Magali García Ramis facts for kids
Magali García Ramis (born in 1946 in Santurce, Puerto Rico) is a famous Puerto Rican writer. She is known for her stories and novels that explore family life, Puerto Rican culture, and the experiences of women.
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About Her Life
Magali García Ramis was born in 1946 in Santurce, a part of San Juan, Puerto Rico. She grew up there with her parents and brothers. Her mother's family lived nearby, so she had close relationships with her aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandmother.
Her father worked for the government at Fort Buchanan. Her mother worked for a short time in her sister's laboratory. Later, she stayed home to care for her children. Magali's oldest aunt, María Luisa Ramis, was the first woman in Puerto Rico to open a laboratory. All of Magali's aunts worked there. When Magali was a teenager, her family moved to Miramar, a nicer area. She then attended the Academia del Perpetuo Socorro, where she finished high school.
Her Education and Writing Journey
In 1964, Magali started studying history at the University of Puerto Rico. After she graduated, she worked for a newspaper called El Mundo. In 1968, she received a scholarship to study journalism at Columbia University in New York City. While in New York, she wrote her very first story, "Todos los domingos" ("Every Sunday").
This story won first prize in a writing contest held by the Ateneo Puertorriqueño (Puerto Rican Athenaeum). She returned to Puerto Rico in 1971 and worked for another newspaper, El Imparcial, until 1972. She also wrote for a literary magazine called Avance until 1973. During these years, she kept writing short stories.
García Ramis sent a book of four short stories to a contest in Cuba. She received an honorable mention for one of her stories, "La viuda de Chencho el Loco" ("The Widow of Chencho, the Mad Man"), which was published in 1974. That same year, she moved to Mexico. She came back to Puerto Rico in 1977 and published another book of short stories called La familia de todos nosotros. She also began working at the School of Communications at the University of Puerto Rico. She often wrote for several Puerto Rican newspapers.
Her famous novel, Felices días, tío Sergio (Happy Days, Uncle Sergio), which was partly about her own life, was finished in 1985 and published in 1986. In 1988, she received a special award called a Guggenheim Fellowship for her second novel, Las horas del Sur (The Hours of the South). In 1993, García Ramis published La ciudad que me habita (The City that Inhabits Me). This book was a collection of her journalistic essays that she had written over the years for various newspapers and magazines.
Magali García Ramis is very connected to her home country. Her short stories, which she prefers to think of as small novels, are about family relationships, what it means to be Puerto Rican, and the lives of women. In 2009, she became a member of the Puerto Rican Academy of the Spanish Language. Today, she continues to work on literary and historical projects.
Main Ideas in Her Stories
Magali García Ramis's stories show what Puerto Rican culture, families, and politics are like. She writes about how people in a family interact. She also explores what it means to be Puerto Rican and what it means to be a woman.
In her most famous novel, Happy Days, Uncle Sergio, she tells the story of a young Puerto Rican girl who loves playing like a boy. The book explores her special relationship with her uncle.
Her Books
Novels
- Felices días, tío Sergio
- Las horas del sur
Essays
- La ciudad que me habita
- La R de mi padre y otras letras familiares
- Los cerebros que se van y el corazón que se queda
- Hostos, bróder, esto está difícil
- El Chango como pájaro nacional
Short stories
- La familia de todos nosotros
- Las noches del riel de oro
- Una semana de siete días
- En la cabaña del tiempo escondido
See also
In Spanish: Magali García Ramis para niños
- List of Puerto Rican writers
- List of Puerto Ricans
- Puerto Rican literature
