{"id":13794,"date":"2011-09-27T07:27:45","date_gmt":"2011-09-27T11:27:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookdragon.si.edu\/?p=13794"},"modified":"2015-08-17T09:56:43","modified_gmt":"2015-08-17T13:56:43","slug":"toxicology-by-jessica-hagedorn-author-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/toxicology-by-jessica-hagedorn-author-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"Toxicology by Jessica Hagedorn + Author Interview [in Our Own Voice]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jessica<\/a>Eight years have passed (far too quickly) since I last saw the inimitable Jessica Hagedorn<\/a>. Her 2003 novel, Dream Jungle<\/a><\/em>, was about to come out and we were in desperate search of boba tea in New York\u2019s East Village. Faced with a closed tea salon (one of her favorites), Hagedorn met my disappointment with a comforting hug and we settled instead on a nearby Japanese restaurant. Noshing with a legend, I can\u2019t remember a thing I ate \u2026 it was all about the stellar company, after all.<\/p>\n

Born and raised in the Philippines, arriving in the United States in her early teens, Hagedorn entered the literary world fully formed: her now-classic coming-of-age debut novel, Dogeaters<\/a><\/em>, garnered a highly coveted National Book Award nomination in 1990<\/a>. In the two decades since, Hagedorn has been recognized as both a leader and a mentor at the forefront of Asian Pacific America with her compilation of Asian Pacific American writings, Charlie Chan Is Dead: An Anthology of Contemporary Asian American Fiction<\/a><\/em> and Charlie Chan Is Dead 2: At Home in the World: An Anthology of Contemporary Asian American Fiction<\/a><\/em>, both of which she edited, in addition to her various other novels, poetry, films, plays, multimedia performance pieces, and a musical.<\/p>\n

Eight years after Dream Jungle<\/em>\u2014in which Hagedorn intertwines the alleged discovery of an ancient \u201clost tribe\u201d in the remote hills of the Philippines with the problematic filming of Apocalypse Now\u00a0<\/em>\u2013\u00a0Hagedorn\u2019s much-awaited new novel, Toxicology<\/em>, hit shelves earlier this year in April. Populated with her usual cast of unpredictable characters, Toxicology<\/em> opens with the spectacular death of a beloved young actor. Separately joining the multiplying crowd of shocked mourners outside the actor\u2019s apartment are Mimi Smith \u2013\u00a0a filmmaker with a minor cult slasher hit who is suffering through a rough patch both creatively and personally\u00a0\u2013\u00a0and her estranged, 14-year-old daughter Violet. Across the East River, Mimi\u2019s older brother Melo is trying to stay sober, and is convinced that their cousin Agnes has met a sinister end at the hands of her wealthy New Jersey employers. Down the hall from Mimi, her neighbor Eleanor Delacroix \u2013 once a famous writer, now an eccentric octogenarian addicted to cocaine and alcohol\u00a0\u2013\u00a0has effectively shut herself in while mourning the death of her long-time lover and partner, the renowned artist Yvonne Wilder. Brought together by loneliness\u2014not to mention the flowing booze and drugs\u00a0\u2013\u00a0Mimi and Eleanor\u2019s disparate lives dovetail one into the other, as both find a strange comfort in their acerbic exchanges and desperate binges.<\/p>\n

Always fascinated by Hagedorn\u2019s writing, I recently caught up with her by phone (\u201csome things never change,\u201d she assures me about her phone number). We laughed, sighed, cackled, debated, and generally plotted to take over the universe \u2026 [… click here for more<\/a>]\n

Author Interview<\/strong>: “Jessica Hagedorn,” Our Own Voice Literary eZine: Filipinos in the Diaspora<\/em>, September 2011<\/a><\/p>\n

Readers<\/strong>: Adult<\/p>\n

Published<\/strong>: 2011<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eight years have passed (far too quickly) since I last saw the inimitable Jessica Hagedorn. Her 2003 novel, Dream Jungle, was about to come out and we were in desperate search of boba tea in New York\u2019s East Village. Faced with a closed tea salon…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27955,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,4,6,1326,6535,136,137],"tags":[205,6608,75,208,10,11,2118,13,2119,2120],"class_list":["post-13794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adult-readers","category-author-interview-profile","category-fiction","category-filipinao-american","category-repost","category-southeast-asian","category-southeast-asian-american","tag-art-architecture","tag-bookdragon","tag-death","tag-drugs-alcohol-addiction","tag-family","tag-friendship","tag-jessica-hagedorn","tag-love","tag-our-own-voice","tag-toxicology"],"yoast_head":"\nToxicology by Jessica Hagedorn + Author Interview [in Our Own Voice] - BookDragon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/toxicology-by-jessica-hagedorn-author-interview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Toxicology by Jessica Hagedorn + Author Interview [in Our Own Voice] - BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Eight years have passed (far too quickly) since I last saw the inimitable Jessica Hagedorn. 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