Aloha from Pat Matsueda

After this post appeared, an interview with Pat was published in The Hawaii Review of Books. Please read “Confessions of a Literary Journal Editor” to learn about her duties for MĀNOA.

Dear friends,

Thursday, Sept. 1, is my last day as the managing editor of MĀNOA. I started in April 1992, about thirty years and four months ago. Before that, I worked as a technical editor for the Water Resources Research Center. Faith Fujimura, the head of WRRC’s publications program (and wife of Shakespeare scholar Thomas Fujimura), hired me in January 1990. It was my first full-time position at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa.

When I joined MĀNOA about two years later, we had only one office and I had no desk or computer of my own. I worked at a table and shared an IBM computer. Frank Stewart, Robbie Shapard, and Darlaine Mahealani Dudoit were my work mates, and together we puzzled out, solved, confronted, debated, and celebrated much, forging what became a nationally recognized literary journal.

It’s been an incredible journey for me, one of two girls raised by an immigrant mother in Makiki, Kalihi, Liliha. Anyone who wants to stay in touch can find me on Twitter or visit my website.

Warmly,
Pat

This photograph was taken August 27, 2022, at my retirement party at Waioli Kitchen & Bakery (and digitally enhanced to convey the joyfulness of the event). Standing (left to right): Masayo Suzuki, graphic artist; Hal Lum, painter and photographer; moi; Jenny Silbiger, librarian, Hawai‘i State Judiciary; Phyllis Young, novelist. Seated: Donovan Colleps, poet and production editor, UH Press; Alicia Upano, novelist and interim journals manager, UH Press.