Santo Domingo + Paterson = Pulitzer Prize for Junot Díaz

Junot Díaz

The latest success story in Paterson literature is Junot Díaz, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his bestselling novel, The Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.  

For more than two hundred years, writers and poets have drawn inspiration from Paterson for their works.  Two John Updike novels, Allen Ginsberg's poetry, an epic poem by William Carlos Williams, and Washington Irving's only published poem. Díaz himself writes, "The Paterson Falls are where the pulse of our state communicates itself, where the true land that we have sought to bury under the concrete detritus of our civilization can still speak to us. A natural treasure of alarming power, a place where I have repeatedly sought refuge, inspiration and a sense of my self. Despite the many attempts to shackle, to hem, to pacify, to in wit destroy the falls, they have survived, a reminder of the tenacity of wild spaces but also, in their singularity, a warning that if we do not act this splinter too will vanish and all of us, in our state, in our country--and yes--in our world will be diminished for it."

We will feature an interview with Junot Díaz in this space in the future.  For a preview of coming attractions, watch his appearance on the Colbert Report.