On Thursday, Feb. 27, author Sandra Cisneros will be a part of the 30th annual Writer’s Symposium By The Sea at Point Loma Nazarene University, for a conversation about writing with founder and host Dean Nelson. Also appearing at the Symposium are authors Jesmyn Ward and Mitch Albom.
Few books have stood the test of time the way House on Mango Street has. Written in the voice of a young girl, the story chronicles the life of Esperanza Cordero, a 12-year-old Mexican-American preteen who is trying to find how she fits into her neighborhood, her school, her family, and her world.
Forty years after its first printing, the book is still popular around the world. Of course, getting banned in some communities is any book’s best publicity. The themes in Mango Street have been deemed as too mature for certain regions and age groups. Still, Los Angeles public schools are using it as their common read for students this year, and schools throughout San Diego use it regularly in their classes. It has also been made into an opera.
While Cisneros has continued to write novels and stories—as well as several collections of witty, insightful, lyrical poetry—she is still best known for her first novel, Mango Street. We caught up with the author to ask five questions before the event.
Courtesy of Sandra Cisneros
House on Mango Street is still huge, especially here in Southern California. Does the significance of this book surprise you? And of all the books you have written, which one would you have thought would have this kind of popularity?
I expected Caramelo would have resonance with the public, especially after laboring on it for almost a decade. I think it’s a stronger book than my first novel. It will garner its audience eventually, I’m certain, perhaps not in my lifetime.
Is there a book or poem by someone else that you tend to return to over and over?
I often return to the same books as the mood strikes. For me they are Merce Rodoreda’s novel Plaza Del Diamante for inspiration. Or the stories of Hans Christian Andersen for the same reason. Or Eduardo Galeano’s, especially ElLibro de Abrazos. I’m a big fan of the stories of Tennessee Williams and Christopher Isherwood. And I like to read poetry that makes me feel like writing poetry. That could be the greats like Emily Dickenson, or Rumi, or Cavafy, or my contemporaries like Martín Espada, Jan Beatty, Ámbar Past, Joy Harjo.
Is there a book or poem of yours that best accomplished what you set out to do, or do all of them do that?
I don’t think a book or a poem could manage all that weight, do you? I try with each book to do something that will exceed my last. I am on a trajectory of self-awareness and craft that perhaps only I am aware of. Of late, I would say I am proudest of my adaptation of House as an opera, a collaboration with composer Derek Bermel. That has pleased and stretched me greatly.
Have you spent much time in San Diego? If so, what do you like to do here? If not, what sounds appealing?
I don’t know San Diego. I think I have only been there once or twice in my life, and only briefly as my destination was across the border for conferences. The only thing I know about San Diego is that RuPaul was born there, and I find that amusing and fascinating.
Dean Nelson is the founder and director of the journalism program at Point Loma Nazarene University, and the founder and host of the annual Writer’s Symposium By The Sea. He has written for the New York Times, the Boston Globe, San Diego Magazine, and elsewhere. His most recent book is Talk To Me: How to Ask Better Questions, Get Better Answers, and Interview Anyone Like a Pro, published by HarperCollins in 2019.
