Carmen Naranjo facts for kids
Carmen Naranjo Coto (born January 30, 1928 – died January 4, 2012) was a famous writer from Costa Rica. She wrote many novels, poems, and essays. She even won a special prize called the Aquileo J. Echeverría Award for her amazing work.
Her Life
Naranjo was born in Cartago, which is the capital city of the Cartago Province in Costa Rica. She went to primary school at Escuela República de Perú and then to high school at Colegio Superior de Señoritas.
She earned her first university degree, called a licenciatura, in Philology from the University of Costa Rica. Philology is the study of language in written historical sources. She also continued her studies in Mexico at the Universidad Autónoma de México and in the United States at the University of Iowa.
Carmen Naranjo also served her country in important roles. In the 1970s, she was Costa Rica's ambassador to Israel. An ambassador is a country's official representative in another country. She also worked as Costa Rica's minister of culture. This means she was in charge of things like arts, history, and traditions for the country. She helped create Costa Rica's social security system, which provides support for people. In 2005, she was honored by being included in La Galería de las Mujeres de Costa Rica, which means "The Women's Gallery of Costa Rica."
Her Books and Writing
Carmen Naranjo wrote many different kinds of books. She wrote poetry, novels (which are long stories), storybooks, and essays (which are short pieces of writing about a topic). Her novels and stories became very popular. One of her first successful novels was Los perros no ladraron (which means "The Dogs Didn't Bark"), published in 1966. She was also well-known for her poetry, like La canción de la ternura ("The Song of Tenderness") from 1964 and Hacia tu isla ("Towards Your Island") from 1966.
Her writing career really started to grow after she returned to Costa Rica in 1964. Before that, she had worked for the United Nations in Venezuela. When she came back, she joined a special writing class led by Lilia Ramos, another Costa Rican writer. In this class, she started reading books by famous Latin American authors like Carlos Fuentes, Juan Rulfo, Jorge Luis Borges, and Octavio Paz.
She published her first collections of poems, Hacia tu isla and Misa a oscuras ("Dark Mass"), in 1964 and 1966. Her first novel, Los perros no ladraron, came out in 1966. Then, in 1968, two more novels followed: Memorias de un hombre de palabra ("Memories of a Man of His Word") and Camino al mediodía ("Road to Midday").
The success of her first three novels helped her become known internationally. She was invited to the University of Iowa in the United States. In 1969, she spent a year at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, which is a famous program for writers. There, she finished her next novel, Diario de una multitud ("Diary of a Multitude"), which was published in 1974.
In 1970, her novel Camino al mediodía won second place in a competition called The Central American and Panama Flower Games. After this success, she began teaching writing classes herself. These classes inspired her to write another important novel, Responso Por El Niño Juan Manuel ("Requiem for the Boy Juan Manuel"), which was published in 1970.
See also
In Spanish: Carmen Naranjo para niños
