The Modern Novel

Biography

Gioconda Belli was born in Managua in 1948. Her father was a well-to-do businessman while her mother was a theatre director. She was sent to school in Spain and then went to the United States to learn English, though she had wanted to study medicine. She then studied advertising and returned to Nicaragua to become the first woman advertising account executive. It was in this capacity that she got to know members of the Sandinistas as well as various writers and artists. She soon started writing her own poetry. She joined the Sandinistas, while keeping up her role as a member of the upper class. She published her first book of poetry but became more and more involved in the Sandinistas and had to leave the country in 1975 for fear of being arrested by the authorities. She lived in Mexico and Costa Rica and continued her support for the Sandinistas as well as writing poetry.

After the Sandinista revolution in 1979, she returned to Nicaragua. She became director of the national television network and then director of the national advertising system. After marrying a US journalist in 1987, she started writing novels. After the Sandinistas’ electoral defeat in 1990, she and her husband moved to the United States. She has continued writing novels and poetry and has also written a children’s book.

Other links

Gioconda Belli
Gioconda Belli (includes a translation of one of her poems)
Gioconda Belli Talks About Forbidden Fruit
Interview
Interview
Gioconda Belli (in Spanish)
Gioconda Belli (selection of her poems – in Spanish)