Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month: Gabriela Mistral, first Latina to win the Nobel Prize in Literature

Lucila Godoy Alcayaga, born April 7, 1889 in Chile, is best known by her pseudonym Gabriela Mistral, and is the first Latin-American to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.  When she was 15, she published her first poems in a local newspaper.  

Following several personal tragedies, Mistral channeled her grief into her writing and she produced her first literary work, which was placed first in a national literary contest in Santiago, Chile.  

She released her first book, Desolacion, with aid from Frederico de Onis, the Director of Hispanic Institute of New York in 1922. 

In November 1945, she became the first Latin American and fifth woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Gabriela passed away from pancreatic cancer in New York City in January 1957.

Celebrating Black History Month: Toni Morrison, first African-American woman to win Nobel Prize

Toni Morrison, born February 18, 1931 in Lorain, Ohio, is the first African-American woman to win a Nobel Prize.  She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993 for her Beloved trilogy.  The first novel Beloved, released in 1988 and she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. 

The second novel in the trilogy, Jazz, was released in 1992 and the following year she won the Nobel Prize in Literature even before the third novel was released.

In 2008, she was nominated for a Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album for Children.

And This Year's Nobel Prize for Literature goes to...

Svetlana Alexievich, a non-fiction writer from Belarus, has won the 2015 Nobel Prize for Literature, only the 14th woman to do so.  Ms. Alexievich draws her works from historical facts and interviews from major events such as the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.  Her most noted work, "War's Unwomanly Face", was based on interviews with hundreds of women who lived through World War II.