an edited collection of essays, ''Latinx Poetics: Essays on the Art of Poetry'' was be published by University of New Mexico Press. It "explores the ways in which a people's history and language are vital to the development of a poet's imagination and insists that the meaning and value of poetry are necessary to understand the history and future of a people."
His poetry appears in ''
The Best American Poetry
''The Best American Poetry'' series consists of annual poetry anthologies, each containing seventy-five poems.
Background
The series, begun by poet and editor David Lehman in 1988, has a different guest editor every year. Lehman, still the general ...
'' and has earned multiple
Pushcart Prize
The Pushcart Prize is an American literary prize published by Pushcart Press that honors the best "poetry, short fiction, essays or literary whatnot" published in the small presses over the previous year. Magazine and small book press editors are ...
nominations; his writing and criticism appear in ''The New York Times'', ''
Harvard Review
''Harvard Review'' is a biannual literary journal published by Houghton Library at Harvard University.
History
In 1986 Stratis Haviaras, curator of the Woodberry Poetry Room at Harvard University, founded a quarterly periodical called ''Erato'' ...
'', ''
Guernica
Guernica (, ), official name (reflecting the Basque language) Gernika (), is a town in the province of Biscay, in the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country, Spain. The town of Guernica is one part (along with neighbouring Lumo) of the m ...
'', ''
The American Poetry Review
''The American Poetry Review'' (''APR'') is an American poetry magazine printed every other month on tabloid-sized newsprint. It was founded in 1972 by Stephen Berg and Stephen Parker in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The magazine's editor is Elizabet ...
'', ''
TriQuarterly
''TriQuarterly'' is a name shared by an American literary magazine and a series of books, both operating under the aegis of Northwestern University Press. The journal is published twice a year and features fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, liter ...
'', ''
Ploughshares
''Ploughshares'' is an American literary journal established in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, ''Ploughshares'' has been based at Emerson College in Boston. ...
'', ''
Kirkus Reviews'' and ''
Cimarron Review''.
Education
Dr. Quesada earned a
Bachelor of Arts degree in
Creative Writing
Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic, or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character development, and the use of literary ...
at the
University of California, Riverside, a
Master of Fine Arts degree i
Creative Writing and Writing for the Performing Artsat
UC Riverside
The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public land-grant research university in Riverside, California. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The main campus sits on in a suburban dis ...
. In 2012, he then went on to earn a
Doctorate in English (Poetry and
Poetics) at
Texas Tech University.
Career
After receiving a Ph.D. in English, Dr. Quesada moved to Illinois in 2012. Soon after, with the mentorship of founding members from
CantoMundo Poetry,
Macondo Writers, and
Letras Latinas Letras Latinas is the literary initiative at the University of Notre Dame's Institute for Latino Studies (ILS), with an office on campus in South Bend, Indiana, as well as Washington, D.C. It strives to enhance the visibility, appreciation and stud ...
, he founded th
Latinx Writers Caucusat the Association of Writing & Writing Programs (AWP).
Dr. Quesada served as faculty at
Northwestern University,
The School of the Art Institute
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which grew into the museum and ...
Vermont College of Fine ArtsUCLA Writers' Program Columbia College Chicago
Columbia College Chicago is a Private college, private art college in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 1890, it has 5,928https://about.colum.edu/effectiveness/pdf/spring-2021-student-profile.pdf students pursuing degrees in more than 60 undergra ...
, where he taught Latinx literature, literary translation, editing, and poetry writing. He is the founding member of the Latinx Writers Caucus, which serves to promote the success of
Latinx
''Latinx'' is a neologism in American English which is used to refer to people of Latin American cultural or ethnic identity in the United States. The gender-neutral suffix replaces the ending of ''Latino'' and ''Latina'' that are typical o ...
and Latin American writers at all stages of their career.
In 2018, a chapbook of original poetry and literary translations of Spanish poet
Luis Cernuda
Luis Cernuda Bidón (September 21, 1902 – November 5, 1963) was a Spanish poet, a member of the Generation of '27. During the Spanish Civil War, in early 1938, he went to the UK to deliver some lectures and this became the start of an exile ...
titled ''Revelations'' was published by
Sibling Rivalry Press
Sibling Rivalry Press is a small press publishing house based in Little Rock, Arkansas founded by Bryan Borland in 2010. It features both online and print components as well as the non-profit SRP Foundation, which financially supports the arts.
...
. The title of the collection is inspired by the medieval book by Christian mystic Julian of Norwich, ''
Revelations of Divine Love''. He is the author of ''Next Extinct Mammal'' (Greenhouse Review Press, 2011), which "revels in the grounded, specific names and places of his California childhood, and invites them to join Zeus and Aphrodite in the pantheon of poetic allusion", and translator of ''Luis Cernuda: Exiled from the Throne of Night'' (Aureole Press, 2008).
In 2021, Dr. Quesada began serving on the board of the
National Book Critics Circle, where he was the VP of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) from 2021 - 2023; he was Chair of the award in nonfiction for the 2022 publishing year. The same year he was Contributing Editor at ''TAB Journal'' at
Chapman University
Chapman University is a private research university in Orange, California. It encompasses ten schools and colleges, including Fowler School of Engineering, Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, Fowler School of Law, and Schmid College of Scien ...
in Orange, California. From 2021 - 2022, Quesada launched and served as the host of the
Mercy StreetReading Series''
a live literary broadcast featuring contemporary poets and writers.
Currently, Dr. Quesada is an editorial advisor fo
Jack Leg Pressand teaches as a
Associate Teaching Fellowat the Attic Institute of Arts & Letters, the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. He is faculty in the MFA in Creative Writing Program at Antioch University-Los Angeles.
Works
''Exiled from the Throne of Night''
2008)
''Next Extinct Mammal'' (Greenhouse Review Press, 2011)
''Revelations'' (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2018)
''Best American Poetry'' (Simon & Schuster, 2018)
''Latinx Poetics: Essays on the Art of Poetry'' (University of New Mexico Press, 2022)
''Jane / La Segua''
The Offending Adam 2023)
External links
Author's websiteProfile at Poetry FoundationProfile at The Academy of American Poets
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Quesada, Ruben
Living people
20th-century American poets
21st-century American poets
American magazine editors
American online publication editors
American male poets
American people of Costa Rican descent
American gay writers
Eastern Illinois University faculty
Hispanic and Latino American poets
LGBT Hispanic and Latino American people
LGBT people from California
American LGBT poets
Poets from California
Texas Tech University alumni
University of California, Riverside alumni
Writers from Los Angeles
Year of birth missing (living people)
20th-century American male writers
21st-century American male writers
20th-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
American male non-fiction writers
Gay poets