A Study Guide for Victor Hernandez Cruz's "Problems with Hurricanes"

By Gale and Cengage

A Study Guide for Victor Hernandez Cruz's "Problems with Hurricanes," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Poetry for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Poetry for Students for all of your research needs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cengage Learning - Gale
• Release date: Sep 28, 2016
• ISBN: 9781535831390

Book preview

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Problems with Hurricanes

Victor Hernández Cruz

1991

Introduction

Problems with Hurricanesfirst appeared in Victor Hernández Cruz's poetry collection Red Beans (1991) and was later reprinted in Maraca: New and Selected Poems, 1965–2000 (2001). Like many of Cruz's poems, the language and imagery of Problems with Hurricanesare steeped in the landscape of his native Puerto Rico and in a street vernacular that lends an air of humor to the idea that the problem in a hurricane is not the wind, but rather the flying debris—especially fruit blown off the trees. The short poem appears in part I of Red Beans, The Guayabera Is the Tuxedo of the Caribbean(a guayabera is a casual linen shirt with a collar). The subtitle hints that Hurricanesis included in this particular section because it considers life in the tropics, as opposed to New York street life, which is another common subject in Cruz's work. This short poem provides an accessible entry point to Cruz's other work, which also frequently explores the motifs of weather, fruit, and the peasant culture of Puerto Rico. The collection Red Beans was the first of Cruz's publications to include longer prose pieces in addition to poetry.

Author Biography

Cruz was born on February 6, 1949, in the rural mountain village of Aguas Buenas, Puerto Rico, where many members of his extended family were tobacconists. When he was five, he immigrated to New York City with his parents and settled in a Hispanic community on Manhattan's Lower East Side. His parents soon divorced, and he continued to live with his mother (who never learned English) and his siblings after his father returned to Puerto Rico. Cruz self-published his first collection of poems, Papo Got His Gun, in 1966, while he was still in high school. A copy found its