Isabel Allende (b.1942) is a Chilean-American writer in the magic realist tradition. Considered one of the first successful woman novelists from Latin America and most widely read Spanish-language authors.
Born in Lima, Peru, Allende is the cousin and goddaughter of former Chilean president Salvador Allende. Several months after the overthrow of Chile’s coalition government in 1973 by the forces of a junta headed by General Augusto Pinochet, she and her family fled Chile.
Allende sought sanctuary in Venezuela. Her first novel, La casa de los espíritus (The House of the Spirits, 1985,) arose directly out of her exile and her estrangement from her family, particularly her aged grandfather, who remained in Chile. It became a worldwide bestseller and achieved critical success. Allende was heralded as the most exciting talent to emerge from Latin America since Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
In 1987, Allende published De amor y de sombra (Of Love and Shadows, 1987) and Eva Luna, and, in 1993, El plan infinito (The Infinite Plan, 1993.) Her first non-fiction work, Paula (1994,) was written for her daughter, a humanitarian who was lying in a coma after porphyria complications.
Allende’s later works include Hija de la fortuna (1999, Daughter of Fortune, 1999) and Retrato en sepia (2000; Portrait in Sepia, 2001.) In 2005, she published El Zorro: Comienza la leyenda (Zorro,) which invents a back-story for the eponymous masked crusader.
Allende’s memoirs are Mi país inventado (My Invented Country, 2003) and La suma de los días (The Sum of Our Days, 2008.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Isabel Allende
Show up, show up, show up, and after a while the muse shows up, too.
—Isabel Allende
You are the storyteller of your own life, and you can create your own legend or not.
—Isabel Allende
Memories…are like smoke, changing, ephemeral, and if they’re not written down they fade into oblivion.
—Isabel Allende
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