
Dr. Cortés elevates the theme of intermarriage to a new level of complexity in his closely observed and emotionally fraught memoir, Rose Hill: An Intermarriage Before Its Time, adapted from his nationally successful one-man play, A Conversation with Alana: One Boy’s Multicultural Rite of Passage.
In his new autobiography, Dr. Cortés lovingly chronicles his family’s tumultuous, decades-long spars over religion, class, and culture, from his early years in legally segregated Kansas City during the 1940s to his return to Berkeley (where his parents met) in the 1950s, and to his parents’ separation, reconciliation, deaths, and eventual burials at the Rose Hill Cemetery.
