1926 Novel El Sol De Texas Finally Translated To English. Turns Out We Probably Won’t Read It.

Conrado Espinoza’s 1926 novel El Sol de Texas has just been translated to English as Under The Texas Sun and The Texas Observer reporter Michele Wucker saves us time reading it by describing it thusly:

A Tex-Mex precursor to The Grapes of Wrath, published 13 years later, Under the Texas Sun similarly uses the travails of migrant worker families to drive home a social message. John Steinbeck’s chronicle of migrant workers spoke to the importance of worker solidarity in the face of adversity. Espinoza’s message, ironically, is one that might resonate with today’s Minuteman border-patrol volunteers: The only good border-crossing by Mexican migrant laborers is the kind that heads back to Mexico.

But, why, you might ask, would anyone hate the good old US of A? Says Wucker:

[In the book], the Garcías represent a cautionary tale for immigrants who might embrace the melting pot. They stay in Texas, only to see their daughter succumb to the corrupting U.S. culture with its “floozy stockings” and “provocative” hats. For Espinoza, the land where all the gringos seem to be giants has nothing but negative influence on immigrants, who arrived on U.S. soil and immediately “all threw themselves headlong into dreaming about instant gratification.” He writes disparagingly of pochos—overassimilated Mexican-Americans: “There are many families that, in terms of appearance, have lost their Mexican identity and are in terms of language (horrible Spanish and horrible English), in terms of their customs (grotesque and licentious); in terms of their desires (futile and fatuous ambitions); a hybrid group which adapts itself neither in this country nor in our own.”

Sounds like Espinoza might have had his girlfriend in her floozy hat stolen by some of our pocho ancestors. Hell hath no fury like a Mexican Nationalist scorned.