Clara Isabel Alegría Vides (May 12, 1924 – January 25, 2018), also known by her pseudonym Claribel Alegría, was a Nicaraguan-Salvadoran poet, essayist, novelist, and journalist who was a major voice in the literature of contemporary
Central America
Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...
. She was awarded the 2006
Neustadt International Prize for Literature
The Neustadt International Prize for Literature is a biennial award for literature sponsored by the University of Oklahoma and its international literary publication, ''World Literature Today''. It is considered one of the more prestigious inte ...
.
Biography
Alegría was born in
Estelí
Estelí (), officially Villa de San Antonio de Pavia de Estelí is a city and municipality within the Estelí department. It is the 3rd largest city in Nicaragua due to the high urbanization of its municipality, at 83%, with an urban population of ...
, Nicaragua, to a Nicaraguan father, Daniel Alegría, and a Salvadoran mother, Ana María Vides. Her cousin was activist
Leonel Gómez Vides. When Claribel was nine months old, her father was sent into exile for protesting human rights violations occurring during the
United States occupation of Nicaragua
The United States occupation of Nicaragua from 1912 to 1933 was part of the Banana Wars, when the US military invaded various Latin American countries from 1898 to 1934. The formal occupation began in 1912, even though there were various othe ...
; as a result, Claribel grew up in
Santa Ana, a city in western
El Salvador, where her mother came from. Claribel Alegría considered herself to be Nicaraguan-Salvadorean. Although she was too young to read or write, she began composing poetry at the age of six and dictated them to her mother, who would write them down. Alegría consistently cited
Rainer Maria Rilke's "
Letters to a Young Poet" as the impetus for becoming a poet. At the age of seventeen, she published her first poems in
Repertorio Americano
''Repertorio Americano'' was a cultural magazine published in San José, Costa Rica by Joaquín García Monge, on and off between 1919 and 1958. It was a significant forum of discussion for the Latin America
Latin America or
* french: Amé ...
, a Central American cultural supplement. Soon after, Mexican educator
José Vasconcelos
José Vasconcelos Calderón (28 February 1882 – 30 June 1959), called the "cultural " of the Mexican Revolution, was an important Mexican writer, philosopher, and politician. He is one of the most influential and controversial personalities ...
arranged for Alegría to attend finishing school in
Hammond, Louisiana. In 1943, she moved to the United States and in 1948 received a
B.A.
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...
in Philosophy and Letters from
George Washington University
The George Washington University (GW or GWU) is a Private university, private University charter#Federal, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. Chartered in 1821 by the United States Congress, GWU is the largest Higher educat ...
.
Alegría was committed to nonviolent resistance. She had a close association with the
Sandinista National Liberation Front
The Sandinista National Liberation Front ( es, Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional, FSLN) is a socialist political party in Nicaragua. Its members are called Sandinistas () in both English and Spanish. The party is named after Augusto Cé ...
(FSLN), which overthrew
Anastasio Somoza Debayle and took control of the Nicaraguan government in 1979. Alegría returned to Nicaragua in 1985 to aid in the reconstruction of Nicaragua.
Alegría later lived in
Managua
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, Nicaragua.
She died on 25 January 2018, aged 93.
Career
Alegría's literary work reflects the style of the popular literary current in Central America during the 1950s and 1960s, "la generacion comprometida" (the committed generation). Like many other poets of her generation who are critical of their societies, she made claims for rights using a language which is often counter-literary.
Alegría published many books of poetry: ''Casting Off'' (2003), ''Sorrow'' (1999), ''Umbrales'' (1996), and ''La Mujer del Río'' (1989). She also published novels and children's stories, as well as testimonies (often in collaboration with her husband, DJ "Bud" Flakoll), such as ''They Won't Take Me Alive''.
Awards
* 1978 Cuban-sponsored
Casa de las Américas
Casa de las Américas is an organization that was founded by the Cuban Government in April 1959, four months after the Cuban Revolution
The Cuban Revolution ( es, Revolución Cubana) was carried out after the 1952 Cuban coup d'état which ...
for ''Sobrevivo'' ("I Survive"), a poetry collection. She was awarded this prize alongside
Gioconda Belli.
