Writer’s
Block airs every Tuesday, at 9 a.m. MST on KFUN/KLVF, streaming live at www.kfunonline.com
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| Ray John de Aragon |
Author celebrates Hispanic culture and traditions
Ray John de Aragon is an educator at heart, which is good because he has spent much of his adult life creating learning opportunities for young people in Las Vegas and Los Lunas school districts. He is Las Vegas born and a lifelong student of life, Hispano culture and art. He follows dual disciplines, finding time to write definitive books based on stories he heard growing up, and a curiosity that lead him to write a book that corrected erroneous understanding of the state's early history.
As an artist he is creative while staying true to the traditions of style and interpretation. His writing has won a number of awards and he has been the subject of a number of articles and books. His enthusiasm about his work never stands in the way of his getting it right. He is a careful researcher and a dedicated historian.
Below I share Ray John's responses to the questions we discussed during his Writer's Block segment July 17.
WB: Please start by telling
the audience what you’ve been up to.
RJ: I’ve been working on a new project titled, The
Hidden History of Spanish New Mexico.
This book will tell the story of the four hundred year history of the
state and will include something about the heritage, culture, and traditions
with information that is not readily available in any other book.
WB: Your books and art
celebrate Hispano culture. Share with us
your thoughts on keeping one’s cultural traditions alive in an ever-changing
world.
RJ: I don’t think people actually realize how
much of how we react to things, our habits, and basic knowledge comes from
those that came before us. Cultural
tradition is what shapes us as human beings, and it will continue to shape us
on into the future.
WB: You’ve written a number
of books, all of which have stood the test of time, creating a compendium of
information that brings understanding to old Spanish and northern New Mexico
traditions, and shines the light of understanding on often flawed depictions of
history. Tell us about some of the books
you’ve written and how your work has influenced or changed how we view the
past.
RJ: I wrote my book, Padre Martínez and Bishop Lamy, because I was incensed at the way our legendary folk hero
priest Padre Antonio José Martínez was depicted in Willa Cather’s Death Comes for the
Archbishop. Although it was a
historical fictional novel people took it as the truth and saw the padre as an
immoral lecherous priest. I felt I
needed to counter that denigrating portrayal with the truth. I attempted to do the same thing with my
book, Hermanos de La Luz, Brothers of the Light to present a more
balanced look at the Penitente Brotherhood of New Mexico. The truth is most people want to hear about
some rituals which have been sensationalized, rather than what was going on in
the world around them. Actually their
rituals reflected their faith and the strength it took to make it in a tough
world and the penance they felt was needed to remind them that good moral
decisions could only be made by picking up their cross and carry it, which was
harder than taking the easy way out. Besides, the persecution they and their families endured by people who
did not understand a culture different from theirs was a much greater penance
than what they would have ever chosen. They were constantly being dragged out of their homes and beaten and
sometimes they and their families were killed.
It wasn’t meant to be a secretive society, but throughout history, from
ancient times to now, the world has not always been kind to things they could
not understand. I think my books have
opened up an understanding and appreciation of the rich cultural and historical
heritage and legacy of the four hundred year old Spanish history of New Mexico.
WB: How do you balance the
time it takes to create a work of physical art and the artistic expression of
writing, both of which take a monumental amount of time?
RJ: I go by the inspiration I feel at the time.
If I feel like painting, I paint. If I feel like writing, I write. If you want to do something bad enough, you
sacrifice. Some people get to go on vacation,
watch TV, sleep, etc., sometimes I have to give those things up and work on
what I believe in.
WB: Let’s talk about New
Mexico Legends and Lore. Now, I’m
Hispanic, on my mother’s side. I grew up
learning what she remembered of stories she grew up with in Arizona, where my
grandfather was a country sheriff and a sheepherder, but those stories were watered
down, I think, by the fact we didn’t live in community with the traditions she
grew up with. I will say, however, that
in this book I recall similar types of stories. Do these stories sort of cross all cultures and come out in different
ways?
