Cuba in Mind An Anthology

by DOMINGUEZ, MARIA FINN

• ISBN13: 9781400076130
• ISBN10: 1400076137
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-06-08
• Publisher: Vintage

Summary

Since Columbus arrived in 1492 and called Cuba "the most beautiful country that human eyes have ever seen," few places on earth have evoked such passion. The thirty-one writers inCuba in Mindoffer ample proof of the fascinations that have lured generations of travelers. In this richly varied anthology of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, we hear from such famous visitors as Anthony Trollope, Langston Hughes, Ernest Hemingway, and Graham Greene. Poets and journalists offer their responses, from Allen Ginsberg and Jayne Cortez to Alma Guillermoprieto and Robert Stone; and novelists weigh in with such fictional portrayals as Elmore Leonard'sCuba Libreand Pico Iyer'sCuba and the Night.Cuban exiles, immigrants, and their offspring provide their unique perspective, from Cristina Garcia's essay "Simple Life" to excerpts from Oscar Hijuelos's novelThe Mambo Kings Play Songs of Loveand from Carlos Eire's memoirWaiting for Snow in Havana.Embracing salsa and santeria, politics and baseball, the island's sparkling beaches and the teeming Havana streets,Cuba in Mindcaptures the vibrancy, the contradictions, the heat and the humor of Cuba as shown by some of the best writers in the English language. Contributors: Thomas Barbour Jose Barreiro Ruth Behar William Cullen Bryant Jayne Cortez Stephen Crane Andrei Codrescu Eleanor Early Carlos Eire Kimi Eisele Cristina Garcia Allen Ginsberg Graham Greene Alma Guillermoprieto Elizabeth Hanly Ernest Hemingway Consuelo Hermer Oscar Hijuelos Langston Hughes Pico Iyer Elmore Leonard Rosa Lowinger Marjorie May Tom Miller Holly Morris Ricardo Pau-Llosa Robert Stone Jim Shepard Isadora Tattlin Anthony Trollope Walter D. Wilcox

