Title: When I was Puerto Rican
First published: 1993
Description: Esmeralda Santiago's story begins in rural Puerto Rico, where her childhood was full of both tenderness and domestic strife, tropical sounds and sights as well as poverty. Growing up, she learned the proper way to eat a guava, the sound of tree frogs in the mango groves at night, the taste of the delectable sausage called morcilla, and the formula for ushering a dead baby's soul to heaven. As she enters school we see the clash, both hilarious and fierce, of Puerto Rican and Yankee culture. When her mother, Mami, a force of nature, takes off to New York with her seven, soon to be eleven children, Esmeralda, the oldest, must learn new rules, a new language, and eventually take on a new identity. In this first volume of her much-praised, bestselling trilogy, Santiago brilliantly recreates the idyllic landscape and tumultuous family life of her earliest years and her tremendous journey from the barrio to Brooklyn, from translating for her mother at the welfare office to high honors at Harvard.
Subjects: Biography, Childhood and youth, Puerto Ricans, Puerto Rican women, Spanish language materials, Niñez y juventud, Puertorriqueños, Biografía, Reading Level-Grade 11, Reading Level-Grade 12, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Women, Puerto rico, biography, Puerto ricans, united states, New york (n.y.), biography
Places: New York (N.Y.), Puerto Rico, New York (State), New York
People: Esmeralda Santiago