When Zeta met Hunter and rascuache became gonzo

Writer Greg Barrios on the Brown Buffalo and giving credit where credit is due.

“Zeta was a very important person,” [poet Raul] Salinas told an interviewer, “an optimist, a dreamer, always encouraging things to change. But the Anglo establishment exploited his talent. In his case it was Hunter Thompson. That guy stole Brown Buffalo’s gonzo style; he turned it into mass-produced merchandise.”

“Is Zeta a hero? A myth?” Salinas told an Acosta biographer. “I guess it depends on whom you ask. The older Chicano generation has a deep affection for Brown Buffalo, but young people know very little, if anything, about him. Tú sabes? They know almost nothing about el movimiento.”

Read AN EXCERPT from Acosta’s The Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo at Xicano Poetry Daily.