Always Running

by

Luis J. Rodriguez

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Always Running makes teaching easy.
Ramiro is Luis Rodriguez’s son (named, it would seem, after Chente Ramírez, Luis’s beloved mentor). Ramiro appears in the memoir’s first and final chapters. At first, he’s portrayed as a teenaged delinquent who hates his father and feels a thirst for crime and violence. In the final chapter, however, Luis shows that Ramiro has made great strides toward getting his life under control, having come to terms with his abusive stepfathers and, much like Luis himself, turned to poetry and music as outlets for his frustrations. By his own admission, Luis wrote his memoir in order to convince Ramiro not to embrace the life of a gang member, as Luis himself did when he was Ramiro’s age.

Ramiro Quotes in Always Running

The Always Running quotes below are all either spoken by Ramiro or refer to Ramiro. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Gangs and Crime Theme Icon
).
Preface Quotes

Following me, Ramiro was a second-generation gang member. My involvement was in the late 1960s and early 1970s in Los Angeles, the so-called gang capital of the country. My teen years were ones of drugs, shootings and beatings, and arrests. I was around when South Central Los Angeles gave birth to the Crips and Bloods. By the time I turned 18 years old, 25 of my friends had been killed by rival gangs, police, drugs, car crashes and suicides.

Related Characters: Luis Rodriguez (speaker), Ramiro
Page Number: 4
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Always Running LitChart as a printable PDF.
Always Running PDF

Ramiro Quotes in Always Running

The Always Running quotes below are all either spoken by Ramiro or refer to Ramiro. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Gangs and Crime Theme Icon
).
Preface Quotes

Following me, Ramiro was a second-generation gang member. My involvement was in the late 1960s and early 1970s in Los Angeles, the so-called gang capital of the country. My teen years were ones of drugs, shootings and beatings, and arrests. I was around when South Central Los Angeles gave birth to the Crips and Bloods. By the time I turned 18 years old, 25 of my friends had been killed by rival gangs, police, drugs, car crashes and suicides.

Related Characters: Luis Rodriguez (speaker), Ramiro
Page Number: 4
Explanation and Analysis: