By Becky Gillette
Photography by Krista McFadden
Source: http://www.deltabusinessjournal.com/#!headline-2/chon
Banu Valladares, the new executive director of the literary arts organization SonEna, lived in large cities before moving to Charleston, population 2,133, this summer. A native of Caracas, Venezuela, home to three million, she moved to Charlotte, N.C. in 1982 where she studied before transitioning into teaching writing at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Later she became the literature director for the North Carolina Arts Council.
You might expect major culture shock moving to a small town in the Delta. One of the first things she did after arriving was walk her dog to the town square. There she met both the mayor and a state senator. “Where else would you meet the mayor the first night in town?” she asks. “It took me all of a half hour to get used to a small town. The next morning, I went to the farmers market, and someone told me where to find a vet. I’ve just been incredibly well received. I feel at home and well cared for. Coming from a big city, you can have a big sense of isolation. There are so many people everywhere. Here people are tuned into each other. I feel like I have inherited a very large family. There is a great sense of community.”
SonEdna Founding Director Benjamen Douglas says he feels confident turning over the reins to Valladares. “She has consistently impressed me, not only with the depth of her knowledge and experience, but also with her warmth and charisma in every single interaction,” Douglas says.
SonEdna was founded in 2006 by Myrna Colley-Lee to celebrate and support the literary arts through programs such as salon readings by established authors, and providing residencies for writers to create new work. The facilities at the Charleston office include three bedrooms for visiting writers. SonEdna also partners with schools and other organizations throughout the Delta with programs designed to enrich the lives of the region’s youth by empowering them through writing.
Since starting in mid July, a lot of Valladares’ work has been connecting with people, learning about resources in the area, and discovering writers who are close by. “I keep telling people I’m a foreigner, in multiple ways,” she says. “But I also have fresh eyes to look at a space and recognize its beauty and richness. The humanities and arts are just so important for reflecting our human conditionn. I think people here in the Delta get it.”
One project she jumped right into is an after school poetry program that is a partnership with the BB King Museum, Delta Arts Alliance and the Indianola Promise Community. A new effort she is excited about is a partnership with the Alzheimer’s Poetry Project(APP), an international organization that works with elders to engage them and help them with memory recall through poetry recitation and call and response techniques.
Valladares worked with the Tallahatchie General Hospital and the public schools to setup a workshop Nov. 16-20 with Gary Glazner, the founder of APP. The workshop will teach hospital staff and middle school students how to use poetry to interact with and support elders with Alzheimer’s. “Young people will come into nursing units at Tallahatchie to be engaged with elders,” Valladares says. “It is going to be a powerful program in our area.” Valladares believes the rich history of the Delta provides lots of material for writers. “Important to our work is a sense of place, and the Delta is a place where there is a lot of racial and social history,” she says. “I don’t know if anyone can come to Mississippi and not be fed by the multiple artistic ways people have dealt with the rich history of the area such as the great legacy of the blues, and the incredible literature that has been written here.
When you cross the border into Mississippi, there is just something energetically beautiful that you can feel and see in the land. When you look back to seehow much wonderful writing and music has come out of the area, you realize there is something about the area that is inspiring and moving.”