A panorama of literature by Latinos, whether born or resident in the United States. This volume, documenting the linguistic and cultural diversity of Latino literary output in the United States, offers an exciting introduction for non-specialist readers. Unique in its scope and perspective, it focuses on variousliterary genres, and cinema, related to Latinos. Each essay considers not only Latino writers who were born or raised in the United States, but also Latin American writers who took up residence in the United States but may also beconsidered part of the literary scene of their countries of origin. Rather than follow one specific mode of organization and presentation, each contributor has offered his or her original perspective on the subject matter or theme. The result is an inclusive spectrum of the voices of the U.S. Latin American diaspora, illuminating the rich and complex culture of Latinos. Carlota Caulfield is Professor of Spanish and Spanish-American Studies at Mills College, California. Darien J. Davis is Associate Professor of History and Latin American Studies at Middlebury College, Vermont. CONTRIBUTORS: Eva Bueno, Carlota Caulfield, Elizabeth Coonrod Martinez, DarienJ. Davis, Jorge Febles, Lydia Gil, Armando Gonzalez-Perez, Patricia M. Montilla, Vincent Spina, Antonio Tosta, Sergio Waisman

This is the story of a remarkable woman whose artistic mission was to relate Mexican cultural history to English-language readers. A world-renowned playwright in the 1930s and best-selling novelist in the 1940s, Josefina Niggli published at a time when Chicana/o literature was not yet recognized as such. Her works revealed Mexico from an insider's point of view, although she found herself struggling with publishers who wanted an American hero pitted against a Mexican villain. Niggli's life experience transpired in Mexico, Texas, the East Coast in the pre-World War II years, and North Carolina, with jaunts to Hollywood and to England, all in an era when few U.S. women writers were able to publish. Only recently has Niggli received critical attention as scholars of Chicana/o literature recognize her as one of the earliest Mexican American writers to focus on life lived between two cultures and nations. This scholarly biography, which includes selections from some of Niggli's unrecognized writings, is designed to solidify her place in the literary canon.

In the early twentieth century, a technological revolution as well as new ideas in science and philosophy, precipitated a radical change in narrative fiction in Latin America. The avant garde novels that appeared by the 1920s forever changed discourse and structure, or the way of creating narrative fiction, and heavily influenced the creation of the internationally recognized Latin American novel of the modern era. However, this early movement has received little attention or recognition as a literary period, although it is as significant to the development of twentieth century literature as the Modernist movement was in the U.S. and Europe. Before the Boom: Latin American Revolutionary Novels of the 1920s proposes a postmodern analysis of the early twentieth century or avant-garde novel by authors from four different Latin American countries: Arqueles Vela in Mexico, Martin Adan in Peru, Pablo Palacio in Ecuador, and Roberto Arlt in Argentina. Each chapter details the socio-political context of each novel, chronicling the events that led to an artistic desire to create an entirely new voice in Latin American fiction."

Elena Poniatowska is recognised today as one of Mexico's greatest writers. 'Lilus Kikus,' published in 1954, was her first book. However, it was labelled a children's book because it had a young girl as protagonist, it included illustrations, and the author was an unknown woman. 'Lilus Kikus' has not received the critical attention or a translation into English it deserved, until now. Accompanying 'Lilus Kikus' in this first American edition are four of Poniatowska's short stories with female protagonists, only one of which has been previously published in English. Poniatowska is admired today as a feminist, but in 1954, when 'Lilus Kikus' appeared, feminism didn't have broad appeal. Twenty-first-century readers will be fascinated by the way Poniatowska uses her child protagonist to point out the flaws in adult society. Each of the drawings by the great surrealist Leonora Carrington that accompany the chapters in 'Lilus Kikus' expresses a subjective, interiorised vision of the child character's contemplations on life.