Rosa Burke Perez

Photo Credit: Annastina Hoeglin Davis — Photo Credit:
*Annastina Hoeglin Davis*

The only child of a Cuban father and an Irish mother, Rosa Burke Perez was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on May 16, 1935. She was a columnist for The Cincinnati Post while acquiring her B.A. at the University of Cincinnati. She married in 1956, graduated in 1957, and in 1958 moved to Mill Valley, California, where her four children were born, where much of her writing is set, and where she lived—including seven years in San Francisco—until 2004. She now shares her time with her children and seven grandchildren in northern California and northern Sweden, the latter locale inspiring her current work.

Upon becoming a single mother in 1969, Rosa began DELIA FAIR, her trilogy of epic poems performed as solo plays. During this work’s lengthy evolution she taught writing and performance to middle school students, campaigned to end the nuclear arms race, served on staff for San Francisco’s largest march protesting the Gulf War, aided conscientious objectors, and entertained a remarkable cross-section of audiences at prestigious campuses, churches, and conferences across the country, often conducting workshops titled “Creating a World That Works.”

The completion of her first trilogy in 1995 led Rosa to embark on her ongoing companion trilogy, OPERATION EDEN, and to then realize that DELIA FAIR is her own Odyssey and OPERATION EDEN her contemporary Iliad.