Literary Texas: Sandra Cisneros
I am a woman, and I am a Latina. Those are the things that make my writing distinctive. —Sandra Cisneros
In 2015, Texas State University’s Alkek Library acquired Sandra Cisneros’ literary archive. The archive, housed at the Wittliff Collections, includes manuscripts, correspondence, diaries, journals, and numerous other items pertaining to her life and work, a work which has long been the focus of many professors, scholars, and readers. Cisneros has said her hope is that the collection, which represents her path to writing, will encourage students and other writers, even though it exposes the amount of hard work that writing well demands. According to Director of the Wittcliff Collections, David Coleman, students rather than be discouraged should recognize what can be accomplished by such labor (Cisneros-Lunsford, Anastasia, “Sandra Cisneros’ works find home in The Wittliff.”).
Sandra Cisneros was born in 1954 in Chicago, and it was there where she grew up. Her father, Alfredo Cisneros de Moral, was Mexican and her mother, Elvira Cordero Anguiano, was Mexican-American. She had six brothers and no sisters, and often described her brothers as six additional fathers. The family spent summers in Mexico and often moved from neighborhood to neighborhood in Chicago. (Martinez, Miriam, “A Latina of many colors, Sandra Cisneros.”)
Cisneros loved going to the library as a child because, she has said, she loved books, and she loved the quiet of the library as opposed to the rowdy atmosphere at home caused by fighting brothers and a television that played incessantly. She was an introverted, sensitive child who felt things deeply, moved from house to house throughout her childhood, and suffered through an oppressive Catholic school in Chicago but still found things such as a flower to “experience deeply.” (Martinez, Mariam).
Later Cisneros graduated from Loyola University in Chicago (1976) and was accepted into the prestigious Iowa University Writers Workshop from which she received an MFA (1978). She recounts the time in the Workshop when students discussed “the archetypical idea of the house.” Many students elaborately described all kinds of spaces in different homes, many of which made no sense to Cisneros, as one who had “lived in gritty places in Chicago.” At first, she felt insecure but then realized she had known many things and places her classmates had not and could not write about. Later, this classroom experience resulted in the book A House on Mango Street (Martinez, Mariam), launching her highly successful and critically acclaimed literary career.
In 1984, Cisneros moved to San Antonio, Texas, where she did a stint as Writer-in-Residence at Our Lady of the Lake University, having previously taught writing at other universities. She was to live in San Antonio until 2013 before moving to San Miguel de Allende, a city in Central Mexico where she still resides.
During her years in San Antonio, Cisneros not only wrote but also founded the Macondo Foundation for Writers and the Alfredo Cisneros Del Moral Foundation, a foundation that provided grants and otherwise served Texas writers. Cisneros has produced an impressive body of work, much of it written while living in San Antonio. Her awards and honors have been numerous and include a National Book Award, a PEN Center West Award for Best Fiction, notable book of the year designations for several of her works from several top journals and newspapers, a PEN Center USA Literary Award for creative nonfiction, A MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, the Texas Institute of Letters Dobie-Paisabo Fellowship, two National Endowments for the Arts in Literature Fellowships in poetry and prose, the Texas Medal of the Arts, the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize by the Poetry Foundation, and many other awards and honors from various universities and literary organizations.
For a list of her novels, short stories, books of poetry, and creative nonfiction, including brief summaries of each, go to Sandra Cisneros’ website at http://www.sandracisneros.com. It is a website well-worth visiting. By the way, A House On Mango Street has sold to date over 6 million copies.
Works Cited/Bibliography
Cisneros, Lunsford, Anastasia. “Archives define Texas author’s life, career.” https://hill views.test.edu/issues/2017/ramping-up-research/Sandra-Cisneros-works-find-home.html
Martinez,Miriam. “A Latina of many colors, Sandra Cisneros.” Latino Leaders, vol. 5, no. 2, Apr.-May 2004, pp. 42+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A116140972/ITOF?u=txshrpub100443&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=1df03315. Accessed 26 June 2023.
Vine, Katy. “SANDRA CISNEROS: THE MYTH BUSTER.” Texas Monthly, vol. 47, no. 12, Dec. 2019, pp. 82+ Gale General One File, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A608614311/ITOF?u=txshrpub100443&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=802c1d8f. Accessed 26 June 2023.
Website: Sandra Cisneros, About my life and work.https://www.sandracisneros.com/mylifeandwork
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