Juana Manuela Gorriti was an Argentine

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

 writer with extensive political and literary links to Bolivia

Bolivia

Bolivia officially known as Plurinational State of Bolivia , is a landlocked country in central South America. It is the poorest country in South America...

 and Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

.

Biography

Juana Manuela Gorriti was born in Salta

Salta

Salta is a city in northwestern Argentina and the capital city of the Salta Province. Along with its metropolitan area, it has a population of 464,678 inhabitants as of the , making it Argentina's eighth largest city.-Overview:...

 near the Bolivian border. She came from a wealthy upper class family, and attended a convent school when she was eight. Her father, José Ignacio de Gorriti

José Ignacio de Gorriti

General José Ignacio de Gorriti was an Argentine statesman, soldier and lawyer. He was a representative to the Congress of Tucumán which on 9 July 1816 declared the Independence of Argentina....

, was a politician and soldier, and signed the Argentine Declaration of Independence

Argentine Declaration of Independence

What today is commonly referred as the Independence of Argentina was declared on July 9, 1816 by the Congress of Tucumán. In reality, the congressmen that were assembled in Tucumán declared the independence of the United Provinces of South America, which is still today one of the legal names of the...

 on July 9. She was also the niece of the infamous guerrilla Jose Francisco "Pachi" Gorriti. Her family was liberal, and supported the Unitarians

Unitarian Party

Unitarianists or Unitarians were the proponents of the concept of a Unitary state in Buenos Aires during the civil wars which shortly followed the Declaration of Independence of Argentina in 1816. They were opposed to the Argentine Federalists, who wanted a federation of independent provinces...

 during a time when Juan Manuel de Rosas

Juan Manuel de Rosas

Juan Manuel de Rosas , was an argentine militar and politician, who was elected governor of the province of Buenos Aires in 1829 to 1835, and then of the Argentine Confederation from 1835 until 1852...

 ran the country. Juan Manuel was a conservative who was in office from 1829 and 1852, and used genocide to steal land from the indigenous people. In 1831, when Gorriti was thirteen, the federal caudillo

Caudillo

Caudillo is a Spanish word for "leader" and usually describes a political-military leader at the head of an authoritarian power. The term translates into English as leader or chief, or more pejoratively as warlord, dictator or strongman. Caudillo was the term used to refer to the charismatic...

 Facundo Quiroga forced Gorriti and much of her family into exile, so they emigrated to Tarija

Tarija, Bolivia

Tarija or San Bernardo de la Frontera de Tarixa is a city in southern Bolivia. Founded in 1574, Tarija is both the capital and largest city within the Tarija Department, with an airport offering regular service to primary Bolivian cities, as well as a regional bus terminal with domestic and...

, Bolivia. This is where she met future husband Manuel Isidro Belzu.

Manuel Isidro Belzu was a captain in the Bolivian Army

Bolivian Army

The Bolivian Army or Ejército Boliviano is the land forces component of the Military of Bolivia, the Bolivian Army has around 31,500 men.- Combat units directly under the Army general command :...

 at the time. They married when she was fifteen, and she bore three daughters. As his career advanced, their marriage suffered, and he abandoned her in 1842 after nine years together. He later went on to become president in 1848, and was assassinated in office to be replaced by Marino Melgarejo. It was rumored, though unconfirmed, that Marino himself shot Belzu during a fake embrace in order take over as President, even though he acted as a dictator. Gorriti did not receive the divorce papers until fourteen years later, during the shelling on Lima

Lima

Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...

's port by the Spanish Navy

Spanish Navy

The Spanish Navy is the maritime branch of the Spanish Armed Forces, one of the oldest active naval forces in the world. The Armada is responsible for notable achievements in world history such as the discovery of Americas, the first world circumnavigation, and the discovery of a maritime path...

 in 1866.

