Sandra Cisneros, this reluctant icon of the literary arts left San Antonio after over 20 years of calling this city her home. She found a new sanctuary in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, a community known for its enclave of artists from around the world. Sandra returns to San Antonio this month for a series of readings at Gemini Ink. She's been back to the city many times, but this will mark her literary homecoming. Yvette Benavides spoke to Sandra Cisneros from her new home in Mexico.
Cisneros is best known for her acclaimed first novel The House on Mango Street (1984) and her subsequent short story collection Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories (1991). Her most recent book is A House of My Own.
Cisneros has received numerous awards for her work, including the MacArthur Foundation Fellowship in 1995 and the Texas Medal of the Arts Award in 2003. She is the recipient of the 1985 American Book Award by the Before Columbus Foundation for The House on Mango Street. Subsequently she received a Frank Dobie Artists Fellowship. She has further received the Quality Paperback Book Club New Voices Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the PEN Center West Award for best fiction, and the Lannan Foundation Literary Award for Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories.
