Dramatist Sylvia Maida Domínguez was born and grew up in the Rio Grande valley of south Texas, the site of most of her later creative endeavors. Her parents, Jesús J. Vásquez and Adela de la Garza Vásquez, were also natives of this borderland region of Texas where the cultural heritage of neighboring Mexico informs the work of local writers, of whom Domínguez is among the most active.

As a child, the eldest of four girls, Sylvia spent many happy summers on a farm with her favorite aunts in nearby Peñitas, Texas, where her creative talent was encouraged. She recalls that she found an outlet for her dramatic energy in devising plots for las comadritas, a children's game involving the re-creation of everyday scenes. Between the fourth and eighth grades in her mission parochial school, she was...