Professor’s diverse ‘voices’ earn praise

On Jan. 1, one of Drew University’s valued faculty members was named to The Boston Globe’s “Put them on your watch list,” of 16 people make it big in 2010.
Assistant Professor of English Tiphanie Yanique, was recognized for her collection of short stories entitled “How to Escape from a Leper Colony” which will be out from Graywolf Press in March.
The Boston Globe article contributor Nicole Lamy states the following: “Tiphanie Yanique’s collection of short stories will astound readers with its range of pitch-perfect voices. Yanique—a native of the Virgin Islands and professor at Drew University—might as well be a ventriloquist: She writes in the voice of a Gambian priest, a gangster in love, a 14-year-old leper. At the start of each story it is as if another character steps out from behind a curtain, reciting his or her story, pulling in the audience of readers.”
When asked how she felt about receiving such media attention for her collection of short stories, Yanique said, “It’s exciting and frightening.  The article says I’m the writer to watch...what if I trip or something? For real or even metaphorically.”
Yanique added, “What if I fall and bust my nose?  Still, I’m enormously grateful.  Artists often labor privately. How wonderful to surface and find that there’s a community there on the other side.”
Recognized for her rare ability to adopt the voices of several different characters, Yanique expressed the challenge that she faced in doing so.
“Trying to do anything well is a challenge,” Yanique said. “Writers are often portrayed as quiet brooding types but, outside of a year or so junior high, I’ve never been like that,” she added.  “I like people.  I like peoples’ stories.  So while it is a challenge to create different characters, it’s one I enjoy”
Finding the inspiration to write is something that every writer struggles with from time to time, yet it appears that the inspiration for Yanique’s collection arose from everything she heard, saw and read.
“The stories come from many places. From my entire life.   From everything I have ever read or been told or dreamed of at night,” Yanique said. “A kiss scene must come from every boy and man I’ve kissed.  Every kiss I’ve witnessed in real life, film, visual art or literature.”
Yanique added, “It’s very easy to say that I wrote the title story after looking at pictures a friend showed me from his trip to the leper colony island of the story.  That’s true.  And it’s an easy sound bite to publish in a magazine or say at an interview.  But it’s only a fraction of the truth”.
“The story also comes from the six months I spent living in Trinidad, where the lead character is from.  It comes from having nuns teach me in elementary schools—as nuns are the catalysts for much of the action in the story,” Yanique said. “It comes from reading Indian fiction in a class I took with Chitra Divakaruni.  Inspiration is consistent.  Every little moment...sometimes it takes just one final thing...a photo brought back from a sailing trip...to pull it all together.  But the possibility for inspiration is the soup we swim around in all day.   It’s the just seeing it.  That’s our job if we are artists.”
When asked what she thought of The Boston Globe’s assessment of her writing, Yanique said, “I think Nicole Lamy is very smart.  And very kind.   I appreciate what she said about voice in the stories because voice is something I work hard at. I write, on one level, to create a community.  I would like the collection to be a community that a reader can enter into.  I’m glad Ms. Lamy felt that the each member of the community was given his or her particular voice.  I hope I’m respecting them, the characters, in that way.”