LUIS J. RODRIGUEZ
Poet, Author, Critic

Luis J. Rodriguez has emerged as one of the leading Chicano writers in the country with ten nationally published books. He is best known for his 1993 memoir of gang life, Always Running: La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A. Luis’ poetry has won a Poetry Center Book Award, a PEN Josephine Miles Literary Award, and “Foreword” magazine’s Silver Book Award, among others. His two children’s books have won a Patterson Young Adult Book Award, two “Skipping Stones” Honor Award, and a Parent’s Choice Book Award, among others. A new novel, Music of the Mill, was published in the spring of 2005 by Rayo/HarperCollins; a poetry collection, My Nature is Hunger: New & Selected Poems, 1989-2004, came out in the fall of 2005 from Curbstone Press/Rattle Edition.

Luis J. Rodriguez's 1993 memoir of gang life, Always Running: La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A., an international best seller, also garnered a Carl Sandburg Literary Award, a Chicago Sun-Times Book Award, and was designated a New York Times Notable Book. Written as a cautionary tale for Luis' then 15-year-old son Ramiro who had joined a Chicago gang, the memoir has been praised from youth and teachers alike. Despite this, the American Library Association in 1999 called Always Running one of the ten most censored books in the United States. Efforts to remove his books from public school libraries and reading lists have occurred in Illinois, Michigan, Texas, and in California, where the battles were quite heated. Yet for all the controversy, Luis has gained the respect of the literary community.

Click here to read what Luis says to critics who say "Always Running,"doesn't belong in the classroom.For a complete listing of Luis Rodriquez's works, his awards and major media appearances and reviews, click here.

Luis J. Rodriguez's poetry collection, My Nature is Hunger: New & Selected Poems 1989 - 2004 (Curbstone Press/Rattle Edition) has won the 2006 Paterson Poetry Prize from the Poetry Center of Passaic County Community College in Paterson, New Jersey. Rodriguez was one of five US poets to be officially invited to take part in the World Poetry Festival in Caracas, Venezuela, from July 17 to 21, 2006.

Luis J. Rodriguez's novel Music of the Mill (Rayo/HarperCollins) received a 2006 Eighth Annual International Latino Book Award in the Best Novel--Historical Fiction category (one of three). The Latino Book Awards is sponsored by Latino Literary Now and was announced on May 20, 2006 at the Washington Convention Center in Washington DC in conjunction with 2006 Book Expo America, co-hosted by the Latino Book & Family Festival.

His poetry won a Poetry Center Book Award, a PEN Josephine Miles Literary Award, and "Foreword" magazine's Silver Book Award, among others. His two children's books have won a Patterson Young Adult Book Award, two "Skipping Stones" Honor Award, and a Parent's Choice Book Award, among others. 

Luis is also known for helping start prominent organizations -- such as Chicago's Guild Complex, one of the largest literary arts organization in the Midwest, and its publishing wing, Tia Chucha Press. He is one of the founders of Youth Struggling for Survival, a Chicago-based not-for-profit community group working with gang and nongang youth. Most recently, he helped start Rock A Mole (rhymes with guacamole) Productions, which produces music/arts festivals, CDs, and film in Los Angeles. He is also working with three other partners to create Tia Chucha's Café Cultural--a bookstore, coffee shop, performance space, art gallery, and computer center for the northeast San Fernando Valley.

Luis has spent twenty years conducting workshops, readings, and talks in prisons, juvenile facilities, homeless shelters, migrant camps, universities, public and private schools, conferences, Native American reservations, and men's retreats throughout the United States. He has also traveled to Canada, Europe, Mexico, Central America, and Puerto Rico doing similar work among disaffected populations.

Luis has been part of the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation's Men's Conferences since 1994 with Mosaic founder Michael Meade, West African teacher-elder Malidoma Some and American Buddhist Jack Kornfield. At these conferences, the complex but vital issues of race, class, gender, and personal rage are addressed with dialogue, ritual, story, poetry, and art involving men of all walks of life, including those in urban street gangs.

Luis' work has also been widely anthologized, including in Letters of a Nation: A Collection of Extraordinary American Letters (1997 Broadway Books/Kodansha American), and most recently in the Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (1999 Thunder's Mouth Press). His poems and articles have appeared in college and high school textbooks throughout the United States and Europe. He has done radio productions and writing for L.A.'s KPFK-FM, California Public Radio as well as Chicago's WMAQ-AM's All-News radio and WBEZ-FM. And his writings have appeared over the last twenty years in The Nation, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, U.S. News & World Report, L.A. Weekly, Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine, San Jose Mercury, Grand Street, Utne Reader, Prison Life, Rock & Rap Confidential, among others.

Call 1-800-691-6888, e-mail info@speakersforanewamerica.com, or visit our web site at speakersforanewamerica.com for more information.

On September 11, 2006, Rodriguez participated in a PBS-TV round-table discussion on the attacks of 9/11, on the Newshour with Jim Lehrer. You can read a transcript and listen to an audio file of the broadcast by clicking here.