Sandra Cisneros on Sonia Sotomayor — one ‘wise Latina’ on another

Author Sandra Cisneros

And now it’s official.

Earlier today, Sonia Sotomayor took the oath of office as the nation’s 111^th justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

But it was this past Thursday when the nation’s first Hispanic member of the high court was confirmed by the Senate by a 68-31 vote. Later on that same Thursday, I attended a reading in Santa Fe at the Collected Works Bookstore featuring acclaimed Chicana writer Sandra Cisneros. And I asked her what she thought about the history Sotomayor had made.

Her answer was classic Cisneros, the Chicago-born Mexican-American writer, who apparently can’t help but fuse eloquence with social commentary. This was her answer:

You know, I think that everybody when they go and they’re reborn after they die, and you have many deaths in your life and you’re reborn, it allows you to have a special vision for other people who are in pain. And I think it’s significant that she’s there because we’re living in a time in which there’s so many communities that are afraid of each other. We need someone who’s going to be that bridge. And so I just don’t understand why everyone wouldn’t want to have a wise Latina…

The rest of Cisneros answer was drown out by laughter from the crowd.

Cisneros’ Santa Fe stop was part of the tour marking the 25^th anniversary of the publication of her first novel, The House on Mango Street.

Prior to taking questions from a packed crowd in the downtown book store, an animated Cisneros read a short story about loss – specifically, a lost cat named Marie.

Cisneros was joined on the book store stage by her friend and outgoing state historian Estevan Rael-Galvez, who said this about Justice Sotomayor’s historic ascension to the highest court in the land:

When then-candidate Obama talked about perfecting our union, the context of that was sharing our stories, learning from our stories. And so absolutely, that wise Latina story of hers matters.

To which, Cisneros added one last thought.