Latin America's most famous author has published a new book just in time for her milestone birthday. A whole century is reflected in the life of Isabel Allende's heroine Violeta.
Isabel Allende 2019 in Madrid
She has written 26 books, they have been translated into 42 languages and she has sold around 75 million. She has received 60 awards in 15 countries for her work and her achievements, and two international film productions are based on her novels.
These are the hard facts that Isabel Allende lists on her homepage under the heading “Biography”. Probably just to get that sorted out. Because she actually finds it strange to look back on her own life like this: “It's just a list of dates, events and achievements. In reality, the important things in my life take place in the hidden chambers of my heart and have no place in one Biography.”
Isabel Allende at her home in Caracas in 1985
It is not the books that are her greatest successes, but the love that connects her with some people and the moments when she tried to help others. For example when she campaigned for the politically persecuted during the military dictatorship under Chilean ruler Augusto Pinochet or as a feminist who still fights for women's rights in her “Isabel Allende Foundation”.
The novel “Violeta” is a tribute to Isabel Allende's mother
In this respect, her latest novel “Violeta” is also a plea for those who have to assert themselves in the macho world. It is the biography of her mother Panchita, with whom Isabel Allende was closely connected until her death in 2018. And it's not a biography either, but wishful thinking on the part of the daughter: Because while the heroine of the novel fought for financial independence and freedom thanks to her business acumen, Allende's mother was dependent on her two husbands. The fictional Violeta is strong and combative on the one hand, but doesn't always behave in an emancipated manner, especially when it comes to love.
The century-spanning novel is amazingly timely. It begins in Violeta's year of birth, 1920, when the Spanish flu is rampant worldwide, and ends in 2020 with the Corona pandemic.
“The Spirit House” – Allende's first work
Allende's debut work “Das Geisterhaus”, which made her world famous, also has biographical features. The novel is about the life of an upper-class family that suffers from the violent patriarch Esteban Trueba. When a military coup ousted the socialist president towards the end, Trueba had high hopes for the new government. He is disappointed because the new rulers who bring terror and persecution to the country do not spare his family either.
Former Chilean President Salvador Allende
When Isabel Allende wrote the family saga in 1982, she was already in exile in Venezuela. Pinochet's military overthrew their great-uncle, socialist President Salvador Allende, in Chile in 1973. A short time later he committed suicide. From then on, the author, journalist and feminist no longer felt safe in her home country.
Strengthening women's rights
Isabel Allende was born in Lima on August 2, 1942, the eldest daughter of a Chilean diplomat. Because her parents separated, she spent most of her childhood at her grandfather's house. She later lived in Bolivia and Lebanon and then returned to Chile. There she worked as a journalist, got married and had two children – daughter Paula and son Nicolás. In 1994, she dedicated her very personal novel of the same name to her daughter, who died of a metabolic disease at the age of 29.
Isabel Allende campaigned for women's rights early on. In 1968 she founded the only feminist magazine in Chile, “Paula”, in which she also supported her great-uncle Salvador Allende. She also wrote various plays and made a name for herself as a television presenter. Since she no longer felt safe during the military dictatorship under Pinochet, she emigrated to Venezuela with her family.
The work in exile
Meryl Streep (right) in the film adaptation of the bestseller “The Haunted House”
In exile, she began writing an imaginary letter to her late grandfather. The long letter became a manuscript, and the manuscript became the novel “The haunted house”. The novel was made into a film in 1993, starring Meryl Streep and Winona Ryder, among others. Even in her debut work, Isabel Allende's unusual narrative style, in which fiction and reality are intertwined, attracted attention, the so-called “magic realism”. She connected the cruel reality with a fantasy world full of magic, which was always characterized by hope.
Critics, however, accuse her of having copied the literary prize winner Gabriel García Márquez, who believed in magical realism, the blurring of fiction and reality. Nevertheless, her stories about strong women and long life cycles convinced the jury of the Chilean National Prize for Literature, so that she was honored with the prize in 2010.
“I look at my life with satisfaction”
Isabell Allende presenting her novella “Beyond Winter” in June 2017
Since over Isabel Allende has been living in the USA for 25 years, but Chile is and will remain her home, as she once said in a DW interview: “I still feel like a Chilean. My parents are Chileans, my family is Chilean and I have lived the first years of my life in Chile, important years, years that shape.”
She fell in love again at the age of 75 after divorcing her second husband. Roger Cukras was originally a fan of hers who sent her emails. Today she is married to him in the third marriage. And he's definitely looking forward to her next novel, because Isabel Allende definitely wants to continue writing.
She doesn't quarrel with her age, on the contrary, she considers it “a precious gift”: “When I was young, I often felt desperate,” writes the author on her website. “There was so much suffering in the world and so little I could have done to alleviate it. But now I look back on my life and am content because there have only been a few days that I haven't tried to make a difference.”
This is an updated version of a 2017 birthday portrait.
