Rafael Arozarena (April 4, 1923 – September 30, 2009) was a Spanish poet and novelist from the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; ) or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, Autonomous Community of Spain. They are located in the northwest of Africa, with the closest point to the cont ...

Biography

Arozarena was born in

Tenerife Tenerife ( ; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands, an Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Spain. With a land area of and a population of 965,575 inhabitants as of A ...

. He studied medicine and after that he started writing books, because writing was what he liked the most and what he usually did. He spent his youth under the influence of the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

(1936–1939) and the post-war. He joined in a literary group called 'Los Fetasianos' ( Fetasiano group) with some of his friends. His first stories appeared in the 1940s in a magazine called ''Arco''. About ten years later, he started to write for a newspaper and all through his life he published six books: ''Alto crecen los cardos, Aprisa cantan los gallos, El omnibus pintado con cerezas, Silbato de tinta amarilla'' and ''Cerveza de grano rojo''. However, his most important book is ''

Mararía ''Mararía'' (1973) is a novel by the Spanish Canarian writer Rafael Arozarena. Published in Barcelona by Noguer in 1973, it was subsequently turned into a successful film in 1998. ''Mararía'' is considered a classic work of Canarian literatur ...

'', which was popularly received and adapted into a film in 1998. In 1988, he received the Canary Prize for Literature, the most important literary prize in the Canary Islands alongside his longtime friend Isaac de Vega. Until his death in 2009, he lived in Bajamar, La Laguna (Tenerife).

Legacy

A high school, Instituto Rafael Arozarena, was built in 2004 and named after Arozarena in

La Orotava La Orotava is a town and a municipality in the northern part of Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands of Spain. The area of the municipality stretches from the north coast to the mountainous interior, and includes the summit of the Teide volcano, ...

Poetry

*''Romancero Canario'' (1946) *''A la Sombra de los Cuervos'' (1947) *''Aprisa Cantan los Gallos'' (1964) *''El omnibús Pintado con Cerezas'' (1971) *''Desfile Otoñal de los Obispos Licenciosos''(1985) *''Altos Crecen los Cardos'' (1959) *''Silbato de Tinta Amarilla'' (1977) *''Amor de la Mora'' (1989)

Novels

*''

'' (1973) *''Cerveza de grano rojo'' (1984)

Children's novels

*''La Garza y la Violeta'' (1998) *''El Dueño del Arco-Iris'' (2002)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Arozarena, Rafael 1923 births Spanish male writers 2009 deaths Spanish poets Spanish novelists