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Always Running by Luis J. Rodríguez

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Always Running by Luis J. Rodríguez Empty Always Running by Luis J. Rodríguez

Post  Drunky McThuggerton Sun Aug 19, 2012 10:50 pm

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I read this book in high school. It was required in one of my classes, cant remember which one it was tho. good book, it had a different cover too.
heres a synopsis i found online:
"By age twelve, Luis Rodriguez was a veteran of East L.A. gang warfare. Lured by a seemingly invincible gang culture, he witnessed countless shootings, beatings, and arrests, then watched with increasing fear as drugs, murder, suicide, and senseless acts of street crime claimed friends and family members. Before long Rodriguez saw a way out of the barrio through education and the power of words, and successfully broke free from years of violence and desperation. Achieving success as an award-winning Chicano poet, he was sure the streets would haunt him no more -- until his young son joined a gang. Rodriguez fought for his child by telling his own story in Always Running, a vivid memoir that explores the motivations of gang life and cautions against the death and destruction that inevitably claim its participants. At times heartbreakingly sad and brutal, Always Running is ultimately an uplifting true story, filled with hope, insight, and a hard-earned lesson for the next generation."

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Post  Guest Mon Dec 03, 2012 3:43 am

I read this because I read his book about stories from LA, but the title escapes me. I enjoyed it, so I decided to get this book too. I was really enjoying it until he left his gang. At first he made it seem as though his friends thought it was no big deal when he dropped out and started working at school. The play he did at school did not seem real to me either. I know he was shot at, but it seemed so much later after his drop out and the play. I know the timeline is sped up and things are changed as per editors and for the general public. I guess I was just disappointed by this change that it sort of ruined the end of the book for me.

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Post  wolfman Mon Dec 03, 2012 11:18 pm

the way i read it, rodriguez was never really in it., he was always looking in from the outside
never really a member of the gang core., but always just "witnessing" it
that ^ ^ to me ("witnessed it" or "lived it") are two diff things., either you really lived it, or you just saw it
two whole diff things
i think rodriguez saw it all happen, but was just outside of it
~> in the true "gang" sense of it
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Post  Guest Tue Dec 04, 2012 12:31 am

I like that idea. However, according to Rodriguez at the end of the preface, he states "This work is not fiction, yet there are people I don't want hurt by having their names and stories made public. I've changed names and synthesized events and circumstances in keeping with the intergrity of a literary, dramatic work, as an artist does in striving for that rare instance when, as a critic once said, 'something of beauty collides with something of truth'"
Page 11 of the above picture 2005
I read it the opposite as you did. I don't know if this preface was in the earlier editions. This is way I read the "story" as I did. Thanks for your input. Maybe it would also look different to a person who lived the lifestlye he is trying to describe.

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Post  wolfman Tue Dec 04, 2012 1:31 am

jennierock wrote:I like that idea. However, according to Rodriguez at the end of the preface, he states "This work is not fiction, yet there are people I don't want hurt by having their names and stories made public. I've changed names and synthesized events and circumstances in keeping with the intergrity of a literary, dramatic work, as an artist does in striving for that rare instance when, as a critic once said, 'something of beauty collides with something of truth'"
Page 11 of the above picture 2005
I read it the opposite as you did. I don't know if this preface was in the earlier editions. This is way I read the "story" as I did. Thanks for your input. Maybe it would also look different to a person who lived the lifestlye he is trying to describe.

of course his narrative is not fiction
he saw it., he witnessed it
so he understood it
but he didn't live it like a bonafide generational varrio gangster lived it
he wrote what he felt coming in from the outside and growing up
but he was never really 100% raised in it
if he was, he would either be dead, locked up.,
or never talk about it and be moved on
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Post  Guest Tue Dec 04, 2012 1:52 am

That is why I originally questioned his story. It didn't seem as though he would be able to easily flow in and out of his gang as his book suggests. When I read certain parts I had to question how deeply involved he was with his friends. Most of the time, you are right, he is an outsider. He makes himself less involved when his friends are breaking laws. He is always passed out or too out of it to be a part of it. Which does read as though he was just on the edge of the lifestyle he claims to be fully involved in.
I never realized that last part till you mentioned it. Thanks. I like the book now more so because it makes more sense that he lived there and was around all this gang activity, but was never deeply involved.

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Post  Forum Gawd Tue Dec 04, 2012 11:08 am

Lol at People That Think Luis Rodriguez Was A Success When he Still Lives In a Shaq Like Homie In Chicago!!
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