“Mexican Bandit or the Last Intellectual?: Ilan Stavans’s Notorious Raid on the Chicano Literary Canon”
“Papier-mâché skulls, rebozos, and statues of the Santa Muerte imbued the Café del Barrio with chic Mexican charm. Books by the latest Chicano authors on the wooden shelves and framed Frida Kahlo reprints on the walls filled the high-ceilinged room with the allure of new adventures. Years of work had culminated in our monthly literary evening at the Chicana poet Raquel Valle Sentíes's home in Laredo's historic district... However, while we admired and supported the groundbreaking efforts of writers such as Tomás Rivera, Rudolfo Anaya, Lorna Dee Cervantes, Américo Paredes, and others, we felt that overall the Chicano literary canon fell short of portraying the Mexican American border in all its color and complexity. Hence, we were committed to the creation of a literature—Chicano, Latino, whatever the latest label might be—that did.”
Flores reflects on the grassroots literary circle in Laredo’s historic district, the South Texas Writing Project, and the critical tension between established literary canons and the lived, multifaceted reality of the border.
