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He is later imprisoned, along with his brothers-in-law, Leandro and Manolo, for participating in the revolution. He and his wife eventually join the revolution, along with their son, Nelson. He married Patria Mirabal when she was 16, on February 24, 1947. Papá: Father to the Mirabal girls, and married to Mama. Despite being the matriarch of a plantation with servants, she is described as illiterate. She takes care of the girls and is always worried about them. Mamá: Mother to the Mirabal girls, and married to Papa. As his regime falls apart, he becomes even more vicious and cruel and eventually has the Mirabal sisters (all except for Dede) killed when they become too much of an opposition to his decaying power. Though married, he has many affairs with young girls who he keeps in houses around the country.

A harsh ruler, he demands complete obedience from everyone and commits many cruel and unjust acts against his people, such as imprisonment without trial, confiscating land, possessions, and torture. He is the self-appointed dictator of the Dominican Republic. Trujillo: Rafael Leonidas Trujillo, also known as 'El Jefe' ('the Chief'), is the main antagonist of the novel.

Also, her tone went from being a little confusing in the beginning and losing her relationship with her family to becoming more connected to her family. She is also a revolutionary, starting a Christian revolutionary group and merging it with her sister Minerva's revolutionary group. She has three children: Nelson, Noris, and Raul Ernesto. She later regains her faith on a pilgrimage to Higüey that she takes with her mother and sisters. She takes the miscarriage of her third child as God's punishment towards her, which drives her further into a religious depression. Her faith wavers intensely as a young woman. While looking for her calling from God, she instead finds her husband, Pedrito, whom she marries at age 16. Patria: The oldest of the Mirabal sisters, she is very religious. She joined because she wanted to feel worthy of Leandro. She joined the revolution while she was living with her sister Minerva. She marries Leandro and has one daughter, named Jacqueline. María Teresa: The youngest of the four Mirabal sisters, she is very materialistic. In the end, she is the only survivor of her four sisters. She has children, all boys, Enrique, Rafael, and David. She is constantly worried about her sisters, telling them they'll be killed. He doesn't want her involved in the revolution, and the conflict almost destroys their marriage. She uses her husband, Jaimito, as the reason she doesn't officially join. She doesn't want to join the revolution because she believes that it will lead to death, so she doesn't. She is not as certain about the revolution as her sisters and feels weaker because of that fact. She has two children, a daughter Minou and a son Manolito.ĭedé: Dede is the second Mirabal sister. She has a brief romance with the revolutionary leader 'Lio' before she meets Manolo in law school (also a revolutionary) and marries him.

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She is focused on law school, and succeeds in completing it as an adult, although Trujillo withholds her law license as revenge. Minerva: The third Mirabal sister, and certainly the most headstrong. First published in 1994, the story was adapted into a feature film in 2001. The book is written in the first and third person, by and about the Mirabal sisters. In 2013, she received the National Medal of Arts from President Obama.In the Time of the Butterflies is a historical fiction novel by Julia Alvarez, relating a fictionalized account of the Mirabal sisters during the time of the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. Ten years later, the family was forced to flee to the United States because of her father’s involvement in a plot to overthrow the dictator, Trujillo.Īlvarez has written novels ( How the García Girls Lost Their Accents, In the Time of the Butterflies, ¡Yo!, In the Name of Salomé, Saving the World, Afterlife), collections of poems ( Homecoming, The Other Side/ El Otro Lado, The Woman I Kept to Myself), nonfiction ( Something to Declare, Once Upon A Quinceañera, and A Wedding in Haiti), and numerous books for young readers (including the Tía Lola Stories series, Before We Were Free, finding miracles, Return to Sender and Where Do They Go?).Ī new novel, The Cemetery of Untold Stories, will be published in 2024.Īlvarez’s awards include the Pura Belpré and Américas Awards for her books for young readers, the Hispanic Heritage Award, and the F. Born in New York City in 1950, Julia Alvarez's parents returned to their native country, Dominican Republic, shortly after her birth.

Julia alvarez interesting facts