By Carla D. Robinson

It’s hard to say exactly what happened that day in 1974 when a group of artists – calling themselves Nuyoricans in recognition of their cultural mélange as Puerto Rican New Yorkers – founded the Nuyorican Poets Café. In the movie Pinero, poet Miguel Algarin (immortalized by Giancarlo Esposito) grows weary of the crew crowding his living room and swiftly unveils a storefront space as a new place for everyone to create and perform. In reality, the group’s official founding is more elusive.

While the colorful, white-haired Algarin is widely acknowledged as having started it all, he doesn’t take such credit. Instead, the Rutgers University professor cites himself as only one of the founders of the Nuyorican, along with close friend Miguel Pinero, the fascinating and puzzling subject of the eponymous film, poet Lucky Cienfuegos, and others. Whatever led to the opening of the Nuyorican’s original doors on East Sixth Street may remain forever shrouded in myth, but what keeps its doors open at 236 East 3rd Street (its location since 1980) is no mystery.

The Nuyorican’s Lower Eastside neighborhood, dubbed Loisiada – “the community” – by its Spanish speaking residents, is a mixture of ethnicities from Puerto Rican to Polish, and the Nuyorican seeks to provide a place where such people can create work that illuminates their experiences. As Lois Griffith, co-director and a founding poet of the Nuyorican once wrote, “The journey from the street corner to the page is full of potholes.” The Nuyorican exists to ease the bumpiness of the road. The Café has helped the careers of Ntozake Shange, Willie Perdomo, and Paul Beatty, to name a few.

The organization’s signature events attract international audiences. Its Open Room, where anyone can perform, was “the first idea,” Algarin says in his introduction to Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Café. “And from this beginning was derived the complex programming that now goes on at the Nuyorican Poets Café.” The spirit of the Open Room is indicative of the Nuyorican, providing an “open, generous, embracing attitude” toward performers, in the hope of nurturing their work.

Another staple at the Nuyorican is the Slam, a high-octane spoken word competition. Some are critical of the concept. Sonia Sanchez questions the humanity of Slams and once said in an interview, “We should not be on some auction block somewhere selling our poetry in that fashion.” But Algarin posits that the Slam is a product of ancient traditions from the Puerto Rican El Trovador to Greek mythology or the African griot. Arguably, Slams have helped bring poetry back to the forefront of American consciousness.

In addition to the Open Room and Slams, the Café presents work by new and established playwrights, offers events specifically designed for youth and women, hosts concerts, and holds Fifth Night, a screenplay reading and short film series. For more information on the Nuyorican Poets Café, visit www.nuyorican.org. For a sample of the poetry that has emerged from the Café, read Aloud. Check out Action: The Nuyorican Poets Café Theater Festival to read plays and performance pieces.M

April 2002