Gregg Barrios's many talents and wide range of interests have found expression in the novel, the short story, poetry, the critical essay, and journalism, this last constituting the bulk of his writing. However, it is as a poet that he assumes the most importance, by giving voice to the Chicano community spirit in simple, unrhymed, everyday language that captures the humor, mood, and tempo of life in the barrio. Characteristic of Barrios is the re-creation of situations with images and characters that move within a real-life, Chicano sociocultural context. Throughout Barrios's work the common person is given larger-than-life dimensions, and the poems are often an exaltation of life and of human values.

Born in Victoria, Texas, on Halloween 1945, Barrios is the son of a Mexican photographer, Gregorio Barrios, Sr., and Eva Falcón, a Texan. The young Gregg Barrios's interests in the movies and rock-and-roll music were...