Alicia Morel Chaigneau (26 July 1921 – 1 March 2017) was a

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

an writer, novelist, storyteller, poet, and essayist best known for her work in the field of

children's literature Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's ...

and theater for children and puppets.

Biography

Early years

Alicia Morel was born on 26 July 1921, to a very well-educated family in which she was the eldest of six children. From a very young age she was extremely interested in literature. Her favorite authors were

Oscar Wilde Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is ...

Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequel ...

Hans Christian Andersen Hans Christian Andersen ( , ; 2 April 1805 – 4 August 1875) was a Danish author. Although a prolific writer of plays, travelogues, novels, and poems, he is best remembered for his literary fairy tales. Andersen's fairy tales, consisti ...

Charles Perrault Charles Perrault ( , also , ; 12 January 1628 – 16 May 1703) was an iconic French author and member of the Académie Française. He laid the foundations for a new literary genre, the fairy tale, with his works derived from earlier folk tales ...

, the

Brothers Grimm The Brothers Grimm ( or ), Jacob (1785–1863) and Wilhelm (1786–1859), were a brother duo of German academics, philologists, cultural researchers, lexicographers, and authors who together collected and published folklore. They are among the ...

, and

Selma Lagerlöf Selma Ottilia Lovisa Lagerlöf (, , ; 20 November 1858 – 16 March 1940) was a Swedish author. She published her first novel, ''Gösta Berling's Saga'', at the age of 33. She was the first woman to win the 1909 Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Pr ...

, and their work formed the basis of her inspiration to write stories. She also felt a great fascination for the outdoors and nature, and she often observed and studied insects, trees, flowers, and the climate when she went out to play with her siblings and explore in the vicinity of their home. Her father is described as a generous, tender, and authoritarian man, who used to play the cello. The family went through numerous changes throughout Alicia's childhood. As the years went on, she learned to play the piano and began to write her first stories and poems. These were based in the

Cajón del Maipo Cajón del Maipo is a canyon located in the Andean southeastern portion of the Santiago Metropolitan Region, Chile. It encompasses the upper Maipo River basin, where the river has entrenched itself in a narrow valley. The zone features a series ...

, a place she frequented for its natural beauty. At age 12 she discovered that her vocation was to write. She was encouraged in this by Jorge Zuloaga, a family friend who provided her with books by authors such as

James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...

Katherine Mansfield Kathleen Mansfield Murry (née Beauchamp; 14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923) was a New Zealand writer, essayist and journalist, widely considered one of the most influential and important authors of the modernist movement. Her works are celebra ...

, and González Vera.

Literary career

In 1938, at the young age of 16, Morel began her literary work with a family-published poetry book entitled ''En el campo y la ciudad'', and after this she ventured into various genres such as novels, poetry, ', Chilean legends, and children's stories. Four years later, Zuloaga invited her to an awards ceremony for the writer

Francisco Coloane Francisco Coloane Cárdenas (; July 19, 1910 – August 5, 2002) was a Chilean novelist and short fiction writer whose works have been translated into many languages. Some of his books were adapted to theatre and film. Biography He was born in ...

, for his most famous work, '. During this time she worked as a physician's assistant, as she had a great devotion to curing the sick. She also repaired and bound old books. In 1951, she published her poetry collection ''Como una raíz de agua'', and made a cultural trip to Europe, where she met

Gabriela Mistral Lucila Godoy Alcayaga (; 7 April 1889 – 10 January 1957), known by her pseudonym Gabriela Mistral (), was a Chilean poet-diplomat, educator and humanist. In 1945 she became the first Latin American author to receive a Nobel Prize in Lite ...

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, Italy, whom she described as having an aura of strong solitude. She collaborated with other writers, such as

Marcela Paz Marcela Paz (February 28, 1902 – June 12, 1985) was the pen name of Esther Huneeus Ramos Falla Salas de Claro, a Chilean writer. She also used the pen names of Paula de la Sierra, Lukim Retse, P. Neka and Juanita Godoy. She was a recipient of the ...

on ''Perico trepa por Chile'', which was adapted for the theater in 2012. During the 1950s, two of Morel's best-known characters were born in ''La Hormiguita Cantora y el Duende Melodía'', whose stories "were transmitted from 1954 to 1957 sradio-adapted editions for children on and Radio Cooperativa Vitalicia, ..adventures which were published in 1956 and 1957." These stories would later be illustrated by her friend, artist . Around this time she also began to visit schools, where she put on puppet shows, presenting more than 15 stories with dozens of characters. Morel was one of the founders of

International Board on Books for Young People The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) is an international non-profit organization committed to bringing books and children together. The headquarters of the IBBY are located in Basel, Switzerland. IBBY history In 1952, Jella Lepm ...

(IBBY) of Chile, together with writers Lucía Gevert Parada, Marcela Paz, and Maité Allamand, among others. She served as vice president of this institution during its early years. She also collaborated on various educational projects, creating a magazine for the ASIMET Compensation Fund and writing for the biannual magazine ''El Volantín''.

