Margarita Madrigal facts for kids
Margarita Madrigal (born May 15, 1912 – died July 23, 1983) was a talented author and language teacher from Costa Rica. She was well-known for her popular book series like Madrigal's Magic Key to... and An Invitation to.... During her life, she wrote 25 books that helped people learn seven different languages!
Contents
About Margarita Madrigal
Her Early Life
Margarita's parents met in Kansas City, USA. Her father, Ezequías Madrigal, was a singer from Costa Rica. He was on tour when his piano player got sick. He found out about a local girl named Carolyn Wilhelm who was a great pianist. She agreed to play with him, and "the romance went on from there," as Margarita later said.
Margarita was born on May 15, 1912, in Alajuela, Costa Rica. She had a sister, Marcella, and a brother, Miguel. As a child, Margarita moved many times with her family. They followed her father's singing and teaching jobs across Latin America. By the time she was 11, Margarita had lived in Mexico and five other Central American countries.
In 1923, her mother sent Margarita to live with relatives in Kansas City. She was worried Margarita was forgetting too much English. There, Margarita went to Wyandotte High School. She said it gave her "a little of the Kansas tradition."
Her Amazing Career
After high school, Margarita went back to Mexico. She studied and later taught at the Puebla State Teachers College. In 1940, the University of Mexico asked her to study how Spanish was taught in the United States. She traveled across the country to gather information for her project.
In November 1940, Margarita moved to New York City. She settled in Greenwich Village and started giving private Spanish lessons. She also taught classes at a local YWCA. She used her own special method, which she described as "streamlined" and simple. Her goal was to help students learn conversational Spanish quickly and have fun doing it.
By 1941, Margarita was already very popular. Soon after, she started publishing her unique teaching methods. Her first books were part of the An Invitation to... series. These included books for Spanish, Portuguese, French, Russian, Italian, English, and German. Her courses quickly became bestsellers. This made her one of the most popular language authors in the country.
Later, she created a series for children called First steps in.... She also made small, easy-to-carry language courses called the See it & Say it in... series.
In the 1950s, Margarita wrote the Madrigal's Magic Key to... series. These books offered more detailed lessons than her earlier works. The first was Madrigal's Magic Key to Spanish in 1955. She followed this with similar books for French (1959) and German (1966). These became her most famous works. She also made audio lessons for the Spanish and French books.
Margarita taught many interesting people during her career. Some of her students included famous authors like Sherwood Anderson and Ernest Hemingway. She also taught radio and television commentators and even a World Tennis Champion, Alice Marble. She worked for important organizations like the FBI and the Rockefeller Institute. She also helped many ambassadors, business leaders, judges, and generals.
A Legal Disagreement
In 1957, Margarita Madrigal was involved in a legal case about her book An Invitation to Russian. A man named Fedor I. Nikanov said that Margarita and her co-author, Sonia Bleeker, had used parts of his Russian language materials without permission.
Margarita did not know Russian herself, so she relied on Bleeker for translations. The book contained parts that were similar to Nikanov's work. These included the Russian alphabet, common phrases, similar words, and even some drawings. Even though this was a small part of Margarita's book, it was a large part of Nikanov's work. The court decided that Margarita had to pay Nikanov some money.
Later Years and Legacy
Margarita kept teaching and working on new versions of her books until the 1970s. She continued to give private lessons in her apartment in Greenwich Village. However, she started spending more time at her weekend home in Mystic, Connecticut. She eventually moved there permanently because she was feeling stressed and overworked.
In her final years, Margarita began writing a history of the Founding Fathers of the United States. She wanted to make it simple and easy to understand, just like she had done with languages. We don't know what happened to this book.
Margarita moved from Mystic in 1979 to Stamford, Connecticut. She passed away at her home there on July 23, 1983, after battling throat cancer. Her sister, Marcella, who lived in Puebla, Mexico, survived her.
Even though Margarita was very successful and popular during her life, her work became less known after her death. Most of her books have not been printed again since they first came out, except for some of her Spanish language materials.
Her Books
Margarita Madrigal wrote many books to help people learn languages. Here are some of her well-known works:
- An Invitation to Spanish (1943)
- An Invitation to Portuguese (1944)
- An Invitation to French (1945)
- An Invitation to Russian (1949)
- Madrigal's Magic Key to Spanish (1953)
- Madrigal's Magic Key to French (1959)
- First Steps in Spanish: A beginner's book for children (1961)
- See it and Say it in Italian (1961)
- See it and Say it in Spanish (1961)
- See it and Say it in French (1962)
- See it and Say it in German (1962)
- First Steps in French: A beginner's book for children (1964)
- An Invitation to Italian (1965)
- Madrigal's Magic Key to German (1966)
- An Invitation to German (1971)
What She Said
Here are some things Margarita Madrigal said:
- "Latin Americans, on the whole, are passionate lovers of democracy. They believe in education and freedom of speech. Costa Rica, for instance, is the most peaceful country I have ever been in. There, we have 14 school teachers for every soldier."
- "It is important for Americans to learn Spanish and what Latin Americans really are like."
- "My tools are a Blackwing pencil, a yellow legal pad, and, when I am lucky, a flood of thoughts."
