PH
OT
O^ COURTESY^OF
THE^ AUTHORNONFICTION BY EMMA WENNERCan you talk a little about what happened
that made you turn away from the rebel’s
leaders? After the Sandinista Front lost the
elections to Violeta Chamorro in 1990, a group
of us thought the party had to change. It had to
get rid of the authoritarian slant it had shown
in the ’80s while it was in power and become
modern and democratic. Daniel Ortega disagreed
and insisted on leading the party on a path that
would not allow Chamorro to govern. He called
us traitors and broke with Sandinismo’s collective
leadership, to become the sole ruler. I suspected
his intentions to turn Sandinismo into his own
fiefdom. I resigned from the party in 1993. What
many of us feared would happen came to pass—
Ortega has now become a dictator as ruthless and
nefarious as Somoza.Why did you decide to write about your
experiences in The Country Under My Skin?
I wanted to give testimony to what I lived through
as a woman and mother. In a way, I wrote it for my
children. I also wanted to show the revolutionary
struggle not from a heroic perspective but as a
process that despite numerous flaws was also filled
with altruism and dreams of a better Nicaragua.Where do you live now, and what are your
feelings about your country? When my young-
est daughter went away to college in 2013, I con-26 MIAMI BOOK FAIR
I
n The Country Under My Skin, Gioconda Belli describes
her involvement with the Nicaraguan socialist rebels
known as the Sandinistas, who ended a dictatorship
and took over the country in 1979. Here, she explains why
she parted ways with the group and how she feels about
Nicaragua today.Why did you join the Sandinistas? I was born under
the dictatorship of the Somoza dynasty that began in- When the third Somoza came to power in 1967,
civic alternatives for political change in Nicaragua were no
longer viable. My generation considered armed struggle as
the only way to depose him. In 1970, I decided to join the
Sandinista National Liberation Front. It was not an easy
decision. What convinced me was to think that if I didn’t
get involved, my two daughters were also going to grow up
in a dictatorship, and eventually they would be the ones to
pay the price of my cowardice or indifference.
What was the hardest part of having a secret life,
involved in the revolution? The hardest part was to
see some of my Sandinista friends and fellow revolution-
aries get killed. Somoza’s army was ruthless. As I got more
involved and danger increased, I eventually had to go into
exile. I had to flee the country and leave behind my two
small daughters in 1975. It was heartbreaking.Gioconda
Belli Dreams
of a Better
Nicaragua
The author, poet, and former Sandinista reflects on her country,
her revolution, and the state of the world“I wanted to give testimony to what I lived
through as a woman and mother. I also wanted
to show the revolutionary struggle not from a
heroic perspective but as a process that despite
numerous flaws was also filled with altruism and
dreams of a better Nicaragua.”vinced my husband to move [from the U.S.] back to Nicaragua. I was not happy
with Ortega’s rule, but I missed my country very much and felt that there I could
be useful. I became president of PEN Nicaragua and was doing a lot of work to
support press freedom and promote literature when last April people’s discontent
exploded into a popular revolt. Since then, we have been living a hellish situation. I
feel as if I were in a time machine that has taken me back to Somoza’s time. I feel so
many of my friends who died for freedom must be turning in their graves.What are you writing next? Last year I finished a novel, Las fiebres de la me-
moria, about a very complex and somewhat mysterious French ancestor, a duke
who escaped his country after he was accused of a crime of passion and ended up
forging a new identity in Nicaragua. [Now] I am working on a poetry collection.AN EVENING WITH GIOCONDA BELLI
Sunday, Nov. 17, 4 p.m.
Building 1, Auditorium