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{{Infobox Writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox Writer/doc]] -->
| name = Gabriela Mistral
| awards = {{awd|[[Nobel Prize in Literature]]|1945}}
| image = Gabriela Mistral-01.jpg
| birthname = Lucila de María del Perpetuo Socorro Godoy Alcayaga
| birthdate = {{birth date|1889|4|7|mf=y}}
| birthplace = [[Vicuña, Chile|Vicuña]], [[Chile]]
| deathdate = {{death date and age|1957|1|10|1889|4|7|mf=y}}
| deathplace = [[Hempstead (village), New York|Hempstead, New York]], [[USA]]
| occupation = [[Poet]], [[Diplomat]], [[Educator]], [[Feminist]]
| nationality = [[Chile]]an
| period = 1922-1957
}}
'''Gabriela Mistral''' ([[April 7]], [[1889]]—[[January 10]], [[1957]]) was the [[pseudonym]] of '''Lucila de María del Perpetuo Socorro Godoy Alcayaga''', a [[Chile]]an [[Poetry|poet]], educator, diplomat, and [[Feminism|feminist]] who was the first [[Latin America]]n to win the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]], in 1945. Some central themes in her poems are nature, betrayal, love, a mother's love, sorrow and recovery, travel, and Latin American identity as formed from a mixture of Indian and European influences.

Mistral was born in [[Vicuña, Chile]], but was raised in the small [[Andes|Andean]] village of [[Montegrande]], where she attended the [[Primary school]] taught by her older sister, Emelina Molina. She respected her sister greatly. Her father, Juan Gerónimo Godoy Villanueva, was also a schoolteacher. He abandoned the family before she was three years old, and died, long since estranged from the family, in 1911. Throughout her early years she was never far from poverty. By age fifteen, she was supporting herself and her mother, Petronila Alcayaga, a seamstress, by working as a teacher's aide in the seaside town of Compania Baja, near La Serena, Chile.

In 1904 Mistral published some early poems, such as ''Ensoñaciones'', ''Carta Íntima'' ("Intimate Letter") and ''Junto al Mar'', in the local newspaper ''El Coquimbo: Diario Radical'', and ''La Voz de Elqui'' using a range of pseudonyms and variations on her civil name.

Perhaps as early as 1900, while living with her sister and mother in the [[Valle de Elqui]], or as late as 1906, while working as a teacher, Mistral met Romelio Ureta, a railway worker, who killed himself in 1909. The profound effects of death were already in the poet's work; writing about his [[suicide]] led the poet to consider death and life more broadly than previous generations of Latin American poets. While Mistral had passionate friendships with various men and women, and these impacted her writings, she was secretive about her emotional life.

An important moment of formal recognition came on [[December 22]], [[1914]], when Mistral was awarded first prize in a national literary contest ''[[Juegos Florales]]'' in [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]], with the work ''[[Sonetos de la Muerte]]'' (Sonnets of Death). She had been using the pen name Gabriela Mistral since June, 1908 for much of her writing. After winning the ''[[Juegos Florales]]'' she infrequently used her given name of Lucila Godoy for her publications. She formed her pseudonym from the two of her favorite poets, [[Gabriele D'Annunzio]] and [[Frédéric Mistral]] or, as another story has it, from a composite of the Archangel Gabriel and the Mistral wind of Provence.

== Career as an Educator ==
Mistral's meteoric rise in Chile's national school system plays out against the complex politics of Chile in the first two decades of the 20th century. In her adolescence, the need for teachers was so great, and the number of trained teachers was so small, especially in the rural areas, that anyone who was willing could find work as a teacher. Access to good schools was difficult, however, and the young woman lacked the political and social connections necessary to attend the Normal School: she was turned down, without explanation, in 1907. She later identified the obstacle to her entry as the school's chaplain, Father Ignacio Munizaga, who was aware of her publications in the local newspapers, her advocacy of liberalizing education and giving greater access to the schools to all social classes. Although her formal education had ended by 1900, she was able to get work as a teacher thanks to her older sister, Emelina, who had likewise begun as a teacher's aide, and was responsible for much of the poet's early education. The poet was able to rise from one post to another because of her publications in local and soon, national newspapers and magazines. Her willingness to move was also a factor. Between the years 1906 and 1912 she had taught, successively, in three schools near [[La Serena, Chile]], then in [[Barrancas, Chile]] then [[Traiguen, Chile]] in 1910, in [[Antofagasta, Chile]] in the desert north, in 1911. By 1912 she had moved to work in a Liceo, or high school, in [[Los Andes, Chile]], where she stayed for six years and often visited Santiago. In 1918 [[Pedro Aguirre Cerda]], then Minister of Education, and a future President of Chile, appointed her to direct a Liceo in [[Punta Arenas]]. She moved on to [[Temuco]] in 1920, then to Santiago, where in 1921, she defeated a candidate connected with the Radical Party, Josefina Dey del Castillo to be named director of Santiago's Liceo #6, the newest and most prestigious girls' school in Chile.

