Cisneros Celebrates Macondo

wenty-five years ago author Sandra Cisneros founded the Macondo Writers Workshop when she invited eight people to convene in the kitchen of her San Antonio, Texas, home. Today the event gathers writers of varying genres and backgrounds every summer for a weeklong master’s-level workshop at Texas A&M and boasts an active community of more than two hundred alumni Macondistas. (This Macondo holds as its mission “to inspire and challenge one another in order to incite change in our respective communities.” The recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships and a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, Cisneros exemplifies that mission with her work as an activist, teacher, and writer. Her classic coming-of-age novel, , has sold more than six million copies since it was published by Arte Público Press in 1984. She recently spoke about Macondo’s origins and impact.