Caro De Robertis | The PEN Ten
So Many Stars: An Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color (Algonquin Books, 2025) is a masterful collection of carefully curated interviews from gifted writer Caro De Robertis. In the introduction, De Robertis writes, “Collecting these stories, and weaving them together, has been one of the greatest honors of my life.” From emergence to transition to activism and beyond, the interviewees are twenty elders whose stories offer much-needed wisdom and build a narrative of resilience and celebration in the face of adversity.
In conversation with PEN America’s Membership Engagement Manager, Aleah Gatto, for this week’s PEN Ten, De Robertis talks through their creative process for structuring the interviews, shares advice for advocacy, and describes their experience venturing into nonfiction (Bookshop).
The compiled interviews that make up So Many Stars are wide-reaching in both content and impact, in part because the interviewees have several decades of experience to speak to. What inspired you to focus on older adults as the subjects of this oral history?
This book grew out of an oral history project I was incredibly fortunate to be part of as an inaugural Baldwin-Emerson Fellow. The effort was led by writer and MacArthur Fellow Jacqueline Woodson, who selected ten writers across the country to gather the oral histories of elders of color. My specific focus was on queer and trans elders of the West Coast.
I was thrilled to take part in this, and to focus on the stories of older adults. Their memories are testament to the incredible ways that trans and gender nonconforming people have always existed, in every time and culture, and will always find ways to live and flourish even in the face of hostility.
In the first section of the book, the interviewees describe their childhoods and the first moments that they thought about their gender identities. To describe themselves, so many of them say something like, “I didn’t have a word for it.” What is there to say about the act of self-discovery and the ability to use definitive words to describe oneself?
These twenty narrators grew up all over this country, and the world, with a dazzling range of life experiences. And yet, that’s one thing all of them have in common: they all had childhoods in which their gender truths were not visible in the language or culture around them. Not having a full lexicon for themselves, they innovated prismatic ways to know themselves, to grow up, to come of age and forge a life where they could be whole and seen as all of who they are.
To me, this speaks to the absolutely brilliant and beautiful ways that trans and nonbinary people carve out space for themselves in their lives, and in the world. We exist; the world may not affirm that we exist, or that we deserve to; and yet, we continue, and we create ourselves in ways that in turn make more room for others.
Queer and trans culture has always been a magnificent, evolving thing. We don’t need language to be definitive; we can let it unfurl in new and expansive directions, the way the rich LGBTQ+ lexicon is doing today. New language means new possibilities. That’s long been a superpower of trans and queer people.
Much like its content, the structure of So Many Stars is nontraditional: instead of sharing full interviews one after the other, you curate snippets of each around similar themes. How did you decide on this structure for the final draft? Did it look different earlier on in the editorial process?
At first, I thought I’d give each person’s life its own chapter. But in a chat with my incredible agent, Michelle Brower, she recommended that I read Please Kill Me: the Uncensored Oral History of Punk, by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain. That helped me see the potential to weave a broader narrative arc into an oral history work, creating an immersive novelistic reading experience. I’m a novelist, so of course I found that irresistible.
I also took a deep dive through the work of Svetlana Alexievich, who received the Nobel Prize in literature for her oral histories, which brilliantly harness unique individual voices toward a deeper collective story (such as of Chernobyl, or Russian women during war). From that point on, I was sold. I set out to craft a book with a broader arc, in which the individual voices are their own yet simultaneously form a kind of symphony.
We exist; the world may not affirm that we exist, or that we deserve to; and yet, we continue, and we create ourselves in ways that in turn make more room for others.
Throughout the book, you decidedly give no exposition: neither your opinion nor descriptions of the interviewees. Despite this, as I’m reading, I find myself imagining them: their appearances, their mannerisms, the settings. In what ways do you hope your readers will approach these stories?
It’s wonderful to hear that the narrators took life in your imagination! I strove to convey the feel of their tone, personalities, and setting through line-level choices, such as through punctuation, pacing, and the preservation of people’s unique verbal styles. It was utterly amazing to sit with these remarkable elders in their kitchens, living rooms, and offices, and bear witness to their intimate stories. These were hours of deep connection, awe and joy, laughter and sorrow, great illumination. In shaping this book, I aimed to recreate that experience for readers as much as I could.
Was there a particular audience that you had in mind when conceiving the topics that you wanted to broach?
I do believe this book is for everyone and anyone who cares about the full spectrum of what it means to be human and alive. That said, while crafting the book, I held certain audiences particularly in mind: these narrators’ fellow trans, nonbinary, genderqueer, and two-spirit people; their fellow people of color; everyone who cares about the lives of trans and nonbinary people; trans and nonbinary youth; and the people who hold and love and support trans and nonbinary youth, including their parents, teachers, relatives, and other allies.
The penultimate chapter of this book, “Thoughts for Younger Generations,” directly addresses young trans and nonbinary people. It’s basically a flood of love notes—affirmations, joy, encouragement, pearls of wisdom. So that was definitely about turning to a specific potential audience and saying, “You are seen.”
Speaking of audiences, have you thought about how your book, and the vital voices that it uplifts, may be treated in the current political climate? At any point, did you feel fear, excitement, rage, compassion?
