Cover of The Revolt of the Cockroach People

The Revolt of the Cockroach People

by Oscar Zeta Acosta · 1973

Chicano seriesbook 2 of 2

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The further adventures of "Dr. Gonzo" as he defends the "cucarachas" — the Chicanos of East Los Angeles.

Before his mysterious disappearance and probable death in 1971, Oscar Zeta Acosta was famous as a Robin Hood Chicano lawyer and notorious as the real-life model for Hunter S. Thompson's "Dr. Gonzo" a fat, pugnacious attorney with a gargantuan appetite for food, drugs, and life on the edge.

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In this exhilarating sequel to The Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo, Acosta takes us behind the front lines of the militant Chicano movement of the late sixties and early seventies, a movement he served both in the courtroom and on the barricades. Here are the brazen games of "chicken" Acosta played against the Anglo legal establishment; battles fought with bombs as well as writs; and a reluctant hero who faces danger not only from the police but from the vatos locos he champions. What emerges is at once an important political document of a genuine popular uprising and a revealing, hilarious, and moving personal saga.

Setting
1970s1970sMore like thisLess of thisCaliforniaCaliforniaMore like thisLess of thisLos AngelesLos AngelesMore like thisLess of thisLatin AmericaLatin AmericaMore like thisLess of this
Subject
biographybiographyMore like thisLess of thishistoryhistoryMore like thisLess of thismemoirmemoirMore like thisLess of this
Audience
adult
Length
medium · 272 pages

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Liked The Revolt of the Cockroach People? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked The Revolt of the Cockroach People. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Barrio Boy Ernesto Galarza · 1971 Shares latino literature, memoir, fiction
  2. The Joke's Over: Ralph Steadman on Hunter S. Thompson Ralph Steadman · 2006 Shares gonzo, nonfiction, biography
  3. Zoot Suit and Other Plays Luis Valdez · 1992 Shares fiction, Latin America
  4. Gonzo Hunter S. Thompson · 2006 Shares gonzo, nonfiction, biography
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“People who read The Revolt of the Cockroach People tend to reach for these next.”

  1. George Washington Gomez: A Mexicotexan Novel Americo Paredes · 1990
  2. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos Rodolfo F. Acuna · 1981
  3. Drink Cultura: Chicanismo Jose Antonio Burciaga · 1992
  4. Emplumada (Pitt Poetry Series) Lorna Dee Cervantes · 1981

“If you want more of the same (biography), start with these.”

  1. Sex and Rage Eve Babitz · 1979
  2. Eve's Hollywood Eve Babitz · 1974
  3. Pseudo Romain Gary · 1976
  4. Kafka's Other Trial: The Letters to Felice Elias Canetti · 1974

“If it was the gonzo that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. The Gonzo Way: A Celebration of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson Anita Thompson · 2007
  2. Living Up The Street Gary Soto, Strawberry Hill Press · 1985
  3. Tales of the Weirrd Ralph Steadman · 1990
  4. Junior Macaulay Culkin · 2006

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. Happy Birthday, Jack Nicholson Hunter S. Thompson · 2005
  2. The Wild Irish Robin Maxwell · 2003
  3. The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time Hunter S. Thompson · 1979
  4. Hippie Dictionary: A Cultural Encyclopedia of the 1960s and 1970s John Bassett McCleary · 2002

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