Cuba
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Song of the Day: “Chan Chan”
The original Buena Vista Social Club was a members-only group that formed in Havana, Cuba, during the first half of the 20th century. The club became a cultural nexus for the city, drawing in musicians and artists who would perform at…
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Cuba’s Unfinished Race Revolution
I want readers to understand how racism and antiracism can exist at the same time even in a revolutionary setting. Antiracism in Cuba: The Unfinished Revolution by author and professor Devyn Benson is the long-untold history of racism against Black…
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Spotlight: Lorenzo Fonda’s “Yo Solve Cuba”
Jotting down experiences in comics form is also a way for me to assimilate and process them through my own life-filter…
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Maybe-True, Half-Hearted Hemingway in Havana
Papa: Hemingway in Cuba is a recently released film from director Bob Yari following the maybe-true misadventures of the late Hemingway and his years in Cuba, where he lived, drank, and complained after winning the Nobel Prize for fiction. A…
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The Sunday Rumpus Essay: Motel Ecstasy
Alia Volz’s artist, expat mom needed to leave Mexico and go back to the United States for a heavy-duty chemo treatment, which meant it was time for a mother-daugther road trip.
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Publishers Lobby to Lift Cuban Embargo
Publishers want access to Cuba. The longstanding trade embargo with Cuba includes books and educational materials, but publishers have been lobbying the White House to lift the embargo. The island nation has a literacy rate near 100%.
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Protecting Papa’s Papers
Ernest Hemingway lived outside of Havana, Cuba for almost twenty years, and his former house there is a national museum. However, time (and the Caribbean humidity) have damaged many of the writer’s books and papers. Now, a Boston-based foundation is helping…
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Collares
“You were promised to the religion,” Carlos Aldama says, his eyes watery and somber. “One of your parents said, ‘Mi hija lo paga.’” My daughter will pay.
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Paper Trumpets #26: Famous Myths of the Golden Age
This is part of the mystery and sometimes frustration of doing collage—trying to remember where things came from.
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The Rumpus Interview with Brian Shawver
Author Brian Shawver talks about his new book, Danger on the Page, his novel Aftermath, MFA programs, and why it’s a good thing that writing never stops being hard work.
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The Sci-Fi “Code”
For Electric Literature, Ryan Britt interviews Cuban sci-fi novelist Yoss. Their discussion covers the influence of heavy metal on Yoss’s fiction, as well as how science fiction can work as “code” for contemporary social issues: In Cuba, on the other hand, it…
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The Politics of Fiction
Fiction written under an authoritarian or totalitarian government often dares readers to view the work as a critique of that society. In a review of two science fiction works by Cuban authors, Electric Literature takes a look at the surprising…