Awards and recognition

During her professional career, Morel received several honors, among them the Order of Merit of the World Council of Education in 1989 and two tributes to her career, at the 21st International Fair of Children's and Young Adult Books in 2007 and the Iberoamerican Congress of Language and Children's and Young Adult Literature (''Congreso iberoamericano de lengua y literatura infantil y juvenil''; CILELJ) in 2010. In the latter year she was selected to represent Chile at the

Hans Christian Andersen Award The Hans Christian Andersen Awards are two literary awards given by the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY), recognising one living author and one living illustrator for their "lasting contribution to children's literature". Th ...

Personal life

Alicia Morel's sister Eduardo Morel Chaignau was the aunt of

Cecilia Morel Montes María Cecilia Morel Montes (born 14 January 1954) is the wife of the former President of Chile Sebastián Piñera, and as such is the former First Lady of Chile. Morel was also the Director of the Sociocultural Area of the Presidency during b ...

, the

First Lady of Chile The First Lady of Chile ( es, Primera Dama de Chile) is the title for the wife of the president of Chile, who is traditionally responsible for directing and coordinating activities in the social field of the presidency and also accompany the presi ...

from 2010 to 2014. Morel married politician William Thayer Arteaga, with whom she had seven children.

Works

Poetry

* 1938: ''En el campo y la ciudad'' * 1951: ''Como una raíz de agua'' * 1990: ''El árbol de los cielos'' * 2007: ''Color del tiempo''

Novels

* 1940: ''Juanilla, Juanillo y la Abuela'' * 1965: ''El jardín de Dionisio'' * 1978: ''Perico trepa por Chile'' (as coauthor with

) * 1988: ''El viaje de los duendes al otro lado del mundo'' * 2001: ''El fabricante de risas'' * 2001: ''La conquista del rocío'' * 2002: ''El viaje de los invisibles'' * 2010: ''Espejos Paralelos''

Short stories

* 1973: ''Cuentos de la Pícara Polita'' * 1978: ''Nuestros cuentos'' (anthology of Chilean authors) * 1983: ''Cuentos Araucanos, La gente de la Tierra'' * 1983: ''La noche en la ventana'' * 1985: ''Polita va a la escuela'' * 1996: ''Polita en el bosque * 1999: ''Las manchas de Vinca'' * 2004: ''Mozart cuenta la Flauta Mágica, cuento'' * 2007: ''Travesuras de Polita'' * 2008: ''El Cururo incomprendido'' * 2010: ''El secreto del caracol'' * 1991: ''Polita aprende el mundo'' * 1991: ''La Hoja Viajera'' * 1991: ''Cuentos de tesoros y monedas de oro'' * 1992: ''Una aguja y un dedal'' * 1993: ''Cuentos de la lluvia'' * 1994: ''Aventuras del Duende Melodía'' * 1994: ''El baile de los cantaritos'' * 1994: ''La cartera azul y Amigos del bosque'' * 1978: ''El Increíble Mundo de Llanca'' * 1995: ''El cururo incomprendido'' * 2015: ''Cuentos de la Panchita''

Translations

* 1990: Translation of ''

The King of the Golden River ''The King of the Golden River or The Black Brothers: A Legend of Stiria'' is a fantasy story originally written in 1841 by John Ruskin for the twelve-year-old Effie (Euphemia) Gray, whom Ruskin later married. It was published in book form in ...

'' by John Ruskin * 1981: Translation of ''

The Little Prince ''The Little Prince'' (french: Le Petit Prince, ) is a novella by French aristocrat, writer, and military pilot Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It was first published in English and French in the United States by Reynal & Hitchcock in April 1943 an ...

'', by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry * 1982: Translation of '' The Garden Party'' by Katherine Mansfield

Other

* 1956: ''La Hormiguita Cantora y el Duende Melodía'' * 1977: ''¿Quién soy?'' (essay) * 1984: ''Los viajes misteriosos de María'' (essay) * 1986: ''La flauta encantada'' (puppetry and theater for children) * 1990: ''Variaciones Literarias'' (essays on

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...

and Katherine Mansfield) * 1991: ''Hagamos títeres'' (teaching text and five works for puppets) * 1995: ''La Era del Sueño'' (essay) * 1996: ''Leyendas bajo la Cruz del Sur'' * 2004: ''La Biblia contada para ti'' (as coauthor with ) * 2005: ''La última polilla del otoño'' * 2006: ''Una mariposa en apuros, El baile del Picaflor'' * 2007: ''Polita en el bosque'' * 2009: ''El Paraguas mágico'' * 2009: ''Polita Aprende el mundo y Polita va a la escuela''

References

External links

Alicia Morel
at the

Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes The Miguel de Cervantes Virtual Library (MCVL; in es, Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, BVMC) is a large-scale digital library project, hosted and maintained by the University of Alicante in Alicante, Spain. It comprises the largest open-acc ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morel, Alicia 1921 births 2017 deaths 20th-century Chilean women writers 20th-century Chilean dramatists and playwrights 21st-century Chilean women writers 21st-century Chilean dramatists and playwrights Chilean women dramatists and playwrights Chilean people of French descent Chilean women essayists Chilean women poets 20th-century Chilean poets 21st-century Chilean poets