Argentina Díaz Lozano Explained

Argentina Díaz Lozano
Birth Name:Argentina Bueso Mejía
Birth Date:5 December 1909
Birth Place:Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras
Death Place:Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Occupation:Writer, women's rights activist, suffragette, diplomat
Years Active:1943–1999

Argentina Díaz Lozano (December 5, 1909  - August 13, 1999) was the pseudonym for the Honduran writer Argentina Bueso Mejía. She was a journalist and novelist, who wrote in the romantic style with feminist themes. She won numerous awards for her books, including the Golden Quetzel from Guatemala, the Honduran National Literature Prize Ramón Rosa" and the "Order Cruzeiro do Sud" from Brazil. She was admitted to the Academia Hondureña de la Lengua and is the only Central American woman whose work has officially contended for a Nobel Prize for Literature.

Biography

Argentina Bueso Mejía's year of birth has been cited as 1909, 1910[1] and 1917,[2] but is generally accepted as 15 December 1912 in Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras to businessman Manuel Bueso Pineda and Trinidad Mejía.[3] [4] [5] She attended Coligio María Auxiliadora in Tegucigalpa between 1925 and 1928 and then completed her secondary education at Holy Name Academy in Tampa, Florida. In 1929, she married Porfirio Díaz Lozano [6] and adopted both of his surnames as her literary name. She graduated with a degree in journalism from the Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala.

She began writing for newspapers while studying in Guatemala and published articles in Diario de Centroamerica, La Hora, El Imparcial, and Prensa Libre and at one point had a weekly column called "Jueves Literarios" (Literary Thursdays) that was carried in several Guatemalan papers. Her first novel, Perlas de mi rosario (cuentos) was published in 1930 and followed by several others. Her first important recognition came in 1944 with Peregrinaje (Pilgrimage), which won first literature prize in Latin American in a contest sponsored by the Pan-American Union and the publisher Farrar & Rinehart. The prize resulted in her book being published in Spanish in Santiago, Chile and in English by Farrar & Rinehart under the title Enriqueta and I, as well as European recognition. Between 1945 and 1955, Díaz Lozano worked in the library of the Institute of Anthropology and History at the University of San Carlos.[7] She was also involved in feminist causes, attending the Primer Congreso Interamericano de Mujeres on behalf of the Comités Pro Paz y Libertad (Committee for Peace and Liberty) of San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa.[8]

Around 1951, she divorced her first husband, keeping his name, and sometime between 1952 and 1954, she married Guatemalan diplomat Darío Morales García. In 1956, Díaz Lozano accompanied Morales to Belgium, where Morales took up a post at the Consul of Guatemala in Antwerp, Belgium. While in Europe, she studied Fine Arts at the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands and published several books in French. Her book Mansión in la bruma was adapted for the stage by Ligia Bernal de Samayoa. In 1964, the book won a Golden Quetzal from Guatemala as best book of the year and Díaz Lozano returned from Belgium to be appointed Cultural Attaché for the Honduran Embassy in Guatemala.

In 1967 and 1968, she conducted a series of interviews with the vice president of Guatemala Clemente Marroquín Rojas and though she did not necessarily agree with his politics she found him an interesting personality. In 1968, she published a biography of him and was awarded the Honduran National Literature Prize "Ramón Rosa" and admitted to the Academia Hondureña de la Lengua, as well as receiving the "Order Cruzeiro do Sud" from the government of Brazil. In 1971, she began the magazine Revista Istmeña and serialized a novel, Su hora under the pseudonym "Suki Yoto". In 1986, the novel would be published under the name Caoba y orquídeas: novela. In 1973, she published Aquel año rojo: novela and in June of that year was nominated as a candidate for the Nobel Prize for Literature. Her nomination was accepted and she was an official candidate for the 1974 award. Díaz Lozano is the only Central American Woman whose works have been an official candidate for the Nobel Prize of Literature.[9] [10]

After the 1976 Guatemala earthquake, Díaz Lozano made her home in Antwerp and traveled back and forth between Belgium and Guatemala, continuing to publish into the 1990s. In February, 1999 she decided to make a trip to visit her homeland in Honduras.

Díaz Lozano died on 13 August 1999 in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

Awards

Publications

Short Stories

Poetry Collections

Essays

Biographies

Recording from the Library of Congress

Argentina Díaz Lozano reading from her own work (1960). https://www.loc.gov/item/93842805/ [11]

External links

Argentina Diaz Lozano recorded at the Library of Congress for the Hispanic Division’s audio literary archive on September 26, 1960

Notes

  1. Her date of birth has been variously cited as 1912, 1910, 1909, but recent findings by her family show she was born on December 5, 1909, and was baptized in Santa Rosa de Copan on September 12, 1912, as Trinidad Mejia.

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Gaitán Guzmán. Nery Alexis. Bibliographic Index of the Honduran Short Story. Cervantes Virtual. Atlantic International University. 23 July 2015. Honolulu, Hawaii. 69. Spanish. 2008.
  2. Web site: Escobedo. Juan Carlos. Argentina Díaz Lozano (1917–1999). Literatura Guatemalteca. Literatura Guatemalteca. 23 July 2015. Guatemala City, Guatemala. Spanish. 28 May 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20151222042230/http://www.literaturaguatemalteca.org/diazlozano.htm. 22 December 2015. dead.
  3. Web site: Reseña Histórica e Inicio de las Letras Hondureñas. Colección Cultural Banco de America. Enrique Bolaños Fundación. 23 July 2015. Nicaragua. 248. Spanish.
  4. Web site: Gonzalez. José. Argentina Diaz Lozano: Rectificacion Historica. Jose Gonzalez Paredes. Jose Gonzalez Paredes. 23 July 2015. La Paz, Honduras. Spanish. 28 February 2013.
  5. Web site: Argentina Díaz Lozano. Biografias y Vidas. La Enciclopedia Biográfica en Línea. 23 July 2015. Spanish.
  6. Book: Avila. Myron Alberto. De aparente color rosa. Discurso y recurso sentimental en las novelas de Argentina Díaz Lozano. 2010. Editorial Guaymuras. Tegucigalpa, Honduras. 978-99926-54-06-4. 69. Spanish.
  7. Web site: Batres V. Ariel. La política en las novellas de Argentina Díaz Lozano. Monografias. Monografias. 23 July 2015. Spanish.
  8. Web site: Flores Asturias. Ricardo. Las Mujeres no Votan Porque Sí: Congreso Interamericano de Mujeres, 1947. Politica y Sentido Comun. Ricardo Flores Asturias. 19 June 2015. Guatemala City, Guatemala. Spanish. 6 June 2011.
  9. Web site: Del rosa al Nobel. El Mundo. Diario Libre. 23 July 2015. Honduras. Spanish. 9 July 2013.
  10. Book: Muñoz. Willy O.. Antología de cuentistas hondureñas. 2003. Ed. Guaymuras. Tegucigalpa. 978-99926-33-05-2. 36. 1. 23 July 2015. Spanish.
  11. Web site: Honduras-born writer Argentína Díaz Lozano reading from her work. Library of Congress. 2019-03-28.