BOOKPATHS

Guantánamo Bay. Cuba

Richard Lea writes about Poems from Guantánamo: The Detainees Speak and Pentagon censorship. Scheduled for August publication, the poems were collected, “despite formidable obstacles,” by Mark Fakloff, a law professor at Northern Illinois University.

“But most of the poems, including the lament by Al Hela which first sparked Falkoff's interest, are unlikely to ever see the light of day. Not content with imprisoning the authors, the Pentagon has refused to declassify many of their words, arguing that poetry ‘presents a special risk’ to national security because of its ‘content and format.’" – from “Inside the Wire,” by Richard Lea, The Guardian

Cuba

The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway (various editions)

The Nobel Prize-winning novel, The Old Man and the Sea, follows Santiago, an aged Cuban fisherman, as he struggles to catch a “great” marlin. Although ultimately losing the fish to sharks, Santiago finds courage in his three-day battle and regains the respect of his fishing village.

Written at Finca Vigía, Hemingway’s farm near Havana, it’s believed he found inspiration for Santiago in Gregorio Fuentes, his long-time fishing companion and captain of his yacht, El Pilar. Born in the Canary Islands, Fuentes spent most of his 104 years in the village of Cojimar, Cuba. Placed in the care of Fuentes, he donated El Pilar to Finca Vigía, currently under renovation, where it’s on display.

The Nobel Prize in Literature 1954

“Sometimes someone would speak in a boat. But most of the boats were silent except for the dip of the oars. They spread apart after they were out of the mouth of the harbour and each one headed for the part of the ocean where he hoped to find fish. The old man knew he was going far out and he left the smell of the land behind and rowed out into the clean early morning smell of the ocean. He saw the phosphorescence of the Gulf weed in the water as he rowed over the part of the ocean that the fishermen called the great well because there was a sudden deep of seven hundred fathoms where all sorts of fish congregated because of the swirl the current made against the steep walls of the floor of the ocean.” – from The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba

Listen to NPR’s Morning Edition interview with British-born Moazzam Begg and read an excerpt from his book Enemy Combatant : My Imprisonment at Guantanamo, Bagram, and Kandahar. Begg “spent nearly two years in Guantanamo Bay before he was released in 2005.”

“Begg was never charged with a crime during his time in the prison. Through limited contact with lawyers, he learned that his family was petitioning both the British and United States governments to release him.” – NPR Website

Cuba

Duncan Campbell talks with Leonardo Padura, “the Hammett of Havana.”

“Mario Conde is Cuba's best-known cop. A hard-boiled, hard-drinking, rule-breaking, loose-living police lieutenant who views the world around him through a hungover haze of cynicism and rum, he is no revolutionary role model. The Havana he inhabits, with its nervous transvestites, corrupt ex-officials and moralising newsreaders, is a rough old place. But the cop and his city have no shortage of admirers.” – from “The Hammett of Havana,” by Duncan Campbell, The Guardian

Cuba

In today’s Guardian, Liz Ford writes about Philip Melling, “a lecturer from the University of Wales, Swansea [who] has been granted access to the published archive of Ernest Hemingway’s life in Cuba.” This is “the first time the material has been made available to anyone outside the country.”