Luis
J. Rodriguez has emerged as one of the leading Chicano writers
in the country with fifteen published books in memoir, fiction,
nonfiction, children's literature, and poetry. Luis' poetry
has won a Poetry Center Book Award, a PEN Josephine Miles
Literary Award, and a Paterson Poetry Book Prize, among
others. His children's books—“America is Her Name” and “It
Doesn't Have to be This Way: A Barrio Story”—have won a
Patterson Young Adult Book Award, two Skipping Stones Honor
Awards, and a Parent's Choice Book Award. A short story
collection, “The Republic of East L.A.,” and a novel, “Music
of the Mill,” came out in 2001 and 2005, both from Rayo
Books/Harper Collins. A poetry collection, “My Nature is
Hunger: New & Selected Poems” appeared in 2005 from Curbstone
Press/Rattle Edition (other poetry books have also been
published by Curbstone Press and Tia Chucha Press). Limited-edition
hand-made art books and broadsides of Luis' poems have also
been made by C & C Press of Pajaro, CA for sale to collectors,
universities, libraries, and other institutions, including
“Seven,” “Two Women/Dos Mujeres,” “Perhaps,” and “Making
Medicine.”
Luis
is best known for the 1993 memoir of gang life, “Always Running:
La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A.” (paperback by Touchstone
Books/Simon & Schuster). Now selling more than 400,000 copies,
this book garnered a Carl Sandburg Literary Award, a Chicago
Sun-Times Book Award, and was designated a New York Times
Notable Book. It became a stage play by the Cornerstone Theater
Company at the Mark Taper Auditorium in the L.A. Public Library
from 2003-2005 to 6,000 high school students, and at the Ivar
Theater in Hollywood for a limited six-day run in 2005. Written
as a cautionary tale for Luis' then 15-year-old son Ramiro—who
had joined a Chicago gang—the memoir is popular among youth
and teachers. One Los Angeles Public Library official said
“Always Running” is the most checked out book in their vast
library system—and also the most “stolen.” Despite its popularity,
the American Library Association called “Always Running” one
of the 100 most censored books in the United States
His
latest book is the long-awaited sequel to “Always Running,”
entitled “It Calls You Back: An Odyssey Through Love, Addiction,
Revolutions, and Healing” (Touchstone Books/Simon & Schuster),
released in the fall of 2011. There is also an e-book from
Simon & Schuster and an audio book of "It Calls You Back"
from Dreamscape Audio Books.
Yet
for all the controversy, Luis has gained the respect of the
literary community. Among his awards, he's received a City
of Los Angeles Arts Fellowship, a Sundance Institute Art Writers
Fellowship, a Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writers' Award,
a Lannan Fellowship for Poetry, an Hispanic Heritage Award
for Literature, an Algonquin West Literary Award from West
Hollywood, CA, a National Association for Poetry Therapy Public
Service Award, a California Arts Council Fellowship, an Illinois
Author of the Year Award, Illinois Arts Council fellowships,
a North Carolina Writer's Residency, and the 2001 Premio Fronterizo,
among others.
Luis
is also known for helping start community organizations-like
Chicago's Guild Complex, one of the largest literary arts
organizations in the Midwest; Humboldt Park Teen Reach in
Chicago; and Tia Chucha Press, one of this country's premier
small presses. He is a founder of Youth Struggling for Survival,
a Chicago-based not-for-profit working with gang and non-gang
youth. He helped start Rock A Mole (rhymes with guacamole)
Productions, which produces music/arts festivals, CDs, and
films in Los Angeles. And he is co-founder of Tia Chucha's
Centro Cultural—a bookstore, performance space and workshop
center in the Northeast San Fernando Valley, which also sponsors
the "Celebrating Words: Written, Performed & Sung" Literacy
and Performance Festival. In addition, Luis is a renowned
gang intervention specialist in Los Angeles, Chicago, and
other cities as well as Mexico and Central America. His 2001
book “Hearts & Hands: Creating Community in Violent Times”
(Seven Stories) summarizes three decades in this area.
