what is sold as mainstream literature, I don't like it very much—very simplified, industrialized, Dan Brown stuff. I don't want to write like that. - Mayra Santos-Febres

I prefer novels. However, I think that the theme of the piece determines its form. Some texts work better in poetry than in essay or stories or plays. It is good though to learn as many techniques in creative writing as one can, so that, as a writer, one has the flexibility to work with the piece and its need.

Our stand as an island/nation/U.S. "territory"/colony is asking for a revision. Personally, I believe that we live in global times. New identities need to participate in the dialogue about civil rights, sovereignty, the need to look past nationalisms and their monolithic discourses on what constitutes citizenship.

People believe that black people live the same way everywhere and that is not true. White people don’t live the same way everywhere, even if you have the same cultural references. Take music. Rap, of course, black rappers don’t live the same way everywhere. There are black rappers in Africa, black rappers in France, black rappers in the U.S. and there are black rappers in the Caribbean. I wanted people to see the way in which that music became a means of expression of a reality, which is at the same time both global and local.