Controversies over the nomination of Gabriela Mistral to the highly coveted post in Santiago were among the factors that made her decide to accept an invitation to work in [[Mexico]] in 1922, with that country's [[Secretariat of Public Education|Minister of Education]], [[José Vasconcelos]]. He had her join in the nation's plan to reform libraries and schools, to start a national education system. That year she published ''[[Desolación]]'' in New York, which further promoted the international acclaim she had already been receiving thanks to her journalism and public speaking. A year later she published ''Lecturas para Mujeres'' (Readings for Women), a text in prose and verse that celebrates Latin America from the broad, Americanist perspective developed in the wake of the [[Mexican Revolution]]. Following almost two years in Mexico she traveled from Laredo, Texas to Washington D.C., where she addressed the [[Pan American Union]], went on to New York, then toured Europe: in [[Madrid, Spain,]] she published ''[[Ternura]]'' (Tenderness), a collection of lullabies and rondas written for a dual audience of children, parents, and other poets. In early 1925 she returned to Chile, where she formally retired from the nation's education system, and received a pension. It wasn't a moment too soon: the legislature had just agreed to the demands of the teachers union, headed by Mistral's lifelong rival, [[Amanda Labarca Hubertson]] that only university-trained teachers should be given posts in the schools. The [[University of Chile]] had granted her the academic title of Spanish Professor in 1923, although her formal education ended before she was 12 years old. Her auto-didacticism was remarkable, a testimony to the flourishing culture of newspapers, magazines, and books in provincial Chile, as well as to her personal determination and verbal genius.

Mistral's international stature made it highly unlikely that she would remain in Chile. In mid-1925 she was invited to represent Latin America in the newly-formed [[Institute for Intellectual Cooperation]] of the [[League of Nations]]. With her relocation to France in early 1926 she was effectively an exile for the rest of her life. She made a living, at first, from journalism and then giving lectures in the [[United States]] and in [[Latin America]], including [[Puerto Rico]]. She variously toured [[the Caribbean]]. [[Brazil]], [[Uruguay]] and [[Argentina]], among other places.

== Roaming the World; Diplomatic Career ==
Mistral lived primarily in [[France]] and [[Italy]] between 1926 and 1932. During these years she worked for the League for Intellectual Co-operation of the [[League of Nations]], attending conferences of women and educators throughout Europe and occasionally in the Americas. She held a visiting professorship at [[Barnard College]] of [[Columbia University]] in 1930-1931, worked briefly at both [[Middlebury College]] and [[Vassar College]] in 1931 and was warmly received at the [[University of Puerto Rico at Rio Piedras]], where she variously gave conferences or wrote, in 1931, 1932, and 1933.

Like many Latin American artists and intellectuals, Mistral served as a consul from 1932 until her death, working in [[Naples]], [[Madrid]], [[Lisbon]], [[Nice, France|Nice]], [[Petrópolis]], [[Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles]], [[Santa Barbara, California|Santa Barbara]], [[Veracruz]], [[Rapallo]] and [[Naples]], and [[New York, New York|New York]]. As consul in Madrid, she had occasional professional interactions with another Chilean consul and [[Nobel Prize]] winner, [[Pablo Neruda]], and she was among the earlier writers to recognize the importance and originality of his work, which she had known while he was a teenager, and she as school director in his home town of Temuco. Along with Neruda, Gabriela Mistral became a supporter of the [[Popular Front (Chile)|Popular Front]] which led to the election of her long-time friend and patron, the [[Radical Party (Chile)|Radical]] [[Pedro Aguirre Cerda]] in 1938. She published hundreds of articles in magazines and newspapers throughout the Spanish-speaking world. Among her confidants were [[Eduardo Santos]], President of Colombia, all of the elected Presidents of Chile from 1922 to her death in 1957, Eduardo Frei Montalva, Chilean elected president in 1964 and [[Eleanor Roosevelt]].

The poet's second major volume of poetry, [[''Tala'']] appeared in 1938, published in [[Buenos Aires]] with the help of longtime friend and correspondent [[Victoria Ocampo]]. The proceeds for the sale were devoted to children orphaned by the [[Spanish Civil War]]. This volume includes many poems celebrating the customs and folklore of Latin America as well as Mediterranean Europe. Mistral uniquely fuses these locales and concerns, a reflection of her identification as "una mestiza de vasco," her [[Europe]]an [[Basque people|Basque]]-[[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Indigenous Amerindian]] background.

