Francisco Jiménez

Francisco Jimenez

Offers a look at a migrant family, detailing their daily life and the struggles they endured to build an existence on the small opportunities they were given

Stories from the Life of a Migrant Child

The Circuit

Having come from Mexico to California ten years ago, fourteen-year-old Francisco is still working in the fields but fighting to improve his life and complete his education.

Breaking Through

Leaving his home in a migrant community, Francisco sets off for college, carrying memories of years of poverty and prejudice.

Reaching Out

A coherent and systematic overview of Chicano literature. All the major aspects of Chicano literature are treated: the themes and myths of Chicano literary expression, the dramatic principles of its theater, the literary recuperation of its history, Chicano bilingualism and code switching, and much more.

The Identification and Analysis of Chicano Literature

In his first year of school, Francisco understands little of what his teacher says. But he is drawn to the silent, slow-moving caterpillar in the jar next to his desk. He knows caterpillars turn into butterflies, but just how do they do it? To find out, he studies the words in a butterfly book so many times that he can close his eyes and see the black letters, but he still can't understand their meaning. Illustrated with paintings as deep and rich as the wings of a butterfly, this honest, unsentimental account of a schoolchild's struggle to learn language reveals that our imaginations powerfully sustain us. La Mariposa makes a subtle plea for tolerance in our homes, our communities, and in our schools.

La Mariposa (Spanish)

“This sequel to Breaking Through and The Circuit again brings to the forefront the daily trials of poor immigrant families . . . compelling and honest.”—School Library Journal From the perspective of the young adult he was then, Francisco Jiménez describes the challenges he faced in his efforts to continue his education. During his college years, the very family solidarity that allowed Francisco to survive as a child is tested. Not only must he leave his family behind when he goes to Santa Clara University, but while Francisco is there, his father abandons the family and returns to Mexico. This is the story of how Francisco coped with poverty, with his guilt over leaving his family financially strapped, with his self-doubt about succeeding academically, and with separation. Once again his telling is honest, true, and inspiring A Smithsonian Magazine Best Book of the Year “Rooted in the past, Jiménez’s story is also about the continuing struggle to make it in America, not only for immigrant kids but also for those in poor families. Never melodramatic or self-important, the spare episodes will draw readers with the quiet daily detail of work, anger, sorrow, and hope.”—Booklist (starred review) “In this eloquent, transfixing account, Jiménez again achieves a masterful addition to the literature of the memoir.”—Smithsonian Magazine “No one who reads these life stories will forget them. Jiménez reaches out to let us walk in his shoes, feel his pain and pride, joy and sorrow, regrets and hope.”—Sacramento Bee

Rose M. Sune Beebe

Gary D. Keller

Viva la Lengua

"'La frontera'...I heard it for the first time back in the late 1940s when Papa and Mama told me and Roberto, my older brother, that someday we would take a long trip north, cross la frontera, enter California, and leave our poverty behind." So begins this honest and powerful account of a family's journey to the fields of California -- to a life of constant moving, from strawberry fields to cotton fields, from tent cities to one-room shacks, from picking grapes to topping carrots and thinning lettuce. Seen through the eyes of a boy who longs for an education and the right to call one palce home, this is a story of survival, faith, and hope. It is a journey that will open readers' hearts and minds.

Because he can only speak Spanish, Francisco, son of a migrant worker, has trouble when he begins first grade, but his fascination with the caterpillar in the classroom helps him begin to fit in.

La Mariposa

A la edad de catorce anos, Francisco Jiftrienez,/ junto con su madre y Roberto, su hermano mayor, es capturado por la migra. Obligada a abandonar su hogar en California, la familia entera viaja en autobus durante veinte horas, hasta llegar a la frontera mexicano-estadounidense en Nogales, Arizona, En los meses y anos subsiguientes, Francisco, su madre y su padre, asi como su hermana y sus cuatro hermanos, no solo luchan para mantener junta a su familia, sino que enfrentan tambien una aplastante pobreza, largas horas de trabajo y flagrantes prejuicios racistas. La manera en que ellos logran mantener su esperanza, tenacidad y generosa bondad se revela en esta emocionante continuacion de Cajas de carton. Sin amargura ni sentimentalismo, Francisco Jimenez termina de contar la historia de su juventud. Una vez mas -sus palabras, sencillas pero potentes, permitiran a los lectores abrir sus mentes y sus corazones.

Senderos fronterizos

At the age of fourteen, Francisco Jiménez, together with his older brother Roberto and his mother, are caught by la migra. Forced to leave their home in California, the entire family travels all night for twenty hours by bus, arriving at the U.S. and Mexican border in Nogales, Arizona. In the months and years that follow during the late 1950s-early 1960s, Francisco, his mother and father, and his seven brothers and sister not only struggle to keep their family together, but also face crushing poverty, long hours of labor, and blatant prejudice. How they sustain their hope, their good-heartedness, and tenacity is revealed in this moving, Pura Belpré Honor-winning sequel to The Circuit. Without bitterness or sentimentality, Francisco Jiménez finishes telling the story of his youth.

Francisco Jiménez

About

Books

Join the club