Leopoldo Marechal was an important Argentine writer in the 20th century. He was born on June 11, 1900, and he died on June 26, 1970.

Biographical notes

Marechal was born in Buenos Aires. His family had French and Basque roots. Despite economic challenges, he became a teacher and professor after earning his degree. In the 1920s, he joined a group of poets connected to the literary journal Martín Fierro. His early poetry books, Los aguiluchos (1922) and Días como flechas (1926), showed an experimental style. Later, his collection Odas para el hombre y la mujer combined new ideas with more traditional writing. This work earned him his first official recognition in 1929, the Premio Municipal de Poesía of Buenos Aires.

In 1926, Marechal traveled to Europe for the first time. In Paris, he met important artists and thinkers like Picasso, Basaldúa, and Antonio Berni. During his second visit to Paris in 1929, he lived in Montparnasse and made friends with artists such as Aquiles Badi, Alfredo Bigatti, Horacio Butler, and sculptor José Fioravanti. Fioravanti later created a bronze bust of Marechal. During this time, Marechal wrote the first two chapters of his novel Adam Buenosayres, which he did not publish until 1948. Some characters in the novel were inspired by his friends from the Martín Fierro group, including artist Xul Solar, poet Jacobo Fijman, Jorge Luis Borges, and Raúl Scalabrini Ortiz.

After returning to Buenos Aires, Marechal married María Zoraida Barreiro in 1934. They had two daughters, María de los Ángeles and María Magdalena, later. In 1940, he won the Premio Municipal de Poesía again for his poetry book Sonetos a Sophia. His wife died in 1947, leaving him with two young children.

The novel Adam Buenosayres, considered one of the most important works in Argentine literature, did not receive much attention at first. This may have been because Marechal supported the government of Juan Domingo Perón, a controversial leader influenced by his wife, Evita. Julio Cortázar, a writer, admired the novel and wrote about it in a magazine in 1949. Despite support from some writers, Marechal’s work was often ignored by others, including Jorge Luis Borges, whose family had been imprisoned during Perón’s rule.

Though Marechal is best known as a novelist, he was first and foremost a poet. He believed all forms of writing, such as poetry, drama, and storytelling, were types of poetry. He once said, “When I wrote Adán Buenosayres, I never intended it to be other than poetry. I always believed all literary genres should be types of poetry.”

Marechal did not gain widespread recognition until the 1965 reprint of Adam Buenosayres, which led to renewed interest in his work. The novel has been translated into French, Italian, and English by different authors. His second novel, El banquete de Severo Arcángelo, was also published in 1965.

In 1967, Marechal was invited to Cuba, where he served on the jury for the Casa de las Américas literary prize. Today, he is seen as a key figure in Argentine poetry and fiction, though he remains less known internationally. Some of his well-known friends and followers include poets Rafael Squirru and Fernando Demaría, to whom he dedicated works. Marechal’s daughters established a foundation to promote his writings.

Work

• Los Aguiluchos (1922)
• Días Como Flechas (1926)
• Odas para el hombre y la mujer (1929)
• Laberinto de amor (1936)
• Cinco poemas australes (1937)
• El centauro (1940)
• Sonetos a Sophía (1940)
• Canto de San Martín o Cantata Sanmartiniana (1950)
• Heptamerón (1966)
• El poema de Robot (1966)
• Poema de la Física (published after the author's death)

• Adam Buenosayres (Adán Buenosayres) (1948)
• El banquete de Severo Arcángelo (1965)
• Megafón, o, La guerra (1970)

• El rey Vinagre (1926)
• El niño dios (1939)
• Narración con espía obligado (1966)
• El hipogrifo (1968)
• El beatle final (1968)
• Autobiografía de Sátiro (1971)

• Antígona Vélez (1951)
• Las tres caras de Venus (1952)
• La batalla de José Luna (1967)
• Don Juan (1978)
• Alijerandro (2012)
• Polifemo (2016)

• Historia de la calle Corrientes (1937)
• Descenso y ascenso del alma por la belleza (1939)
• Vida de Santa Rosa de Lima (1943)
• Cuaderno de navegación (1966)

• Adán Buenosayres (Paris Grasset, Unesco 1995; translated into French by Patrice Toulat)
• Adán Buenosayres (Vallecchi, Firenze 2010; editor Claudio Ongaro Haelterman; translated into Italian by Nicola Jacchia)
• Adán Buenosayres (translated into English by Norman Cheadle; published by McGill-Queen's University Press, 2014)

Works about Leopoldo Marechal

• Squirru, Rafael. Leopoldo Marechal. Buenos Aires: Argentine Cultural Editions, 1961.
• Coulson, Graciela. Marechal, la pasión metafísica. Buenos Aires: García Cambeiro Editions, 1973. 190 pages.
• de Navascués, Javier. Adán Buenosayres: una novela total. Estudio narratológico. Pamplona: EUNSA (University of Navarra), 1992. 296 pages.
• Kröpfl, Ulrike. Leopoldo Marechal oder die Rückkehr der Geschichte. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert Verlag, 1995. 409 pages.
• Kröpfl, Ulrike. Cahiers d'Histoire des Littératures Romanes. Romanistische Zeitschrift für Literaturgeschichte. Heidelberg: University Press C. Winter, 21st Year, 1997. Special edition, pages 393–415.
• Cheadle, Norman. The Ironic Apocalypse in the Novels of Leopoldo Marechal. London: Támesis Books, 2000. Collection Támesis, Series A, Monographs 183.
• Podeur, Jean-François. Don Juan, de Leopoldo Marechal: du Mythe à l'allégorie du salut. Avignon: University of Avignon, Institute of International Research on Performing Arts, Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences, Paper Number 3, 1993.
• Lojo de Beuter, María Rosa. La mujer simbólica en la narrativa de Leopoldo Marechal. Buenos Aires: Belgrano Editorial, 1983. Literary Criticism Essays, Year 1983.
• Cavallari, Héctor Mario. "Leopoldo Marechal: El espacio de los signos." Xalapa, Mexico: Veracruz University, 1981.