On [[August 14]], [[1943]], Mistral's 17-year-old nephew Juan Miguel Godoy killed himself. The grief of this death, as well as her responses to tensions of World War II and then the [[Cold War]] in Europe and the Americas, are all reflected in the last volume of poetry published in her lifetime, '''Lagar''', which appeared in a truncated form in 1954. A final volume of poetry, [[''Poema de Chile'']], was edited posthumously by her friend Doris Dana, and published in 1967. ''Poema de Chile'' describes the poet's return to Chile after death, in the company of an Indian boy from the [[Atacama]] desert, and an [[Andes|Andean]] deer, the [[huemul]]. This collection of poetry anticipates the interests in objective description and re-vision of the epic tradition just then becoming evident among poets of the Americas, all of whom Mistral read carefully.

In [[November 15]], [[1945]], Mistral became the first Latin American, and fifth woman, to receive the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]]. She received the award in person from [[Gustav V of Sweden|King Gustav of Sweden]] on [[December 10]], [[1945]]. In 1947 she received a doctor honoris causa from [[Mills College]], [[Oakland, California]]. In 1951 she was awarded the long overdue [[Chilean National Prize for Literature|National Literature Prize]] in Chile.
<!-- Unsourced image removed: [[Image:Gabiela Mistral con Santiago Martinez Delgado.jpg|thumb|right|Gabriela Mistral with Master [[Santiago Martínez Delgado]] at [[Columbia University]] in NY, probably October of 1930.]] -->

Poor health somewhat slowed Mistral's traveling. During the last years of her life she made her home in the [[town of Roslyn, New York]]; in early January of 1957 she transfered to Hempstead, New York, where she died from [[cancer]] of the pancreas on [[January 10]], [[1957]], aged 67. Her remains were returned to Chile nine days later. The Chilean government declared three days of national mourning, and hundreds of thousands of Chileans came to pay her their respects.

Some of Mistral's best known poems include: ''Piececitos de Niño'', ''Balada'', ''Todas Íbamos a ser Reinas'', ''La Oración de la Maestra'', ''El Ángel Guardián'', ''Decálogo del Artista'' and ''La Flor del Aire''.

==Work==
* ''Sonetos de la Muerte'' (1914)
* ''Desolación'' (1922)
* ''Lecturas para Mujeres'' (1923)
* ''Ternura'' (1924)
* ''Nubes Blancas y Breve Descripción de Chile'' (1934)
* ''Tala'' (1938)
* ''Antología'' (1941)
* ''Lagar'' (1954)
* ''Recados Contando a Chile'' (1957)
* ''Poema de Chile'' (1967, published posthumously)
* Mistral may be most widely quoted in English for ''Su Nombre es Hoy'' (His Name is Today):
:''“We are guilty of many errors and many faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children, neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made, and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer ‘Tomorrow,’ his name is today.”''

==See also==
* [[Grito de Lares]]
* [[Giannina Braschi]], poet in the tradition of Gabriela Mistral.
* [[Barnard College]], repository for part of Mistral's personal library, given by Doris Dana in 1978.

==External links==
* [http://www.legadodegabrielamistral.cl/ Gabriela Mistral's heritage] (In Spanish)
* [http://www.poetseers.org/nobel_prize_for_literature/gab Life and Poetry of Gabriela Mistral]
* [http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates/1945/mistral-bio.html Nobel biography]

{{Nobel Prize in Literature Laureates 1926-1950}}

<!-- Metadata: see [[Wikipedia:Persondata]] -->

{{Persondata
|NAME=Mistral, Gabriela
|ALTERNATIVE NAMES=
|SHORT DESCRIPTION=[[Chilean poet]]
|DATE OF BIRTH=[[April 7]], [[1889]]
|PLACE OF BIRTH=[[Vicuña, Chile]]
|DATE OF DEATH=[[January 10]], [[1957]]
|PLACE OF DEATH=[[Hempstead (village), New York]], [[United States]]
}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mistral, Gabriela}}
[[Category:1889 births]]
[[Category:1957 deaths]]
[[Category:Nobel laureates in Literature]]
[[Category:Chilean poets]]
[[Category:Chilean schoolteachers]]
[[Category:Chilean academics]]
[[Category:Chilean diplomats]]
[[Category:Chilean women writers]]
[[Category:Feminist writers]]
[[Category:People from Hempstead, New York]]
[[Category:People from Coquimbo Region]]

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[[zh:加夫列拉·米斯特拉爾]]

Revision as of 18:36, 25 November 2008