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After the flight: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Chiles September 11
September 11, 1973 changed the lives of many Chileans forever: the supreme commander of the armed forces, General Augusto Pinochet, putsch against the incumbent socialist President Salvador Allende. The military bombed the presidential palace “La Moneda” in the capital Santiago, arrested government loyalists, leftists and Pinochet opponents.
After the Flight: Coup, Dictatorship and the Road to Democracy in Chile
Salvador Allende: A President of the People
Socialist Salvador Allende had been elected to office just three years earlier. Because he nationalized companies and expropriated large landowners, his government encountered fierce resistance from the start. So much socialism in South America is also a thorn in the side of the USA. With the help of the CIA, she boycotts Allende's economic policies and stirs up anti-government sentiment in the Chilean media.
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After the escape: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Death of the President
On the day of the coup, Salvador Allende committed suicide in the presidential palace (his body is shown being carried out of the building). “From here to the cemetery, I'm not a man of exile,” he said when he took office. Meanwhile, the “Estadio Nacional”, where football is usually played, becomes a concentration camp: 40,000 people are imprisoned, thousands are tortured and murdered.
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After the escape: putsch, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
A stadium as a concentration camp
Walter Ramirez, cameraman for the film “After the Escape,” is also arrested. On September 11, 1973, the student is walking through Santiago with a fellow student. Soldiers arrest both – because his long-haired friend has Argentine pesos with him, which he needs for a trip to Argentina to visit his wife and son. Both are held for days in the National Stadium as suspected “traitors to the country”.
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After the escape: Putsch, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Shots in the changing room
Walter Ramirez and his friend are locked in a locker room with nearly a hundred other men. Everyone shares two toilets, soldiers shoot at the windows from outside – out of boredom. After a few days, Walter and his friend are released. To this day he doesn't know why. Maybe because his father worked for a US company? The subject is taboo in his family.
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After the flight: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
From general to dictator: Augusto Pinochet
The mastermind behind the coup is General Augusto Pinochet, supreme commander of the armed forces. From 1973 to 1990 he ruled Chile dictatorially: left-wing parties and trade unions are banned, freedom of the press and freedom of expression abolished. The Pinochet regime is receiving massive support from the USA, but also from politicians in Germany.
After the escape: putsch, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Torture, murder and book burning
< p>Now artists, writers and intellectuals also live dangerously in Chile. Singer-songwriter Victor Jara is arrested, tortured and shot dead in a basketball stadium in Santiago. Books by unpopular authors are burned in the streets. Many opponents of the dictatorship will leave Chile in the coming months and years.
After the flight: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Antonio Skármeta: From Chile to Berlin Exile
The writer and university lecturer Antonio Skármeta also left Chile in 1973. He lived in exile in Berlin for 16 years, where he wrote the successful books “Nixpassiert” and “Mit brennender Patience”, some of which were filmed several times. The theme of exile becomes one of his life themes. Antonio Skármeta's story is told in the DW special “After the Escape”.
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After the flight: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
Isabel Allende: From Chile via Venezuela to the USA
Another prominent exile is Isabel Allende, author of the world bestseller The Spirit House. The journalist and women's rights activist went into exile in Venezuela in 1975. Incidentally, President Salvador Allende was not her uncle, as is often said, but her father's cousin. In the novel “Paula” Allende describes her time in exile. Today she lives in the USA.
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After the escape: putsch, dictatorship and the way to Democracy in Chile
Pinochet and the military: the end is near
In August 1987, dictator Augusto Pinochet inspects the military parade marking the 14th anniversary of his assumption of power. But his days are numbered: a referendum on his future is scheduled for next year. The opponents of the dictatorship mobilize all forces. With a spectacular action, they initiate the turning point for Chile…
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After the flight: coup, dictatorship and the road to democracy in Chile
An advertising campaign ended the dictatorship
In October 1989, the Chileans decide whether Augusto Pinochet can stand as the sole candidate in the next elections. Yes or no? A colorful advertising video mobilizes the masses – a majority dares and votes “No!”. The end of the dictatorship has begun.
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After the escape: putsch, dictatorship and the way to Democracy in Chile
Peaceful Transition to Democracy
In March 1990, Pinochet hands over the presidency to the Christian Democrat Patricio Aylwin (right). Pinochet remains chief of the army until 1998. None of the numerous international proceedings against him lead to a conviction. Augusto Pinochet died on December 10, 2006 at the age of 91 – without ever being held accountable for the crimes of the dictatorship.
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After the escape: putsch, dictatorship and the way to Democracy in Chile
Legacy of dictatorship in a divided society
The dictatorship in Chile is only slowly being worked through, democracy has not solved all the problems. In 2017, people repeatedly demonstrated against the AFP pension system, which was privatized during the Pinochet era and which excludes many Chileans or only provides mini pensions. The legacy of the dictatorship continues to this day. But at least: Now people are allowed to take to the streets for their opinion.