Aldecoa, Josefina R. (1926—)

Spanish educator and author. Born Josefina Rodriquez in La Roba (León), Spain, in 1926; earned doctorate in philosophy from University of Madrid; married Ignacio Aldecoa (d. 1969, a writer), in 1952; children: Susanna (b. 1954).

Selected works:

El arte del niño (The Art of the Child, 1960); A ningune parte (Going Nowhere, 1961); Los niños de la gueraa (Children of Wartime, 1983); La enredadera (The Clinging Vine, 1984); Porque éramos jóvenes (Because We Were Young, 1986); El vergel (The Orchard, 1988).

In the late 1940s, Josefina Aldecoa earned her doctorate in philosophy from the University of Madrid. Though she wrote articles and stories for the reviews Espadaña and Revista española, and published a volume of short stories in the 1960s, Aldecoa would remain less interested in her own literary career than in education and in her husband's writing.

In 1950, Josefina met Ignacio Aldecoa at the High Council of Scientific Research. They were married two years later and in October of 1954 had a daughter, Susanna. Socially the Aldecoas were among the literati of Madrid's café society. Between 1951 and 1953, they made over 100 missions to less privileged regions of Spain to spread education and culture. In 1956, they moved to Blasco de Garay, and then to America in 1958, when Josefina received a grant to study education in the States. Upon their return to Spain in 1959, Josefina founded Estilo, a private school for children from two to seventeen years of age. Ignacio died in 1969. In the years following, Aldecoa's publications resumed, including her memoirs and her first novel.

sources:

Fiddian, Robin. Ignacio Aldecoa. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979.

Crista Martin , Boston, Massachusetts