Matinee

Fun movie to watch, many familiar faces. Ebert gave it three and a half stars. "Matinee," a delightful comedy and one of the most charming movies in a long time, takes place exactly at a moment when that innocence may have ended.

Compañero

After Alberto Granado died on 5 March, I watched the film Motorcycle Diaries. Granado and Guevara had taken the journey, and I remembered having watched the DVD some time back. That led me to watching Benicio del Toro in Che. Part one, the Argentine Partie un, l'Argentin  and Che. Part two, guerrilla Partie deux, guérilla.

That led me to wanting to read Che's biography. Two were available: John Lee Anderson's Che Guevara : a revolutionary life,which I needed to interloan, and this one, which was on the shelf. I took the latter one from the shelf, and interloaned the former.

I was flummoxed in reading Castañeda's work. He used the phrase fifteen minutes of fame referring to Guevara (whose fame has lasted far longer than 15 minutes, and to whom the phrase does not begin to fit), and referred to him as our man. I could not believe he would use such language, and was put off. Anderson's book arrived a few days later, I switched to it, and dropped Castañeda's work.

Che: Part two

A straightforward telling of Ernesto Guevara's last year, from the last few days in Cuba, already in disguise as an OEA (OAS) bureaucrat, to his assassination in Bolivia. Nowhere as dramatic as Part one, almost a documentary, it lacks impact. Benicio del Toro does a masterful job of portraying el Che, but ... for the loyal base, this is a great film. Yet, even so, I thought it lesser than Part One. There was no mention of Congo, for instance.

Che: Part One (The Argentine)

(2008). Nicely done. Familiar story, yet riveting.

Nobel a platform for outspoken Vargas Llosa

The Nobel Prize in literature brings a long-awaited accolade to Peruvian author Mario Vargas Llosa, and also a new platform for him to assail leftist leaders Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Fidel Castro of Cuba.

Fidel is an anachronism, as he himself recognizes.

Vargas Llosa has regularly directed barbs at Chavez, denouncing him as autocratic. When the novelist visited Venezuela last year to attend a pro-democracy forum, he was stopped by authorities at the airport for nearly two hours. He said he was questioned and told that as a foreigner he didn't "have the right to make political statements" in Venezuela.

What a bunch of mierda. People who are afraid of words are cowards, and will, in the long run, lose.

Chavez disputed that account at the time, saying his critics were putting on a show to discredit his government. Chavez invited Vargas Llosa and other intellectuals to debate on live television, then backed away from a direct debate after critics suggested a one-on-one contest with Vargas Llosa — with equal time for each.

Chávez would look a fool debating Llosa one-on-one. In a gaggle, he could let pandemonium and disorder be his allies, as he usually does.

He burst onto the literary scene in the early 1960s with the novel "The Time of the Hero" (the Spanish title was "La Ciudad y los Perros") — a book that drew on his experiences at a Peruvian military academy and angered the country's military. One thousand copies of the novel were burned by military authorities, with some generals calling the book false and Vargas Llosa a communist.

How ironic. Then again, irony is the stuff of life.

Buena Vista Social Club

A classic. Quite enjoyable. Bravo, Ry Cooder.

Dancing with Cuba

Picked up, looks interesting; another time.

The man who invented Fidel

DePalma, Anthony. (2006). The man who invented Fidel: Cuba, Castro, and Herbert L. Matthews of The New York times.New York: Public Affairs.

Excellent work. Enjoyed reading immensely. DePalma debunks myths on both sides of the equation, analyzes Matthews's career and role, and does not spare the Times in his judgment. This is a book that should be widely known and read, but it is far too serious and challenging to be such. Alas, the world subsists on bad books and myths.

One person mentioned prominently was a journalist resident in Cuba before Matthews arrived, Ruby Hart Phillips. She had contacts everywhere, the Batista government included, and did little foot work to research her stories. Needless to say, she disliked and resented Matthews and his work. She went by the name of R. Hart Phillips to fight sexism.

She wrote two books on Cuba: Cuba, island of paradox (1959) and The Cuban dilemma.(1963).

Samples of DePalma's words:

"Matthews was a scholar with a deadline, an intellectual with printer's ink on his hands and a soldier's tolerance for danger in his heart." p.19

"In a time of misconceptions and lies, the truth itself became malleable. Both the accusers and the accused were willing to believe that image mattered more than reality. Policy was being misshaped by perception, while perceptions were distorted by emotions. Both government and journalism were under tremendous pressures at this critical moment, and both would be forced to change in significant ways in their relationship to one another." p.229

The real Fidel

Coltman, Leycester. (2003). The real Fidel Castro. foreword by Julia E. Sweig.
New Haven : Yale University Press.

Mentioned by Anthony DePalma in his book, The man who invented Fidel (about Herbert Matthews).

World Safe for Capitalism

The topic of books on the Dominican Republic arose last night; there are very few in the County. Peninsula owns two, from 1968 and 1970. There are nine all told in the County, which is pitiful. One is from 1928, written by Sumner Welles. (Look at his Wiki page; there is video from 1933). The books go to 1972, and then there is a jump to a book from 2002, A world safe for capitalism : dollar diplomacy and America's rise to global power. Reviews of that book mention the San Domingo Improvement Company. Googling that gave this as the first result: San Domingo Improvement Company Claims (Dominican Republic, United ... a pdf from the UN entitled REPORTS OF INTERNATIONAL ARBITRAL AWARDS. Why the UN? It's dated14 July 1904. Curious.

Interest piqued, I looked some more; the fourth link is for Ulises Heureau, president of the DR thrice in the 1880s. Fascinating reading. Mentioned is made of the Ten Years' War, one of three wars for Cuban independence.


Book sources Wikipedia page

Cuban music

Cecilia Valdes / estudio critico por Raimundo Lazo. (1979). Villaverde, Cirilo, 1812-1894. Mexico: Porrua. [SP FIC Villaverde]

Cecilia Valdés is both a novel by the Cuban Cirilo Villaverde (1812–1894), and a zarzuela based on the novel. It is a work of importance for its quality, and its revelation of the interaction of classes and races in Cuba.

Cited in the liner notes of Cachao: Master Sessions.



[INT 0026] CD CUBA 789.2 CACHAO