Gabriela Mistral
Mistral is the pen name of Lucila Godoy Alcayaga, the protagonist of the book. A groundbreaking educator, she would later go on to make history as the very first Latin American writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature for her poetry.
José Vasconcelos
During the years of Mexico Revolution, Vasconcelos rose to become the country’s first Minister of Education. As a result, he became intricately and intimately involved with Mistral. He is notably quoted as finding Mistral fascinating precisely because of her queerness: a very masculine feminity.
Inés Mendoza de Muñoz
Inés was also a schoolteacher made good. She would eventually become the First Lady of Puerto Rico when her legendary husband Luis became the island’s first elected governor. Her place in Puerto Rican history is not relegated merely to marriage, however, as she was a dominant figure in the feminist movement and an influential member of the Nationalist Party.
Juan Miguel Godoy
Juan Miguel was Mistral’s young nephew by birth, but they essentially experienced a mother/son relationship. So close was the bond that the actual biological parentage of Juan Miguel became a subject of rumors and gossip. She would transform her grief over his teenage suicide into verse in the final collection of poetry published while she was still living.