* 2006
Neustadt International Prize for Literature
The Neustadt International Prize for Literature is a biennial award for literature sponsored by the University of Oklahoma and its international literary publication, ''World Literature Today''. It is considered one of the more prestigious inte ...
.
* 2017 XXVI
Premio Reina Sofía de Poesía Iberoamericana by the
Universidad de Salamanca and the Spanish
Patrimonio Nacional
Patrimonio Nacional ( en, National Heritage) is a Spanish autonomous agency, under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of the Presidency, that administers the sites owned by the Spanish State and used by the Monarch and the Spanish Royal F ...
.
Published works
* ''Anillo de silencio'' (1948)
* ''Suite de amor, angustia y soledad'' (1950)
* ''Vigilias'' (1953)
* ''Acuario'' (1955)
* ''Tres cuentos'' (1958)
* ''Huésped de mi tiempo'' (1961)
* ''Vía única'' (1965)
* ''Cenizas de Izalco'' (1966)
* ''Aprendizaje'' (1970)
* ''Pasaré a cobrar y otros poemas'' (1973)
* ''Sobrevivo'' (1978, Premio Casa de las Américas de Poesía)
* ''La encrucijada salvadoreña'' (1980)
* ''Nicaragua: la revolución sandinista'' (1980)
* ''Flores del volcán; Suma y sigue'' (1981)
* ''Flowers from the Volcano'' (1983)
* ''No me agarran viva: la mujer salvadoreña en lucha'' (1983)
* ''Para Romper El Silencio: Resistencia Y lucha en las cárceles salvadoreñas'' (1983)
* ''Álbum familiar'' (1984)
* ''Despierta, mi bien, despierta'' (1986)
* ''Luisa en el país de la realidad'' (1987)
* ''Cenizas de Izalco'' (1989)
* ''Woman of the River (Pitt Poetry Series)'' (1989)
* ''They Won't Take Me Alive: Salvadoran Women in Struggle for National Liberation'' (1990)
* ''Family Album'' (1991)
* ''Fugue'' (1993)
* ''Death of Somoza'' (1996)
* ''Thresholds/Umbrales: Poems'' (1996)
* ''Tunnel to Canto Grande'' (1996)
* ''El Nino Que Buscaba A Ayer'' (1997)
* ''Sorrow'' (1999)
* ''Casting Off'' (2003)
* ''Soltando Amarras'' (2003)
;In English translation
* ''Flowers from the Volcano,'' trans. Carolyn Forché (Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh, 1983)
* ''Luisa in Realityland'', trans. Darwin J. Flakoll (New York: Curbstone Press, 1987)
* ''Sorrow'', trans. Carolyn Forché (New York: Curbstone Press, 1999)
* ''Soltando Amarras/Casting Off: Poems by Claribel Alegría,'' trans. Margaret Sayers Peden (Willimantic: Curbstone Press, 2003)
;In anthology
* ''Ghost Fishing: An Eco-Justice Poetry Anthology'' (University of Georgia Press, 2018)
References
Further reading
*
*
External links
Claribel Alegría gana premio internacional
Encuentro-Taller con Claribel Alegría
Academy of American Poets
Claribel Alegria at Curbstone Press
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alegria, Claribel
1924 births
2018 deaths
Columbian College of Arts and Sciences alumni
Nicaraguan essayists
Nicaraguan journalists
Nicaraguan women essayists
Nicaraguan women journalists
Nicaraguan women poets
Nicaraguan translators
People from Estelí Department
People from Santa Ana Department
Salvadoran journalists
Salvadoran poets
Salvadoran translators
Salvadoran women writers
Nicaraguan women children's writers
Salvadoran women children's writers
Salvadoran women journalists
20th-century essayists
20th-century Nicaraguan poets
20th-century novelists
20th-century translators
21st-century essayists
21st-century novelists
21st-century poets
21st-century translators
20th-century Nicaraguan writers
21st-century Nicaraguan writers
20th-century Nicaraguan women writers
21st-century Nicaraguan women writers
20th-century Salvadoran women writers
21st-century Salvadoran women writers
Pseudonymous women writers
Nicaraguan emigrants to El Salvador
Salvadoran expatriates in the United States
20th-century pseudonymous writers
21st-century pseudonymous writers