Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez: An Autobiography

Here is the poignant journey is a "minority student" who pays the cost of his social assimilation and academic success with a painful alienation - from his past, his parents, his culture - and so describes the high price of "making it" in middle class America.

Provocative in its positions on affirmative action and bilingual education, Hunger of Memory is a powerful political statement, a profound study of the importance of language... and the moving, intimate portrait of a boy struggling to become a man.