Jimmy Santiago Baca (Magill’s Choice: American Ethnic Writers)
Author Profile
Jimmy Santiago Baca began to write poetry as an almost illiterate vato loco (crazy guy, gangster) serving a five-year term in a federal prison. He was twenty years old, the son of Damacio Baca, of Apache and Yaqui lineage, and Cecilia Padilla, a Latino woman, who left him with his grandparents when he was two. Baca stayed with them for three years, then went into a boys’ home, then into detention centers and the streets of Albuquerque’s barrio at thirteen. Although he “confirmed” his identity as a Chicano by leafing through a stolen picture book of...
[The entire page is 614 words long]
Join eNotes
Over 3,500 study guides, question and answer forums, literature criticism, reference content, and much more!
Navigate
See Also
