Sunday, August 7 – “An Unfinished Memoir” by Jose Limon
On Sunday, I spent the morning at Osmium Coffee Bar (one of my favorites thus far; lots of work space and a great atmosphere) and the afternoon at Bittersweet Cafe (less of a coffee shop and more of a cafe where you’d stop for lunch).
I’m gonna be totally honest, after “How To Do Things With Dance,” I’m finding it really hard to get back into memoirs and be really captivated by them. Limon is no exception, but there were a few things that stood out to me anyway.
The first of these is low points. Limon writes about his abusive father, which is hard but important to read. This is interesting to me because it seems like all of the choreographers of color that I’ve read thus far have recounted stories of abusive parents or rough childhoods, where the white choreographers didn’t have the same sorts of stories. This makes some sense, of course, because of the socioeconomic status that goes along with being a person of color, but is still noteworthy.
Limon also talks about how World War II instigated a low point in his life when the Nazis occupied France. He was “born and reared a Francophile,” so it hit close to home for him. WWII also affected him because of immigration policy–when Congress required all aliens living in the United States to register and give them relevant information, he realized “with a jolt” that he was an alien. This stood out to me because it reflects the status of so many refugees and immigrants today, especially those who have lived here their whole lives–America is home to them, and the notion that they be deported or sent to a place they’ve never known would be just as shocking.
In addition, Limon’s autobiography is, obviously, unfinished. As a result, it stopped in sort of an odd spot, and didn’t have the same sense of overall understanding or cohesion as the other autobiographies I’ve read. I can’t help but wonder how it would have read if he had had the time to finish.