Sandra Cisneros’ New Novel ‘Martita, I Remember You’ Is A Love Letter To The Ones Left Behind

Sandra Cisnero, author

You could not imagine how hard I was wracked with nerves before my interview with Sandra Cisneros. It was one of my first full-hour interviews for Town Square with Ernie Manouse.

The House on Mango Street was required reading when I was in elementary school. Cisneros’ characters live well before and long after they appear as sentences in her stories. For me, Mango Street was the first true reflection of myself in media- one that wasn’t exaggerated for comedy or relegated to the background of someone else’s greater, richer, and, frankly, whiter main character.

If her characters were housekeepers or lived in the barrio, it wasn’t for flavor or as a plot point- it was the plot.

So to spend an hour with Cisneros discussing her life and work was not only surprising but surreal. Before the interview, I even caught myself wondering if maybe I was a character she had written in some old notebook tucked away as some ten-year-old reader in me with more imagination than professionalism resurfaced to shake my arm.

After all, I was a Latina who grew up in the barrio, who knew women who hollered at creeks and reflected on their lifelong friendships, who scrubbed rich homes alongside my mother and resented it, then later admired it. Especially now, when I still struggle to remove a makeup stain from a white shirt, I’m sure my mother would have made it disappear with just the right amount of jabón y ándale.

In the first few minutes of the interview, I sat in the strangeness of the moment before fully slipping into my role as an interviewer. Looking back, it remains one of my favorite conversations. Cisneros was a captivating and generous subject - a reminder that world-shapers come in all forms, including the books waiting quietly on a shelf.

You can listen to our interview here:
The “Godmother of Chicana literature” discusses her latest work, the value of solitude, travel, and more.