José Antonio Villarreal
Encyclopedia
José Antonio Villarreal (born 30 July 1924, Los Angeles, California
) was a Chicano
novelist. He was born in 1924 in California to migrant Mexican farmworkers. Like Juan Manuel Rubio in Pocho, Villarreal's father fought with Pancho Villa in the Mexican Revolution. He spent four years in the Navy before attending the University of California at Berkeley in 1950.
exodus of 1910; as a first-generation American, Richard struggles with the conflicting values of his parents: his father's Mexican sense of honor, tradition, pride and masculinity and the more Americanized view of family and women's roles that his mother and especially his sisters adopt. Richard's father harbors a dream to return his family to Mexico, but his circumstances and choices keep him in the United States. Similarly, Richard does well in school and wants to go to college to become a writer, but he must become the man of the house after his father leaves the family; yet Richard himself leaves the family to join the Navy after Pearl Harbor
. According to scholar Francisco A. Lomelí, the novel argues "that people of Mexican descent have a rightful place they can claim their own that is both Mexican and Anglo American, which Chicanos synthesize in varying degrees [and] accentuates, for the first time in a mainstream American literary scene, Hispanic characters as complex and multidimensional who, despite their individual flaws, possess depth and credibility".
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
) was a Chicano
Chicano
The terms "Chicano" and "Chicana" are used in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. However, those terms have a wide range of meanings in various parts of the world. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement, mainly among Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's...
novelist. He was born in 1924 in California to migrant Mexican farmworkers. Like Juan Manuel Rubio in Pocho, Villarreal's father fought with Pancho Villa in the Mexican Revolution. He spent four years in the Navy before attending the University of California at Berkeley in 1950.
Pocho
Villarreal's novel Pocho (1959) is one of the first Chicano novels, and the first to gain widespread recognition. Pocho has been called the "pivotal transitional link between 'Mexican American' and 'Chicano' literature", both because of its strengths as a novel and because of its use in the rediscovery and recuperation of Latino literature in the 1970s. The novel details the childhood of Richard Rubio, who father Juan Manuel left Mexico in the post-RevolutionMexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a major armed struggle that started in 1910, with an uprising led by Francisco I. Madero against longtime autocrat Porfirio Díaz. The Revolution was characterized by several socialist, liberal, anarchist, populist, and agrarianist movements. Over time the Revolution...
exodus of 1910; as a first-generation American, Richard struggles with the conflicting values of his parents: his father's Mexican sense of honor, tradition, pride and masculinity and the more Americanized view of family and women's roles that his mother and especially his sisters adopt. Richard's father harbors a dream to return his family to Mexico, but his circumstances and choices keep him in the United States. Similarly, Richard does well in school and wants to go to college to become a writer, but he must become the man of the house after his father leaves the family; yet Richard himself leaves the family to join the Navy after Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
. According to scholar Francisco A. Lomelí, the novel argues "that people of Mexican descent have a rightful place they can claim their own that is both Mexican and Anglo American, which Chicanos synthesize in varying degrees [and] accentuates, for the first time in a mainstream American literary scene, Hispanic characters as complex and multidimensional who, despite their individual flaws, possess depth and credibility".
Works
- Fiction
- "Some Turn to God," short story, Pegasus, 1947
- "A Pot of Pink Beans Boiling," short story, San Francisco Review, 1959
- POCHO, a novel, Doubleday & Company, New York, 1959
- POCHO, reprint, Anchor Books, New York 1971
- "The Conscripts," short story, Puerto del Sol, 1973
- THE FIFTH HORSEMAN, a novel of the Mexican Revolution, Doubleday & Company, New York, 1974
- THE FIFTH HORSEMAN, Second edition, The Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilingue, State University of N.Y., Binghamton, 1984
- POCHO, New Edition, in Anchor Literary Series, Anchor Books, Doubleday & Company, New York, 1984
- CLEMENTE CHACON, novel, Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilingue, State University of N.Y., Binghamton,1984
- TWO SKETCHES: "The Last Minstrel in California," and "The Laughter of My Father," Iguana Dreams, ed. Delia Poey and Virgil SuarezVirgil SuárezVirgil Suárez is a Cuban American poet and novelist. He is a professor of English at Florida State University. He is one of the leading writers in the Cuban American community, known for such novels as Latin Jazz and Going Under....
, Harper-Collins, 1992 - POCHO, Spanish Language edition, transl. Roberto Cantu, Anchor Books, N.Y. 1994
- Articles
- "The Fires of Revolution," Holiday Magazine, 1965
- "California: "The Mexican Heritage," Holiday Magazine, 1965
- "Mexican-Americans in Upheaval," West Magazine of the Los Angeles Times, September 1966
- "Mexican-Americans and the Leadership Crisis," West Magazine, September 1966
- "Olympics, 1968, "Mexico's Affair of Honor," Empire Magazine, Denver Post, April 1968
See also
- List of Mexican American writers