RJ: I think that in all cultures the world over
there are stories that have been passed down from one generation to the next
that teach lessons or follow universal themes.
It doesn’t matter what the color of our skin is, how our culture or
traditions are different. We all want to
be treated with dignity, to be loved, to be taken care of, to wish that our
children could always be safe and protected. We are a very creative people and we find ways of expressing ourselves
by making it interesting, magical, or frightful. Whatever works to get our point across. What youth wants to hear, “Don’t go into a
canal with rushing water or ditch filled to the brim with water because you
could drown!” Doesn’t it make a more
lasting impression if one says, “I’ve heard that La Llorona is always looking
for children who go near the water in the arroyos and if she catches them, they
might not ever see their family again. So be very careful. You never know…”
WB: What prompted you to put
together this particular collection?
RJ: When I told the stories in the book to
students at schools, at presentations around the state, at conferences, and at
university classrooms I always enjoyed seeing how kids and adults would
respond. Since people seemed to be
enthralled by the stories, I wrote them down.
WB: What stories resonated
with you as a child and has that changed as you’ve matured?
The story of La Llorona is one I grew up
with living next to the Arroyo Manteca near the Old Town Plaza here in Las
Vegas. Of course my mother told me the
story to keep me away from the arroyo, but as I grew older, my friends and I
searched for La Llorona in the arroyo by day, but never by night. I decided to write a full-length book on La
Llorona, The Legend of La Llorona, which is still in print. As a child I didn’t understand why the
stories were told, but as an adult I understand the value in those
stories. In today’s society, kids watch
programs or play games where blood is gushing, or brains are bursting out of
characters heads, but there is no value in the story, no moral learned, except
maybe a “how to” guide on how to do the same things, but do it before it’s done
to you, or do it well enough to not get caught.
People say its not real, but when it does become real some of us are
shocked, others may think they were stupid because they got caught, and still
others may think, “It’s not really that big of a deal!”
WB: Of the books you’ve
written which has been your favorite?
I can’t say any one book I’ve written is my
favorite. Each one had a purpose. I guess I could say, my next one and the one
after that is my favorite. Each new book
is the infant waiting to be born.
WB: Which has had the
greatest impact and why?
At this point, Padre Martinez and Bishop
Lamy has had the greatest impact. It
has been referred to as a revisionist history by some, I say, “Is it a
revisionist history because I dare to contradict what the so called “experts”
have quoted over and over again without looking at the facts?” At one time it wasn’t easy to do research by
looking at documents from primary sources or as close to the primary source as
possible, but today there is no excuse for rehashing what somebody else has
said with the technology that is available.
I would say read and reread both the pros and cons, what are the statistics,
what else was going on at the time, who is saying it, why they are saying it
and then make your statement. Hey, there
is nothing like history, the written words of those who lived it, and time will
eventually bring out the truth. New
“old” documents come out of secret government folders or hidden chests
everyday. We just need to look for
them. Sometimes we like what we find,
sometimes we don’t.
WB: You have also written
children’s books. Talk a little about
that.
RJ: It always seems that I have ten different
projects going at the same time. Being a
Title I reading teacher I always wanted to write children’s books because I
saw how kids reacted to Dr. Seuss so I wrote City of Candy and Streets of
Ice Cream. It sold well and now I
have several children’s books in the works.
WB: On the book cover for New Mexico Legends and Lore, you quote
a common New Mexico expression, “Fear always leads us to suspect the
worst.” Do you regard that as a caution
to not be fearful or a defeatist reality? As in, the worst is bound to happen so I might as well get the fear part
of it out of the way up front.
RJ: This famous New Mexico dicho most probably
means something like, “If at first you don’t succeed, try again.” What it also means is keep on trying until
you do. We say, “Think before you
leap!” Sometimes, we have to leap before
we think or we might not ever do it!
RJ: Tome on the Range is having a book signing on
Saturday, July 21. I will
be there to sign the books and try to answer any questions you might have. We might be able to share some stories.
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