Sandra Cisneros

She founded the 'Macondo Foundation' in 1998 in her kitchen and it was officially incorporated in 2006. The foundation works with writers who write about community-building and non-violent social change.

She founded the 'Alfredo del Moral Foundation' in 2000 to commemorate the memory of his father. The foundation awards writers that were born in Texas, write about Texas or have lived there since 2007.

Sandra Cisneros was born in Illinois, Chicago on December 20, 1954, to a Mexican father and a Chicana mother. She had six brothers.

Her father was an upholsterer and hence the family kept shifting between Chicago and Mexico City. Due to this Sandra became shy and reserved and could never commit to a lasting friendship or a relationship.

Her mother, Elvira was a very strong female influence on her. Elvira was a voracious reader and was more socially enlightened and conscious than her husband. She ensured that her daughter realizes and achieves her potential.

Sandra Cisneros received her high school education from Josephinum Academy, a small Catholic all-girls school. She wrote poetry and was the literary magazine's editor.

In 1976, she graduated from Loyola University with BA in English and received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writer's Workshop at the University of Iowa, in 1978.

After graduating she taught former high-school dropouts at the Latino Youth High School in Chicago, in 1978. This experience helped her in understanding the problems of the young Latino Americans.

In her 1984 hit-novel 'The House on Mango Street' she very boldly addresses subjects such as gender inequality and the marginalisation of cultural minorities. Admiring her courage and writing skill, many top universities offered her the position of 'Writer-in-Residence'.

She draws inspiration from her personal experiences and by observing the people of her community and those around her. She makes a record of conversations from where ever she goes and later incorporates them in her story.

Proud of her ethnicity, she regularly uses Spanish words/phrases in place of English ones. But her easy and descriptive sentence formation helps the non-Spanish speakers in comprehending the sentence.

In 1991, she published a collection of 22 short stories called the 'Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories'.

Sandra's first novel, 'The House On Mango Street' which came out in 1984, has sold more than 2 million copies.