Mesa, Ariz.
In the new book “The Cisco Kid: American Hero, Hispanic Roots,” co-authors Gary D. Keller and Francis M. Nevins trail the history of the character, from his initial creation outside the Hispanic world to his Hollywood interpretation as a Latino persona, Arizona State University’ s Bilingual Press announced.
This is one of about 10 books that will be published this year by the Bilingual Press at ASU. As the largest Hispanic-focused publisher and distributor in the country, the Bilingual Press was founded in 1973 at the City College of New York and moved to ASU in 1985.
Keller and Nevins argue that mainstream American culture and the Hispanic community made the character into a cultural phenomenon, producing a new persona, what Keller, director of the Hispanic Research Center at ASU, refers to as a “noble bandit,” a robber and outlaw elevated to the status of avenger and champion of social justice. His colleague Nevins is a professor at St. Louis University School of Law.
“This notion is continually exemplified through the Cisco Kid films and more recently with the movie ‘The Cisco Kid,’ made in 1994 by Luis Valdez. It starred Jimmy Smits and Cheech Marin and made the Cisco Kid into a proto-Chicano,” says Keller.
That character – the Cisco Kid – first appeared in the 1907 short story “The Caballero’s Way” by American writer O. Henry. Originally, the character was not portrayed Mexican, but a murderous Anglo, possibly modeled after Billy the Kid, the authors said.
The first sound film featuring the Cisco Kid in 1929 titled “In Old Arizona,” was also the first time “Spanglish” was used in a movie, further cementing the character in Hispanic culture, the authors said.
