Uruguayan puppeteer, teacher, poet and playwright. Humberto Zarrilli introduced, in 1936, the teaching of theatre in Uruguay’s Institutos Normales (teacher training institutes) as well as the teaching of puppetry in primary schools. In 1938, with Professor Fernando Amado and other teachers, he created a puppet theatre and performed shows in schools throughout the country.

Among Zarrilli’s works (some in collaboration with Roberto Abadie Soriano) are: Poemas para niños (Poems for Children, 1939); La isla afortunada (The Fortunate Island, 1934), inspired by the adventures of Jason and the Argonauts; La ciudad del dragón (The City of the Dragon, 1936); La gesta de la emancipación (The Feat of Emancipation, 1944), a dramatic poem; La epopeya de Artigas (The Epic Poem of Artigas, 1952), after the historical work by Juan Zorrilla de San Martín; El regreso del hada Melusina (The Return of the Fairy Melusina, 1952), a comedy in three acts and eight scenes performed at the Teatro Solís in Montevideo on November 23, 1952.

Humberto Zarrilli received support from the Dirección de Enseñanza Primaria y Normal (directorate of primary and secondary education) and collaborated with the scholarly magazine El Grillo (The Cricket), whose first issue appeared in December 1949.

(See Uruguay.)