Esquivel was the third of four children born to Julio Caesar Esquivel, a telegraph operator, and his wife, Josephina. Reared in Mexico City, Esquivel grew up across the street from her grandmother. Her grandmother's house had a chapel and the smell of her grandmothers' cooking mingled with the odors of the chapel. Cooking would always remain an important part of Esquivel's life and it was natural for her to blend the art of cooking into her first novel.
Esquivel attended the Escuela Normal de Maestros, the national teachers' college. A few years after graduating, she married Alfonso Arau, a Mexican film director. They had one child, Sandra. During an interview with Smith, Esquivel explained that she wrote "[o]ut of necessity. . . . I am a kindergarten teacher and I worked in a theater workshop for children and there was very little material available so I began to write children's plays." She went on to write for children's public television. Esquivel credited Arau with teaching her how to write film scripts and for inspiring her to work in film. The power of love is ever present in her books and an important theme in her own life.
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