Solórzano, Laura 1961–

PERSONAL:

Born 1961, in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.

CAREER:

Artisan, poet, and writer. Textiles artisan business, Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, owner.

WRITINGS:

Semilla de Ficus, Ediciones Rimbaud (Tlaxcala, Mexico), 1999.

Lobo de Labio (chapbook), Cuadernos de Filodecaballos (Guadalajara, Mexico), 2001.

Boca Perdida (poetry), Bonobos (Metepec, Mexico), 2005.

El Espejo de la Jaula: Antología Personal, Secretaría de Cultura del Gobierno del Estado de Jalisco (Guadalajara, Mexico), 2006.

Lip Wolf (poetry), introduced by Dolores Dorantes, translated by Jen Hofer, Action Books (Notre Dame, IN), 2007.

Contributor to Hoja Frugal and Sin Puertas Visibles: An Anthology of Contemporary Poetry by Mexican Women, edited by Jen Hofer, University of Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 2003.

SIDELIGHTS:

Laura Solórzano is a Mexican artisan, poet, and writer. Born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, in 1961, she runs her own textile artisan business in her hometown. She studied psychology and also teaches creative writing classes. As a writer, she has contributed to the Mexican literary journal Hoja Frugal.

Solórzano published her first book, Semilla de Ficus, in 1999 through Ediciones Rimbaud. In 2001 she published a chapbook, Lobo de Labio, through Cuadernos de Filodecaballos. Solórzano published a book of poetry, Boca Perdida, in 2005 with Bonobos. She then published El Espejo de la Jaula: Antología Personal through Guadalajara's Secretaría de Cultura del Gobierno del Estado de Jalisco the following year.

Solórzano's work was featured in an anthology in 2003 edited by Jen Hofer called Sin Puertas Visibles: An Anthology of Contemporary Poetry by Mexican Women. Ray Bianch, reviewing the anthology on ChicagoPostmodernPoetry.com, remarked that "Solórzano's work is filled with things that open doors for us a reader of poetry," adding that it "reflects, refracts, and changes colors so effectively that you do not know what is or what is not."

In 2007 Solórzano published Lip Wolf, which was translated by Hofer and introduced by Dolores Dorantes. The poetry in the book relies heavily on images to convey the message in the text. They are a product of Solórzano's personal life experiences. Some of the poems are abstract while others are more straightforward but cover common situations, including making references to childbirth, homemaking, and conflicts and tensions often found in intimate relationships. Solórzano does not claim that any of the poems are directly autobiographical, however. She merely imparts the poetry as if it were coming from her memory. Lip Wolf contains a total of forty-nine poems, each titled by a combination of asterisks, words in parentheses, or numbers, yet the collection of poems reads continuously as a single item.

Naomi Millán, reviewing the book in ForeWord Magazine, pointed out that "it is difficult poetry." Millán concluded: "Unconcerned with conventional contemporary poetry, this work stands apart with its obsessive and intoxicating project, burrowing into the reader's mind. It seems to access language at the elemental, the words reaching back toward an original level of meaning." A contributor to Publishers Weekly remarked that the poems "engage in complex verbal stunts." The same contributor offered that "these layered, playful, and sorrowful poems reward repeated readings."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

ForeWord Magazine, September-October, 2007, Naomi Millán, review of Lip Wolf, p. 36.

Publishers Weekly, June 25, 2007, review of Lip Wolf, p. 36.

ONLINE

ChicagoPostmodernPoetry.com,http://www.chicagopostmodernpoetry.com/ (May 9, 2008), Ray Bianchi, review of Sin Puertas Visibles: An Anthology of Contemporary Poetry by Mexican Women.