New Chicano Literature Manuel Ramos

L I T E R A T U R E New Chicano Literature Manuel Ramos Bruce Novoa* arcus Embry, a most astute young crit - ic of U.S. Latino literature, has insist - Med for the last few years that at this That novel anticipated one of the most in - moment when old-style Chicano writing seems to teresting characteristics of the more recen t have run its course, seeds of renovation can be spate of detective novels: the explora - found in the new boom in detective novels. About tion of the Hispano/Indio origin of the a decade ago, I presented a similar proposition to a U.S. Southwest. However, hardly any - group of European scholars, stating that Chicano one read The Waxen Image because it authors were using the detective genre to investi - did not conform to the sociopolitical con - gate the social and ideological circumstances of cerns of Chicano political activism. A de - their communities and in particular the history cade later, Rolando Hinojosa, an established of the Chicano civil rights movement. They ex - author with unassailable ethnic credentials, pres sed misgivings, questioning if a formulaic genre re-launched the genre with Partners like the detective novel could allow for serious com - in Crime: A Rafe Buenrostro Mys - mentary on socio-historical matters or even provide tery (1985) , a clear homage to reliable cultural information. Though I assured the Agatha Christie’s 1929 clas - them that in Latin America it already had done sic detective novel, but set in so, they remained unconvinced, especially since the South Texas Valley. Featuring there was relatively little production in the genre characters and setting familiar to by Chicanos at the time. Now, as Marcus Embry Hinojosa readers, they accepted it points out, we have no lack of titles by Chicano as another installment in his multi- writers. The other question —whether detective volume fictional history of Belkin writing can accommodate ideological commentary County. More recently Hinojosa re - and provide cultural data— is still to be explored. turned to the genre with Ask a Policeman Before addressing that question, a little back - (1998). Another pioneer of the contempo - ground may be appropriate. The mystery or crime rary Chicano novel, Rudy Anaya, entered the novel is not an entirely new phenomenon in Chi - detective field with Alburquerque (1992), the first cano literature. When contemporary Chicano lit - in a series of sleuthing adventures set in New erature was starting to solidify itself in the 1970s, Mexico. Significant as this context may be, the Rudy Apodaca published The Waxen Image (1977), Chicano detective novel is more associated with a mystery novel with an international setting that newer and younger novelists. ultimately focused on New Mexico in the search To explore Chicano detective writing three to resolve the disappearance of a main character. names are essential: Michael Nava, Lucha Corpi and Manuel Ramos. Each has an impressive bib - * Professor at the University of California at Irvine. liography, each has created one or more distinc - 115 Voices of Mexico • 65 tive investigators replete with their of murders forces Montez to reevaluate the 1960s own voice and life-style, each has killing of a student militant —metaphor for the staked out a milieu immediately death of idealism— he realizes that the accepted associated with their novels, explanation was false. In a pattern repeated in and each has achieved subsequent works, Montez discovers corruption recognition within infecting the very heart of Chicanismo. The mes - the genre with loy al sage is unavoidable: to survive, one must jettison readers who await naïve idealism and analyze the history of Chi ca - new adventures. These three writers have mas - no cultural nationalism and politics like a detec - tered the technical craft of the genre, so their books tive investigates a case, following the hard facts do not read like momentary forays into mys tery writ - wherever they lead. In his latest novels Ramos ing . Part of the pleasure derived from sleuthing includes the historical struggle over water rights texts is how they handle generic rules, another is dating back to the Mexican American war ( Brown - to encounter a writer who respects those expecta - on-Brown ) and the present Mexican drug and tions while introducing innovations. Nava, Corpi illegal immi gration trade ( Moony’s Road to Hell ), and Ramos balance formula against innovation. although the latter also features yet another rev - For me, Ramos, a native of Colorado, has cre - elation of corruption within the 1960s movement ated the most convincing total package. His fa - similar to the Rocky Ruiz novel. By inserting his - vorite sleuth is Luis Montez, a classic noire down- torical materials or current social problems Ramos and-outer, a middle-aged lawyer tottering on the allows readers to consider them in summary fash - edge of professional and personal failure. A blend ion , like a sleuth might peruse the facts gathered of reluctant realist and sentimental soft touch, for him by his diligent assistant. A pattern of strug - he is an easy mark for physically well-endowed gle by the Mexican-American community emerges women, especially if they are intelligent. Ramos’ in which despite great odds it survives and even other protagonist, Danny “Moony” Mora, a full- prospers. However, Ramos refreshingly avoids fledged private investigator, is much harder edged the simplistic binary of we/good versus they/evil. than Montez, less sentimental, more calculating, His sleuths find Chicanos on both sides of the and not plagued by Montez’s self-effacing re grets . equation, and at times it seems that the entire cast Where Montez’s environment is endearingly chaot - is Mexican American. In effect, some ic and messy, Mora’s is ordered and intentional. of his worst villains are vatos from Yet despite themselves, both get swept into in - the old neighborhood. Worse vestigating violent crimes that threaten them and still, others are powerful, res - their intimate circle with death —just like the pected, and even beloved com - would-be screen writer of “Murder Movie,” the munity figures. While old story included in this issue. Naturally, survival guard Chicano activists pro - depends on solving the case in time. And every - duce nostalgic panegyrics where beautiful, sexy strangers stand —or lie— to the movement, Ramos in their way. So much for fidelity to the demands provides a much more rea l - of the genre. istic appraisal. Yet his pro - Like his predecessors mentioned above, Ra mos tagonists were once, and still laces his plots with historical elements, providing would like to be, idealists; readers with implicit commentary on Chicano cul - they too yearn for that flash tural development. The Ballad of Rocky Ruiz , his of optimism we called the first novel (Irvine Prize for Li terature in 1992), 60s, but Ramos’ plots keep reads like a response to a nagging question: why confronting them with incon - did the Chicano Movement fail? When a series trovertible reminders of its betray - 116 Literature al, much too often at the hands of are neither excluded from any level of society nor people from their own ethnic do they pretend to be uneducated or unsophisti - community. cated. As Ramos interweaves histor - Marcus Embry likes to cite a passage from Moony’s ical and social observations with Road to Hell where Ramos describes his detec - quickly paced plots, punctuated tive’s bookcase, laden with well-read volumes. A with the requisite violence and sex, few titles appear: “ The Silver Cloud Café . The he steadily provides glimpses of a Drunken Boat . …y no se lo tragó la tierra . The Poet specific site, the Denver metroplex and in New York . White Leg ”. What does it mean for its surroundings that include northern New Chicano culture, Embry posits, that Ramos’ de tec - Mexico. Writing a series set in one location tive stores modern, canonized classics by Rim - allows him to build up what anthropologists call baud and Lorca amid three Chicano novels as if a thick description of locale. The detective’s eye they were equals in the space of intellectual pro - for detail lends itself to rich documentation, but duction? This is not the place to decipher the books that eye here is always Chicano, the fibers of his as clues to the novel’s outcome —which they are— intense weave tinted with an ethnic tonality new just to point out Ramos’ insistence that Chicano to the U.S. detective novel. Readers come to rec - literature accepts no boundaries, no cultural stereo - ognize Denver like a familiar landscape, experi - typing. As with the best examples of universal - encing at street level its rise into an international ized art, while set in clearly identifiable places, destination as well as a leading model for urban with localized characters, the result is open and development over the last decades of the past cen - limitless. tury. This transformation into a world-class city coin - cided with the rise of its Chicano population into a major player in the city’s life. It also coincided with the rise to prominence of the Mexican drug SOURCES CITED cartel, giving some of Ramos’ novel an inter natio nal dimension ripe with crime motifs. Denver becomes a space experienced through a Chicano lens. Anaya, Rodolfo A., Albuquerque (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1992). While so much Chicano literature is still bog ge d Apodaca, Rudy S., The Waxen Image (Mesilla, N.M.: Titan down in the pretense that we are all poor, Ra - Publishing Company, 1977). mos opens a window onto the burgeoning Chi cano Hinojosa, Rolando, Partners In Crime: A Rafe Buenrostro middle class. True, his plots often lead readers Mystery (Houston: Arte Público Press, 1985).

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