The son of American-born parents of Mexican background, Gary Soto was born on 12 April 1952 in Fresno, California. His father, also born in Fresno, was killed in an accident at work at the age of twenty-seven, when Soto was only five years old. Soto's grandparents, both born in Mexico, made their living in the United States from field and factory work. Soto grew up in the environs of the San Joaquin Valley, a social experience he described in an unpublished 27 May 1988 interview: "We grew up very Californians, like pochos.... Assimilation was looked upon as something for kids to go through." Upon graduation from high school in 1970 Soto decided to attend Fresno City College because he though he would not be able to get into California State University, Fresno. At Fresno City College he chose geography as a major, as he put it, "for no articulate reason except that I...