María Esther Vázquez (4 August 1937 – 25 March 2017) was an Argentine writer and journalist, best known as a collaborator and biographer of

Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo ( ; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish literature, Spanish-language and international literatur ...

and

Victoria Ocampo Ramona Victoria Epifanía Rufina Ocampo (7 April 1890 – 27 January 1979) was an Argentine writer and intellectual. Best known as an advocate for others and as publisher of the literary magazine '' Sur'', she was also a writer and critic in he ...

Biography

She was born in Buenos Aires in 1937 into a family of Galician descent. Her father was born in

Cambados Cambados is a municipality in Galicia, Spain in the province of Pontevedra. It is known for its historical monuments, its seafood and the famous white wine, Albariño. The town is a Site of Cultural Interest, declared in 2001, and was named E ...

, and her mother in

Vilanova de Arousa Vilanova de Arousa (; unofficial ) is a municipality in the province of Pontevedra, in the autonomous community of Galicia, Spain. It belongs to the comarca of O Salnés O Salnés is a ''Comarcas of Galicia, comarca'' in the Galicia (Spain), Gal ...

. At 16, she entered the

Universidad de Buenos Aires The University of Buenos Aires (, UBA) is a public research university in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is the second-oldest university in the country, and the largest university of the country by enrollment. Established in 1821, the UBA has educa ...

to study literature. In 1957, while working at the

National Library A national library is a library established by a government as a country's preeminent repository of information. Unlike public library, public libraries, these rarely allow citizens to borrow books. Often, they include numerous rare, valuable, ...

, she met the library's director,

. He introduced her to his fellow writers from '' Sur'' magazine. At the beginning of the '60s, she dated Borges, and in February 1964 they announced their marriage, although several months later they split up. They remained friends and wrote a couple of books together. Vázquez wrote a biography on Borges, ten years after his death, called ''Borges: Esplendor y derrota'' (''Borges: Splendor and Defeat'').

Personal life

She married poet and writer Horacio Armani in on 14 December 1965. They were married for nearly 50 years before his death in 2013. She died in Buenos Aires in March 2017 of a

cerebral hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as hemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain (i.e. the parenchyma), into its ventricles, or into both. An ICH is a type of bleeding within the skull and one kind of stro ...

Honors

Her honors included: *1988:

Order of Merit of the Italian Republic The Order of Merit of the Italian Republic () is the most senior Italian order of merit. It was established in 1951 by the second President of Italy, President of the Italian Republic, Luigi Einaudi. The highest-ranking honour of the Republi ...

*1987: Konex Award *1995: Comillas Prize of the Tusquets Publishing House in Spain *1997: Prize of the International Book Fair of Buenos Aires *2004: Konex Award *2012: Rosalía de Castro Award from the PEN Club of Galicia *2012: the Gold Medal of Emigration from the Federation of Spanish Societies of Argentina

Bibliography

*''Los nombres de la muerte'' (1964) *''Introducción a la literatura inglesa'' (1965); co-written with

. *''Literaturas germánicas medievales'' (1966); co-written with Jorge Luis Borges. *''El mundo de Manuel Mujica Láinez'' (1983) *''Desde la niebla'' (1988) *''Victoria Ocampo'' (1993) *''Borges: esplendor y derrota'' (1996) *''Borges, sus días y su tiempo'' (1999) *''Victoria Ocampo. El mundo como destino'' (2002) *''La memoria de los días'' (2004)

Notes

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Vazquez, Maria Esther 1937 births 2017 deaths Argentine essayists Argentine women short story writers Argentine women journalists Jorge Luis Borges Writers from Buenos Aires Argentine people of Galician descent