Don Luis Leal

Leal recounts his experiences as a child of the Mexican Revolution, recalling the entrance of Villa and Zapata into Mexico City. He describes his life in Chicago from 1927 to 1943 and then in the Philippines as a member of the American armed forces. He also discusses his academic career and his contributions to Chicano literary criticism. The unusual format of a conversation between two friends gives readers a taste of the tertulias that Don Luis hosts, at which colleagues, friends, and students discuss literature, life, and art, thus reviving the Hispanic tradition of the literary circle.