On the Same Page with Sandra Cisneros

When Sandra Cisneros turned her poetic talent to writing a series of fictional vignettes, The House on Mango Street came to life.

"Don't presume The House on Mango Street is an autobiography," Cisneros said in the interview. "I think a lot of time people feel that it's so true that it happened to me. "The way I write is I take things that happened to other people, and, in the case of that book, it was my students. I cut and paste from memory from my mother's stories, from my memory and I make a composite. Some of the stories are mine, but I have to say the emotions, they're all mine."

The House on Mango Street tells the story of Esperanza Cordero, a young girl growing up in a Latino neighborhood in Chicago, in 44 vignettes that are intertwined but may be read in any order.

"I taught myself to write fiction by trying to cross-pollinate poetry and fiction," Cisneros said. "I wanted to write a book that you could open any place and just read one, or you could read from left to the right and get another story.

"I think people are very busy, especially working class people, and don't have a lot of time. I wanted to give them something that had the brevity and the lyricism of poetry, and the power of poetry, but a story that wouldn't terrify them. Sometimes, when we open a book of poetry, we think, 'Oh, I can't read that; I don't know what they're talking about.' But if you see a little story that's a paragraph long, it's less threatening, less intimidating."

Cisneros said the novel resulting from this "story cycle" was written while she was teaching an English course to high school dropouts.

"I just wrote it so I could go to sleep at night," she said. "The book is doing the work that I wanted it to do, which is to give direction to young people and to give hope to young girls who are leading self-destructive lives."

After the interview, Sanders met with a panel of readers at That Bookstore at Mountebanq Place in Conway. Those discussing the book are Dr. Wayne Stengel, professor of English at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway; Cecilia Garcia-Garza, an English/Spanish translator; and Sarita Perez, who will be a senior at Parkview High School in Little Rock in the fall.

The novel is the 2004 selection for If All Arkansas Read the Same Book, a statewide reading and discussion program sponsored by the Arkansas Center for the Book at the Arkansas State Library.

"Sandra Cisneros is a compelling storyteller and The House on Mango Street is a jewel of a book that's of interest to readers across the spectrum," Jane Thompson, Arkansas Center for the Book coordinator, said. "When we select a book for this program, we look at several issues: is the book accessible to a variety of sensibilities and ages; does the book address a larger context; and is the author someone who truly enjoys talking with people about her book.

"Over the course of her visit to Arkansas, Cisneros spoke to perhaps 1,000 young people. One has to be certain that a life or two was transformed in those magical few days that a young writer was inspired, or a student motivated to continue his or her studies. If such indeed was the case, then I would say that we chose well."

About the Author

Acclaimed Author Sandra Cisneros to Appear in Jonesboro, Little Rock, Ft. Smith and Springdale as Part of State-Wide Reading Program. Little Rock Sandra Cisneros, award-winning poet, novelist, and free-spirited performance artist, will travel throughout Arkansas beginning April 19, 2004, to help the Arkansas Center for the Book at the Arkansas State Library celebrate National Library Week. The text selected for the program, IF ALL ARKANSAS READ THE SAME BOOK, is Ms. Cisneros's classic work for young adults, The House on Mango Street.

While Ms. Cisneros's writings are widely anthologized in language arts textbooks and read in schools throughout the country, her scope extends to an adult readership as well. Ms. Cisneros's current novel Caramelo reached the best-seller lists, selling over 100,000 copies.

A classroom favorite and a solid choice for adult book discussion groups interested in exploring unique form and voice, The House on Mango Street offers vivid descriptions of a neighborhood in the heart of Chicago's barrio. Home to a coterie of flamboyant characters and a charming little girl named Esperanza, The House on Mango Street is Esperanza's story; the reader sees the barrio through her eyes with its ceremonies, institutions, human relationships, shops, and homesthe homes people occupy and the homes they dream of.

Esperanza's name means Hope in Spanish, but some days she dreams of being re-baptized as the more colorful Zeze the X. Esperanza is a writer-in-the-making who knows that her world will someday extend beyond the barrio, just as she knows that her identity will remain firmly rooted in the heritage that encompasses her community. As such, The House on Mango Street addresses such themes as class consciousness, love, religion, feminism, and alienation from mainstream culture.

Ms. Cisneros is a 1976 graduate of Loyola University and holds an M.F.A. in writing from the prestigious University of Iowa Writers' Workshop. In addition to Caramelo and The House on Mango Street, Cisneros is the author of My Wicked Wicked Ways (1987), Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories (1991), Loose Woman (1994), and Hairs / Pelitos, a work for children published in 1994. Ms. Cisneros received the Before Columbus American Book Award for The House on Mango Street and has received two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as a grant from the MacArthur Foundation.

Copies of The House on Mango Street have been supplied to all Arkansas public libraries and their administrative offices by the Arkansas Center for the Book to encourage local participation in this reading initiative, now in its fifth rotation.

Based on a model developed by the Washington Center for the Book and the Seattle Public Library, the goals of this program are to encourage book programming and discussion in public libraries throughout the state, and to provide a context whereby all members of the book community can work together on a single, focused project. Books selected for this program are generally accessible in content and language to readers of all ages and reading levels, and have a larger context around which discussion can develop. Other authors selected for this program are Terry Kay, Rick Bragg, Douglas Kelley, and Sidney S. McMath.

Ms. Cisneros's visit to Arkansas is made possible by grants from the Library Services & Technology Act, the Arkansas Humanities Council, and the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation.