Born in Managua, Nicaragua, second of five children, Belli’s father was a businessman and her mother was the founder of the Managua Experimental Theatre. From a privileged milieu, Belli spent her primary school years in a Catholic school run by nuns in Managua and was sent to Madrid, Spain, for secondary school, graduating in 1965. She studied Advertising and Journalism in Philadelphia and returned to Managua where she got married. The first of her four children was born in 1969, a year before she began writing and publishing her poems in the cultural supplement to the Nicaraguan newspaper,

La Prensa

. From the beginning her poems were considered scandalous since they were about the female body and sensuality, topics which had not been broached so frankly before in Nicaraguan women’s…

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Citation: Lavoie, Sophie M.. "Gioconda Belli". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 21 June 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=12745, accessed 28 March 2024.]

12745 Gioconda Belli 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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