Separated, but not divorced, she left Bolivia for Peru, where her literary life would take off. She started teaching, and eventually founded a school. In Lima, a coastal city where she lived, Gorriti arose as an influential journalist, and started to regularly host tertulias. Fashionable men and women of mostly a well educated background would attend these salons, such as Ricardo Palma

Ricardo Palma

Manuel Ricardo Palma Soriano was a Peruvian author, scholar, librarian and politician. His magnum opus is the Tradiciones peruanas.- Biography :...

 and Manuel González Prada

Manuel González Prada

Jose Manuel de los Reyes González de Prada y Ulloa was a Peruvian politician and anarchist, literary critic and director of the National Library of Peru...

, Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera, Clorinda Matto de Turner and Teresa González de Fanning. They would meet to discuss literature and progress, a theme Gorriti felt passionate about, and would include in much of her literature. Gorriti was a feminist, and it showed in many of her journals. Through her writings, she instructed and inspired women to take on the modern gender roles which were so common in Europe and North America. She wanted women to stand up and be heard, to educate themselves, and not be afraid to go against the norm.

In 1866, the Spanish Navy shelled ports on Peru's and Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

's coastlines, including the port of Lima. Gorriti served as a battlefield nurse. She also risked her life evacuating the wounded when the Spanish surrendered at Callao. For her heroism, and Florence Nightingale

Florence Nightingale

Florence Nightingale OM, RRC was a celebrated English nurse, writer and statistician. She came to prominence for her pioneering work in nursing during the Crimean War, where she tended to wounded soldiers. She was dubbed "The Lady with the Lamp" after her habit of making rounds at night...

-like actions, Gorriti was seen as a Peruvian freedom fighter, and was awarded the Second Star of May by the Peruvian government. She wrote about these events in numerous articles and short stories, later collected and published in the Album of Lima founded by herself and her friend and fellow writer Carolina Freyre de Jaimes. Gorriti also founded the newspaper The Dawn of Lima with fellow poet Numa Pompilio Yona.

In 1878, Gorriti returned to Argentina, and even after having faced numerous scandals in her life such as divorce, exile, and Belzu having a child out of wedlock, she was still seen as an exceptional woman who brought great pride to her country. Her daughter Mercedes became sick in Peru in 1879, but Gorriti could not go to her because of the war between Chile and Peru over the provinces of Tanca and Arica. Mercedes died later that year. Gorriti also founded the newspaper The Argentina Dawn, where she published many articles on the rights and education of women, and how Progress was limiting their freedom. When she died, Argentines hailed her as a famous, instructive, influential journalist in her day.

Literary contributions

Gorriti wrote a number of novels and short stories, including "La hija del mazorquero" and "El lucero de manantial." Both of these stories are melodramatic tales with a strong anti-Rosista political message. She also wrote a number of other novels and short stories. Among these is another melodramatic novel, "La oasis de la vida" written in the 1880s as an advertisement for the insurance company "La Buenos Aires": the plot is the standard "poor orphan boy can't marry his true love", but all is resolved when he finally discovers his parents had a life insurance policy with company, and so he isn't quite so poor after all. This novel was indicative of the new, more expansive literary climate in Argentina at the time.

Of interest, but not often noted, was her on-again, off-again, three-year stay in Lima where she served as a mentor for a whole generation of women writers. This resulted in her publication of a short but influential novel "La Quena" in the prestigious newspaper El Comercio. Later as Peruvian politics began to stabilize she contributed to the institutionalization of Peruvian literature by collaborating in the Revista de Lima with stories like "El Angel Caido", "Si haces mal no esperes bien" and others. By organizing and hosting her tertulias, she provided a great opportunity for many female writers like Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera, Clorinda Matto de Turner

Clorinda Matto de Turner

Clorinda Matto de Turner was a Peruvian writer who lived during the age of the Latin American independence movements. Her own independence inspired women throughout the region as her writings sparked controversy in her own culture.- Biography :She was born and raised in Cuzco, Peru...

 and Teresa González de Fanning to come together and discuss literature, progress, and the progress of women. Many of the attendees would later go on to write more about these subjects, including Teresa González de Fanning, who founded an enlightened women's movement.

Although perhaps not as well-known as she should be, Juana Manuela Gorriti is an author not to be overlooked. Her stories are finely crafted, and not only bear witness to trends in South American literature of the 19th century, but are enjoyable reading in their own right.