SAMMY JULIAN
SHE writes stories of passion; of passionate lives.
The characters she creates with broad strokes from her literary pen live with passionate commitment — to love, to their world, to an ideal.
That is what attracted me to Isabel Allende, the most “widely read” author in Spanish literature, with over 56 million editions of her books sold throughout the world and translated into more than 30 different languages.
Also, like her stories, Allende has her own fascinating personal history, which I suggest you should get to know, for it is a life lived to the fullest despite the hardships. Such colorful background can only enrich one’s creative juices to flow from mind to paper.
Even at 71, the author has somehow retained the boundless energy of her youth even as she herself admits she has actually lost in the last decades of her fruitful existence.
Just reading her works impresses upon the reader the writer as being young and fresh.
Such an effect comes from her stories, which are driven by the powers of fantasy and imagination.
In all her writings, fantasy and adventure win over violence and dictatorship — light battles the dark and wins in the end.
When you read her literary creation you feel like you have achieved freedom; it is as if you feel you don’t have to prove anything anymore; that you are no longer stuck in the idea of who you are or who you should be; you feel lighter; you feel you do not carry grudges, ambition, vanity, or any of the deadly sins that aren’t even worth it.
And then, somehow, you end up thinking hard about how to live passionately through the process.
Definitely, her stories are romantic, in the very best sense of the word.
But on the same level of intensity, we love and admire her because of her community work.
The Isabel Allende Foundation works with nonprofits in the United States and Chile to empower and protect women and girls — understanding that empowering women is the only true route to social and economic justice.
Her own foundation has also set up the Paula Scholarships at the request of her daughter, Paula, who died in 1992. It allocates scholarships to underprivileged women and children.
Currently, she is involved in more than 20 nongovernmental organizations, including Madre, which provides support for women and children who have been abused, and Canal Community Alliance, which assists ethnic groups.
A passionate woman with passionate causes and ideals — that is Isabel./PN
