Lo que logra "El Feliz Ingenio Neomexicano": Felipe M. Chacón and Poesía y prosa

Anna M. Nogar and Gabriel Meléndez

El feliz ingenio neomexicano (UNM Press 2021) is a bilingual recovery edition of Obras de Felipe Maximiliano Chacón, el Cantor Neomexicano: Poesía y prosa, the first collection of poetry published by a Mexican American author. Journalist and author Felipe M. Chacón, part of a distinguished and active family of nuevomexicano authors, published the book in Albuquerque in 1924, on the presses of the bilingual newspaper La bandera americana. El feliz ingenio neomexicano (that “inspired New Mexican wit”) reestablishes Chacón’s work and his reputation by making the text widely available to readers for the first time in nearly a century. In this talk, Dr. Anna M. Nogar and Dr. A Gabriel Meléndez discuss the enduring legacy of Felipe M. Chacón's deeply bilingual writing, created and shared during New Mexico's fraught 19th and early 20th centuries. Anna M. Nogar is Professor in the University of New Mexico’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese. She is the author, editor, and coeditor of several books, including Quill and Cross in the Borderlands: Sor María de Ágreda and the Lady in Blue, 1628 to the Present; A History of Mexican Literature; and Sisters in Blue: Sor María de Ágreda Comes to New Mexico / Hermanas de Azul: Sor María de Ágreda viene a Nuevo México (UNM Press). A. Gabriel Meléndez is a Distinguished University Professor and the former director of the Center for Regional Studies at the University of New Mexico. Meléndez is the author, editor, and coeditor of numerous books, including The Book of Archives and Other Stories from the Mora Valley, New Mexico; Santa Fe Nativa: A Collection of Nuevomexicano Writing (UNM Press); and The Writings of Eusebio Chacón (UNM Press).