María Elena Walsh

María Elena Walsh (1 February 1930 – 10 January 2011) was an Argentine poet, novelist, musician, playwright, writer and composer, mainly known for her songs and books for children. Her work includes many of the most popular children's books and songs of all time in her home country.

Biography

Early years (1930–1944)

María Elena Walsh was born on 1 February 1930 in a house at 547 Calle 3 de Febrero in Villa Sarmiento, Morón, Greater Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires Province, as the second daughter of the second marriage of Enrique Roberto Walsh (1882–1947), a railway employee of Irish descent who played the piano, from Brandsen, and Lucía Elena Monsalvo (1895–1961), a housewife from Merlo, of Spanish descent. Her father was a widower and had five children from a previous marriage to María Maroñón: Carlos, Zulema, Mario, Arturo and Enrique. Her sister was Susana Beatriz Walsh (1925–2000), known as "Babe", with whom she had a difficult relationship throughout her life.

As a child, she lived in a big house, where she greatly enjoyed reading and listening to music in a cultural environment. The Walsh family belonged to the educated middle class. Her paternal grandparents were British and had migrated to Argentina in 1872, while her maternal grandparents were Andalusian and Creole. Her grandmother Agnes Hoare (1852–1898), from London, married an Irishman, David Walsh, and had a notable influence on her life, particularly through the letters she left behind, which were later compiled in her book Novios de antaño (1990). María Elena described her as "a great reader... she became desperate when she did not receive the newspaper from England. Those letters revealed to me that she was tremendously interested in Argentine politics at the time." From English popular culture, María Elena adopted the habit of entertaining herself in her early years with nursery rhymes and traditional children's verses sung to her by her father, such as "Baa Baa Black Sheep" and "Humpty Dumpty", and developed the habit of verbal constructions that characterize British nonsense, one of the main sources of inspiration in her work.

Walsh learned to read and write at the early age of four thanks to the teaching of a neighbour. She was also influenced by classical music and opera. Her father often played the piano, especially waltzes by Moszkowski, Waldteufel and Toselli, and the young Walsh was particularly attracted to the music halls shown in neighbourhood cinemas. She defined herself at that time as a "rather difficult, unruly" child who felt "very lonely, melancholic, and suddenly abrupt, sullen". The authoritarianism and severity that her father showed toward her mother marked Walsh's lifelong defence of women.

Walsh entered General Manuel Belgrano Primary School No. 21 at the age of seven and joined third grade directly because she already knew how to read and write. She showed interest in subjects such as Spanish, dictation, calligraphy and drawing, and in her leisure time enjoyed playing statues, tag and trading cards. In literature, Walsh read works by Jules Verne, Charles Dickens and Saturnino Calleja, as well as magazines such as El Tony, Pif Paf and Billiken. In entertainment, she admired Ginger Rogers, Fred Astaire, Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy.

The expansion of the neighbouring La Chapelle asylum and the culverting of the Maldonado Stream led the Walsh family to move in 1943 to a more modest house on Calle Gaona in Ramos Mejía, which she would describe decades later as "the end of childhood". At the age of 12, in order to perfect her knowledge of painting and drawing, she enrolled on her own initiative at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes Prilidiano Pueyrredón, where her teachers included Fernán Félix de Amador, Hernán Lavalle Cobo, Luis Borraro and Tilda Thamar. Her father distrusted that institution and had instead previously suggested Technical School No. 6 Fernando Fader. The atmosphere of the school was deeply affected after the 1943 Argentine coup d'état, which was reflected in Walsh's earliest writings. Years later, she graduated as a teacher of drawing and painting.