Author Biography

While teaching in the English Department at Hunter College of the City University of New York, Maria Finn Domìnguez designed and taught a writing course for CUNY students at Casa de las Americas in Havana, Cuba. She works as a freelance writer and has written for, among many others, <i>The New York Times, Audubon Magazine</i>, and the <i>Anchorage Daily News,</i> and she has been a commentator for Alaska Public Radio. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College and has published literary work in magazines such as <i>The Chicago Review, New Letters, </i>and <i>Exquisite Corpse</i>. She has lived and worked in Alaska, Guatemala, and Spain, and traveled extensively throughout Latin America. She and her husband, Rafael Dominguez, met in Havana, Cuba. They now live in Brooklyn, New York.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION	xv
TRAVELERS	1	(96)
"Because most visitors have only the vaguest idea of Cuba's troubled history, I am going to review it as briefly as I can, and if you are not interested, you can skip to the part about cocktails."
Eleanor Early
ANTHONY TROLLOPE	3	(10)
from The West Indies and the Spanish Main
The Victorian novelist arrives on a visit to the Spanish Crown's "most splendid appendage," eager to tour a slave sugarplantation.
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT	13	(7)
"Letter XLVIII" from Letters of a Traveller
Bryant describes the stunning beautiful countryside around Matanzas in 1849, and reveals the secrets of the sugar-refining process.
WALTER D. WILcox	20	(10)
"Among the Mahogany Forests of Cuba"
In 1906 Wilcox explores the wildestpart of Cuba, the Bay of Cochinos-long famed forpirates, crocodiles, and sharks-and survives a hurricane.
ELEANOR EARLY	30	(11)
from Ports of the Sun
A breezy tour of Havana in the 1930's that encompasses a fairy-tale orphanage, Columbus's bones, the delights of Spanish mayonnaise, the broken heart of Dona Isabel, and, of course, cocktails.
CONSUELO HERMER AND MARJORIE MAY	41	(5)
from Havana Mariana: A Guide to Cuba and the Cubans
A 1930's travel guide claims that Cuba's most flourishing domestic products are charm, romance, humor, and the worship of Lady Luck.
ROBERT STONE	46	(21)
"Havana Then and Now"
While visiting Havana in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet bloc, the novelist recalls first seeing the city as a seventeen year-old sailor in 1955.
ALMA GUILLERMOPRIETO	67	(7)
from Looking for History: Dispatches from Latin America
Two consummate showmen face off in a stadium: Fidel Castro and Pope John Paul II
ANDREI CODRESCU	74	(9)
from Ay, Cuba!
A 1990's visitor is assailed by flocks of seductive young jineteras, who seem to share the widespread conviction that all foreigners are there to help keep Cubans from starving.
KIMI EISELE	83	(16)
"The Flesh, the Bones, and the Beating Heart"
A young American backpacker falls in love with Che, thirty years after his death.
EXPATRIATES, REAL AND IMAGINED	97	(72)
"People ask you why you live in Cuba and you say it is because you like it. It is too complicated to explain.... "
Ernest Hemingway
ELMORE LEONARD	99	(9)
from Cuba Libre
The mistress of an American sugar baron is asked to be a spy for the insurgents who are fighting against Spain in 1898.
STEPHEN CRANE	108	(20)
"The Clan of No-Name"
A young rebel lieutenant faces his first battle against the Spanish, armed with a photo of his sweetheart.
GRAHAM GREENE	128	(11)
from Our Man in Havana
A British vacuum cleaner salesman in 1950's Havana pretends to be a spy.
ERNEST HEMINGWAY	139	(5)
from "The Great Blue River"
Hemingway reveals the biggest reason he lives in Cuba, and many smaller ones.
JIM SHEPARD	144	(19)
"Batting Against Castro"
American minor-league baseball players come to play for a Cuban team during the Batista regime's final years and find themselves up against Fidel Castro, in more ways than one.
ISADORA TATTLIN	163	(8)
from Cuba Diaries: An American Housewife in Havana
The wife of a businessman posted in Havana arrives during the extreme deprivations of the "Special Period" of the early 1990's, armed with soap, socks, tennis balls, and tomatoes in her luggage.
AFICIONADOS	169	(68)
"The drumming never stops in Cuba-congas, mostly, skin on skin beating out eerie rhythms soft as Cuba itself... . Drumming in Cuba seems always to touch on desire."
Elizabeth Hanly
LANGSTON HUGHES	171	(6)
"Havana Nights"
The poet attends a rumba party in Havana, "to which one does not invite one's wife, one's mother, or one's sweetheart."
JAYNE CORTEZ	177	(5)
"Visita" and "In 1985 I Met Nicolas Guillen"
An African American poet searches for the Cuban poet Nicolas Gullin.
ALLEN GINSBERG	182	(6)
from an interview with Allen Young in Gay Sunshine
Ginsberg describes being kicked out of Cuba after calling Che Guevara "cute."
ELIZABETH HANLY	188	(14)
"Santeria: An Alternative Pulse"
A reporter learns that you can't understand Cuba without understanding the seductive religion of Santeria.
PICO IYER	202	(7)
from Cuba and the Night
A tourist falls for a beautiful Cubana, whose longings turn out to be more complicated than he had realized.
TOM MILLER	209	(13)
from Trading with the Enemy: A Yankee Travels Through Castro's Cuba
Nita Villapol, famed television chef and the queen of Cuban kitchens, defends the Revolution.
HOLLY MORRIS	222	(9)
"Adventure Divas"
Documentary filmmakers seek out a group of young female rappers and a famous erotic poet who is still going strong in her eighties.
THOMAS BARBOUR	231	(8)
from A Naturalist in Cuba
A pioneering naturalist waxes lyrical about the avian delights of an island he can never visit again.
EXILES, IMMIGRANTS, AND THEIR OFFSPRING	237
"My head buzzed with the sudden recognition of a place that held something for me beyond memory."
Rosa Lowinger
OSCAR HIJUELOS	239	(7)
from The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love
The Mambo King recalls his early days as a young upstart singer in Santiago.
RUTH BEHAR	246	(4)
"In the Absence of Love"
A Jewish Cuban American in a loveless marriage returns again to Cuba, where she believes there is nothing left to find.
CRISTINA GARCIA	250	(4)
"Simple Life"
An American who left Cuba as a child marvels at the unexpected gifts that Cubans routinely conjure from the most unpromising circumstances.
CARLOS EIRE	254	(9)
"Trece" from Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy
The author tells tales of his ancestors, frequent champions in the "lose-everything sweepstakes."
RICARDO PAU-LLOSA	263	(3)
"Charada China"
An expert in the Chinese Cuban method of choosing lottery numbers tells you how to play your dreams.
ROSA LOWINGER	266	(8)
"Repairing Things"
An art conservator is stunned to find that Cuba is not only the place of loss and decay she had always seen through the eyes of her exile parents, but a treasury of architectural wonders and a place that can ground her to the past.
JOSÉ BARREIRO	274
from The Indian Chronicles
Columbus discovers Cuba, observed by his adopted son Diego, a captured Taino boy.