Absolutely. It’s wild. This is my eighth book launch, but it’s the first one where I’ve felt that speaking publicly about the book could concretely put my life at risk. I am a child of South American dictatorships. I am no stranger to the word “disappeared,” the way it is being used right now—rightfully—to describe what has happened to Rümeysa Öztürk, and so many other people in this country in recent months, in retaliation for expressing political views the federal government did not like. And the notion that trans and gender nonconforming people are fully human? That’s a view the current federal government does not like.
So is there fear? Yes. But there is also tremendous compassion and fierce love in me for the millions of people in this country currently grappling with parallel fears, whether it’s of being disappeared, or facing other threats to their safety, stability, livelihood, or everyday wellbeing because of the political climate. There are many ways to be afraid right now; there are also many ways to connect, to fortify ourselves, to affirm community, affirm who we are.
More than anything, I hope this book can uplift, not only the voices in it, but the people it reaches, even if in some small way.
There are many ways to be afraid right now; there are also many ways to connect, to fortify ourselves, to affirm community, affirm who we are.
You are an accomplished author of myriad novels, short fiction, essays, and translations, but this is your first work of nonfiction. Can you speak to your experience foraying into this genre? Did you learn something that you didn’t expect?
Every book teaches us how to write it. As a writer, I’m constantly learning. Creating this book has been daunting and exhilarating, all at once.
I knew I’d be drawing on my novelist’s toolbox for shaping the narrative arc of the book. Something that surprised me, though, was how I also drew on my toolbox as a literary translator. When I translate a book, I work with language, and all my aesthetic faculties are brought to bear, but I’m also placing those tools in service of another person’s voice. I’m constantly asking, not just, “What would best serve this book?” but also, “What would best serve the vision of the original writer of this book?” That background helped prepare me to shape these narrators’ voices, as best I could, in service not only to the book at hand, but to the people to whom these voices belong.
Are there other writers, activists, or people of marginalized backgrounds who have influenced you in your writing career?
So many. Too many to count or name. I’ll focus here on trans and genderqueer literature: canonically, the work of Leslie Feinberg, Qiu Miaojin, and Manuel Puig have meant the world to me. And, today, even as attacks on trans and nonbinary rights have increased violently, we are experiencing an incredible literary explosion, a visionary renaissance, with brilliant writers such as Julián Delgado Lopera, Denne Michele Norris, Roque Raquel Salas Rivera, Jordy Rosenberg, Andrea Lawlor, Camila Sosa Villada, Rivers Solomon, Charlie Jane Anders, and Ryka Aoki blazing the way.
What work went into finding, and selecting, the twenty interviewees? Was there any moment where you had to choose whose story to tell and whose to leave out? What was the editorial process like with so much essential content to work with?
I started with my own networks, which to my great fortune are rich with queer and trans people of color. I asked activists, scholars, writers, and community leaders for names of elders they thought I should include. From there, whenever I interviewed an elder, I invited them to add names to my list of candidates. I also did my own research, of course, and worked hard to make sure my list was inclusive in a range of ways.
Bamby Salcedo is an example of someone to whom I didn’t have a personal connection. She’s an icon! As the founder and executive director of the TransLatin@ Coalition, she’s extremely busy, so I was thrilled when she agreed to be interviewed and share her absolutely astounding stories.
Editing was not easy. Is it ever? But it did feel joyful, in part because I got to work with the brilliant Madeline Jones at Algonquin. There were definitely things that were hard to cut. But the goal was always to balance the vision for the book with ways to honor the narrators’ original voices, and I feel we did that.
Whoever you are, whatever your path, if you’re on the side of humanity and justice, know that you’re never alone. You’re accompanied and needed and in fact part of a deeply rooted, radiant legacy of social change.
So Many Stars not only illuminates the lives of the individuals you interview; it also compels readers to reflect on how society has historically treated—and currently treats—people of color with nontraditional gender identities. What are your takeaways for how our world has progressed, or transgressed, in identity ideology? What advice would you give for advocating for trans, nonbinary, genderqueer, and two-spirit people of color?
We have come incredibly far. And it didn’t happen automatically. It happened because previous generations of trans and gender nonconforming people have acted with blazing courage, on behalf of their own lives and communities, and shaped the cultural innovations that allow so many of us to live in our wholeness today. All social change is composed of thousands of seemingly small, everyday acts of blazing courage. That’s essential to hold onto.
Are we under attack right now? Absolutely. One hundred percent. But that doesn’t mean we haven’t progressed; it’s a sign of how much we have progressed. It’s backlash. As two-spirit activist Joan Benoit says in So Many Stars, “They know they’re a dying breed. That’s why they’re being as charged and violent as they are.”
I’d say, don’t give up. Stay tall inside. Whoever you are, whatever your path, if you’re on the side of humanity and justice, know that you’re never alone. You’re accompanied and needed and in fact part of a deeply rooted, radiant legacy of social change. Find community. Listen to stories and honor your own. Find ways to keep fighting. It’s worth it. We are worth it. The future is worth it. And we are all still here, shaping the future, every single day.
A writer of Uruguayan origins, Caro De Robertis is the author of six novels, including The Palace of Eros, Cantoras, and more. Their books have been translated into seventeen languages and have receive numerous honors, including two Stonewall Book Awards and the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, which they were the first openly nonbinary writer to receive. De Robertis is also an award-winning literary translator and a professor at San Francisco State University. They live in Oakland, California with their two children.