Because
of this, Luis is has become a leading gang expert testifying
through affidavits, phone testimonies, and court appearances
in more than 60 cases, mostly deportation cases to Mexico
and Central America. His thirty years of urban peace and gang
intervention work was utilized in the development of the Community-based
Gang Intervention Model with around forty other L.A. gang
peace advocates and interventionists, which the L.A. City
Council approved in February 2008, and is now sent across
the United States and other countries. He’s also now a trainer
for the Advancement Project’s gang intervention academy.
For
his community work, Luis has been recognized by Inner City
Struggle of East L.A. with its “Spirit of Struggle”/Ruben
Salazar Award; the “Local Hero of Community Award (with Trini
Rodriguez and Enrique Sanchez) from KCET-TV of L.A. and Union
Bank of California; “Hero of Nonviolence” Award from Rev.
Michael Beckwith and the Agape Christian Center in Culver
City, CA; and a "Unsung Heroes of Compassion" Award, presented
by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
On
top of this, Luis has spent more than thirty years conducting
workshops, readings, and talks in prisons, juvenile facilities,
homeless shelters, migrant camps, universities, public and
private schools, conferences, churches, Native American reservations,
and men's conferences throughout the country. He’s also traveled
to Canada, Europe, Japan, Mexico, Central America, South America,
and Puerto Rico doing similar work among disaffected populations.
International cities where he’s read, talked, and done workshops
include Tokyo, Mexico City, Guadalajara, Guatemala City, San
Salvador, Managua, Lima, Buenos Aires, Caracas, London, Paris,
Milan, Rome, Berlin, Amsterdam, Montreal, Toronto, Sarajevo,
and others.
Luis
has been part of the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation's Men's
Conferences, youth events, poetry events, men-women summits,
and more since 1994 with Mosaic founder and mythologist Michael
Meade and other teachers. At these conferences, the complex
but vital issues of race, class, gender, as well as personal
rage and grief, are addressed with dialogue, ritual, story,
poetry, drumming, and dance involving people of all walks
of life, including those in urban street gangs. He also created
a CD of his poems called "My Name's Not Rodriguez" for Dos
Manos Records with original music by Ernie Perez and the band
Seven Rabbit, released in the summer of 2002. And he’s founder
in 2009 of Barking Rooster Entertainment, which plans to create
new content for films, books, CDs, TV, radio, and the Internet.
On
top of this, Luis' work has been widely anthologized, including
in "Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail!: Stories of Crime,
Love, and Rebellion" (2011 PM Press, Los Angeles); “Letters
of a Nation: A Collection of Extraordinary American Letters”
(1997 Broadway Books), “The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry”
(1999 Thunder's Mouth Press), and “Bum Rush the Page: A Def
Poetry Jam” (2001 Three Rivers Press). He’s also appeared
on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” “Good Morning America,” NBC’s
“Nightly News with Brian Williams,” PBS-TV’s Jim Lehrer News
Hour, Discovery Channel’s Health Network’s “Life Force,” PBS-TV’s
“Making Peace,” National Public Radio’s “Fresh Air,” CNN’s
“What Matters,” and Head Line News’ “Leaders with Heart,”
among other programs.
Articles
on Luis Rodriguez and reviews of his works have appeared in
the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, La Opinion (L.A. leading
Spanish language publication), Washington Post, Christian
Science Monitor, Oakland Tribune, San Francisco Examiner,
Associated Press, L.A. Weekly, The Face Magazine, Entertainment
Weekly, Kirkus Review, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal,
People Magazine (En Espanol), and many more publications,
including in Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Guatemala, Venezuela,
Japan, Germany, Italy, and more.
Luis’s
poems and articles have appeared in college & high school
textbooks throughout the U.S. and Europe. He’s been a daily
newspaper writer, a weekly newspaper writer, freelancer, and
he's done radio productions/writing for L.A.’s KPFK-FM, California
Public Radio, Chicago's WMAQ-AM's All-News radio, and WBEZ-FM.
He’s also been a recurring honorary co-host with Dominique
DiPrima on KJLH-FM's “Front Page” talk show in L.A. And his
writings have appeared in The Nation, New York Times, Los
Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, U.S. News & World Report,
L.A. Weekly, Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine, American Poetry
Review, The Bloomsbury Review, San Jose Mercury, Grand Street,
Utne Reader, Rock & Rap Confidential, Fox News Latino, National
Public Radio’s Latino USA, The Huffington Post, The Progressive,
and others.
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