Joaquín Gutiérrez Mangel

Joaquín Gutiérrez Mangel (30 March 1918 – 16 October 2000) was a Costa Rican writer who won multiple awards, and whose children's book Cocorí has been translated into ten languages. In addition to writing children's books, Gutiérrez was a chess champion, war correspondent, journalist, story-teller, translator, professor, and communist activist.

Early life Born to Paul Gutiérrez and Estela Mangel Rosas in Limón on the Caribbean coast, the geographic area that inspired Cocorí, Gutiérrez moved to San José when he was nine years old and studied at Buenaventura Corrales Elementary and then the Colegio Seminario (Seminary School). While attending Liceo de Costa Rica (Costa Rica High School), Gutiérrez and five other students founded a group called the Leftist Student Wing. In 1934, he graduated from Liceo de Costa Rica. He began studying law but was expelled during a student strike. Gutiérrez's father sent him to New York to study English for a year. During his year in New York, he cultivated a friendship with Costa Rican communist Manuel Mora, one of the leaders of the Costa Rican Civil War.

In 1937, he published his first book, Poesías ("Poems"). His second book of poetry was published in 1938, titled Jicaral. In 1939, at the age of twenty-one, Gutiérrez was named Costa Rica's national chess champion and he traveled to Argentina to compete in the World Chess Championships; however, the outbreak of World War II prevented him from further competing.

While in Chile, Gutiérrez worked as a translator for several news agencies, including Reuters, UPI, and the Associated Press. He continued his work as an editor and journalist and eventually started traveling as a correspondent. In 1962, Gutiérrez went to the Soviet Union where he reported from various regions within the communist country. He chronicled the space race and the internal political struggles between Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev. as well as other Vietnamese leaders. In 1972, when Augusto Pinochet deposed Allende and began a military dictatorship, Gutiérrez returned to Costa Rica.

He continued his literary career and even began teaching at the University of Costa Rica. While writing his own books and stories, he also translated and published Shakespeare's King Lear in 1981, Macbeth in 1986, Julius Caesar in 1994, as well as Hamlet. Later, Gutiérrez translated the works of Mao Zedong from English to Spanish. He became a close friend of poet Pablo Neruda, The character of Cocorí was Afro-Caribbean. The qualities he portrays in the book raised accusations of racism, notably from fellow Costa Rican author Quince Duncan, human rights activist Epsy Campbell Barr, and others working on behalf of Proyecto Caribe, an organization devoted to promoting Afro-Caribbean rights. They claimed that ugliness was associated with being of African descent and that the comparisons of the character Cocorí to monkeys create a damaging image. Eventually, in 2003, under the direction of Wilfrido Blanco Mora, the Ministry of Public Education dropped the requirement that Cocorí be read in public schools.

His novel Puerto Limón, published in 1950, took place during the United Fruit strike of 1934, a common theme of the '40s Generation authors, such as Carlos Luis Fallas. It was a coming-of-age story. Murámonos Federico, published in 1974, is a story about class struggle on a Costa Rican plantation. Gutiérrez's final book was published in 1999, a memoir called Los azules días.

Personal life Gutiérrez was married to Elena Nascimento, a Chilean. Gutiérrez and Nascimento had two daughters including Elena Gutiérrez, a Chilean-Costa Rican ballet dancer, choreographer and founder of the National Dance Company of Costa Rica. Through his daughter Elena, Gutiérrez was the grandfather of Ishtar Yasin Gutiérrez, an Iraqi Chilean-Costa Rican director, screenwriter, producer and actress.

Gutiérrez died of heart failure in 2000 at 82 years old following a respiratory infection. and was named by the newspaper, La Nación, as the most important national literary figure of the twentieth century. He is in the Costa Rican Sports Hall of Fame for his exceptional chess career. Liceo Joaquín Gutiérrez Mangel, inaugurated in 2001 in Desamparados, Costa Rica is named after Gutiérrez.

Works

Poesía, 1937, San José (Costa Rica) Jicaral, 1938, San José (Costa Rica) Cocorí, 1947, Santiago (Chile) Manglar, 1947, Santiago (Chile) Puerto Limón, novela, 1950, Santiago (Chile) Del Mapocho al Vístula, 1953, Santiago (Chile) La hoja de aire, 1968, Santiago (Chile) Murámonos, Federico, 1973, San José (Costa Rica) Volveremos, 1974 Te conozco mascarita, 1977, Santiago (Chile) Te acordarás, hermano, 1978, Havana (Cuba) Chinto Pinto, 1982, San José (Costa Rica) Vietnam: Crónicas de guerra, 1988, San José (Costa Rica) Obras completas, 1998–2003, San José (Costa Rica) Crónicas de otro mundo, Editorial Universidad de Costa Rica, 1999, San José (Costa Rica) Los azules días, memorias, Editorial Universidad de Costa Rica, 1999, San José (Costa Rica)