Rolando Hinojosa

Infobox writer
name = Rolando Hinojosa


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caption = on a visit to UC Merced; December, 2006
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birthdate = 1929
birthplace = Texas
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occupation = novelist, poet, professor
nationality = USA
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notableworks = Klail City Death Trip Series (15 vols.)
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awards = Premio Casa de las Américas; Quinto Sol


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Rolando Hinojosa (born 1929) is a novelist, essayist, poet and the Ellen Clayton Garwood professor in the English Department at the University of Texas at Austin.

Life and career

Hinojosa has devoted most of his career as a writer to his "Klail City Death Trip Series," which comprises 15 volumes to-date, from “Estampas del Valle y otras obras” (1973) to “We Happy Few” (2006). He has completely populated a fictional county in the lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas through this generational narrative. Although he prefers to write in Spanish, Hinojosa has also translated his own books and written others in English.

He was born in Texas's Lower Rio Grande Valley in 1929, to a family with strong Mexican and American roots; his father fought in the Mexican Revolution while his mother maintained the family north of the border. An avid reader during childhood, Hinojosa was raised speaking Spanish until junior high, where English was the primary spoken language. Like his grandmother, mother and three of his four siblings, Hinojosa became a teacher; he has held several academic posts and has also been active in administration and consulting work.

Hinojosa was the first Chicano author to receive the prestigious Premio Casa de las Américas award for “Klail City y sus alrededores” (Klail City), part of the series. He also received the third and final Premio Quinto Sol Annual Prize (1972), for his work Estampas del Valle y otras obras. [Cyrus R.K. Patell, "Emergent Ethnic Literatures: Native American, Hispanic, Asian American," A Concise Companion to Postwar American Literature and Culture, ed. Josephine G. Hendin, p.367]

Works

* Ask a Policeman. Houston: Arte Público. 1998.
* Los amigos de Becky. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1991.
* Becky and her Friends. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1990.
* Claros varones de Belken. Tempe, AZ: Bilingual, 1986.
* . Tempe: Bilingual, 1994.
* "Crossing the Line: The Construction of a Poem." Milwaukee, WI: Spanish Speaking Outreach Institute-U. of Wisconsin, 1981.
* Dear Rafe. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1985.
* Dear Rafe/Mi querido Rafa. Houston: Arte Público Press, 2005.
* Estampas del Valle. Tempe: Bilingual, 1994.
* Estampas del Valle y otras obras. Berkeley: Quinto Sol, 1973.
* Estampas del Valle y otras obras. Berkeley: Justa, 1977.
* Generaciones, notas y brechas. San Francisco: Casa Editorial, 1978.
* Generaciones y semblanzas. 1977. Berkeley: Justa, 1979.
* Klail City. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1987.
* Klail City und Umgebung. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1981.
* Klail City y sus alrededores. La Habana: Casa de las Américas, 1976.
* Korea Liebes Lieder/Korean Love Songs. Osnabrück, Germany: O.B.E.M.A., 1991.
* Korean Love Songs. Berkeley, CA: Justa, 1978.
* Mi querido Rafa. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1981.
* Partners in Crime. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1985.
* Rites and Witnesses. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1982.
* This Migrant Earth. Houston, TX: Arte Público, 1987.
* The Useless Servants. Houston: Arte Público, 1993.
* The Valley. Ypsilanti, MI: Bilingual, 1983. (Hinojosa's own translation of "Estampas del Valle")
* We Happy Few. Houston: Arte Público Press, 2006.

References

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* Pollock, Mary Sanders. "Crime and Community in the Rafe Buenrostro Mysteries." "CLUES: A Journal of Detection" 24.3 (Spring 2006): 7-14.
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External links

* http://www.bookrags.com/biography/rolando-hinojosa/
* http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/english/faculty/profiles/Hinojosa%20-%20Smith/R./