Pedro Juan Gutiérrez
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Pedro Juan Gutiérrez
Pedro Juan Gutiérrez (born 27 January 1950, in Matanzas, Cuba) is a Cuban novelist. He grew up in Pinar del Río and began to work selling ice cream and newspapers when he was eleven years old. He was a soldier, swimming and kayak instructor, agricultural worker, technician in construction, technical designer, radio speaker, and journalist for 26 years. He is a painter and sculptor and an author of several poetry books. He came to Centro Habana, a dilapidated part of the capital, when he was 37 and was astonished by the level of violence but also by the energy of the people who lived there. He is the author of ''Dirty Havana Trilogy'', ''King of Havana'', ''Tropical Animal'' (winner of Spain's Alfonso Garcia Ramos Prize in 2000), ''The Insatiable Spiderman'', ''Dog Meat'' (winner of Italy's Narrativa Sur del Mundo Prize), ''Snake's Nest'' (winner of the Prix des Amériques Insulaires et de la Guyane in 2008), ''Our GG in Havana'', and the short stories of ''Melancholy of Lion ...
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Matanzas
Matanzas (Cuban ) is the capital of the Cuban province of Matanzas. Known for its poets, culture, and Afro-Cuban folklore, it is located on the northern shore of the island of Cuba, on the Bay of Matanzas (Spanish ''Bahia de Matanzas''), east of the capital Havana and west of the resort town of Varadero. Matanzas is called the ''City of Bridges'', for the seventeen bridges that cross the three rivers that traverse the city (Rio Yumuri, San Juan, and Canimar). For this reason it was referred to as the "Venice of Cuba." It was also called "La Atenas de Cuba" ("The Athens of Cuba") for its poets. Matanzas is known as the birthplace of the music and dance traditions danzón and rumba. History Matanzas was founded in 1693 as ''San Carlos y San Severino de Matanzas''. This followed a royal decree ("''real cédula''") issued on September 25, 1690, which decreed that the bay and port of Matanzas be settled by 30 families from the Canary Islands. Matanzas was one of the regi ...
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Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and Atlantic Ocean meet. Cuba is located east of the Yucatán Peninsula (Mexico), south of both the American state of Florida and the Bahamas, west of Hispaniola ( Haiti/Dominican Republic), and north of both Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. Havana is the largest city and capital; other major cities include Santiago de Cuba and Camagüey. The official area of the Republic of Cuba is (without the territorial waters) but a total of 350,730 km² (135,418 sq mi) including the exclusive economic zone. Cuba is the second-most populous country in the Caribbean after Haiti, with over 11 million inhabitants. The territory that is now Cuba was inhabited by the Ciboney people from the 4th millennium BC with the Gua ...
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Dirty Realism
Dirty realism is a term coined by Bill Buford of ''Granta'' magazine to define a North American literary movement. Writers in this sub-category of realism are said to depict the seamier or more mundane aspects of ordinary life in spare, unadorned language. Definition The term formed the title of the Summer 1983 edition of ''Granta'', for which Buford wrote an explanatory introduction: Dirty Realism is the fiction of a new generation of American authors. They write about the belly-side of contemporary life – a deserted husband, an unwanted mother, a car thief, a pickpocket, a drug addict – but they write about it with a disturbing detachment, at times verging on comedy. Understated, ironic, sometimes savage, but insistently compassionate, these stories constitute a new voice in fiction. Style Sometimes considered a variety of literary minimalism, dirty realism is characterized by an economy with words and a focus on surface description. Writers working within the genre tend t ...
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List Of Cuban Writers
A list of Cuban writers, including novelists, poets, and critics: Cuban authors and writers have influenced and shaped the history of the world. Throughout the years many of their contributions have caused radical shifts: from social movements to global perspectives in the Americas and beyond. A * Brígida Agüero (1837–1866), poet * Mirta Aguirre (1912–1980), poet, novelist, and journalist * Magaly Alabau (born 1945), poet * Dora Alonso (1910–2001), author and journalist * Reinaldo Arenas (1943–1990), openly gay poet, novelist, and playwright, author of '' Before Night Falls'' () B * Joaquín Badajoz (born 1972), poet and writer * Gastón Baquero (1916–1997), poet and writer * Miguel Barnet, anthropologist and testimonialist * Antonio Benítez-Rojo (1931–2005), author and critic * Pedro Luis Boitel (1931–1972), poet and dissident * Mariano Brull (1891–1956), postmodern poet C * Lydia Cabrera (1899–1991), anthropologist and poet * Guillermo Ca ...
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Pinar Del Río
Pinar del Río is the capital city of Pinar del Río Province, Cuba. With a population of 139,336 (2004) in a municipality of 190,332, it is the List of cities in Cuba, 10th-largest city in Cuba. Inhabitants of the area are called ''Pinareños''. History Pinar del Río was one of the last major cities in Cuba founded by the Spanish, on September 10, 1867. The city and province was founded as ''Nueva Filipinos, Filipinas'' (New Philippines) in response to an influx of Asian laborers coming from the Philippine Islands to work on tobacco plantations. Pinar del Río's history begins with the Guanahatabey, a group of nomadic Indians who lived in caves and procured most of their livelihood from the sea. Less advanced than the other indigenous natives who lived on the island, the Guanahatabey were a peaceful and passive race whose culture came about largely independently of the Taíno and Siboney cultures further east. The Guanahatabey were extinct by the time of the Spanish arrival in ...
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Centro Habana
Centro Habana is one of the 15 municipalities or boroughs (''municipio''s in Spanish) in the city of Havana, Cuba. There are many retail spaces (such as ''Plaza de Carlos III'' commercial center, office buildings, hotels, bars and clubs (such as the ''Casa de la Musica'' on Galliano). A chinatown - ''Barrio Chino'' - is also located in this district. It is a smaller municipality of Havana, and it has the highest population density. Centro Habana is divided into five ''consejos populares'' (wards): Cayo Hueso, Colón, Dragones, Los Sitios and Pueblo Nuevo. History The infrastructure of the city, built 450 years ago, heavily deteriorated during the 1990s after the collapse of the Cuban-Soviet trade partnership. In 1996, restoration projects were started to improve housing and infrastructure in the Cayo Hueso community. Centro Habana was established as an administrative division in 1963 and later formally made its own ''municipio'' in 1976. Demographics In 2004, the municipalit ...
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Alfonso Garcia Ramos
Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century (Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian peninsula. In the later medieval period it became a standard name in the Hispanic and Portuguese royal families. It is derived from a Gothic name, or a conflation of several Gothic names; from ''*Aþalfuns'', composed of the elements ''aþal'' "noble" and ''funs'' "eager, brave, ready", and perhaps influenced by names such as ''*Alafuns'', ''*Adefuns'' and ''* Hildefuns''. It is recorded as ''Adefonsus'' in the 9th and 10th century, and as ''Adelfonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'' in the 10th to 11th. The reduced form ''Alfonso'' is recorded in the late 9th century, and the Portuguese form ''Afonso'' from the early 11th. and ''Anfós'' in Catalan from the 12th Century until the 15th. Variants of the name include: ''Alonso'' (Spanish), ''Alfonso'' (Spanis ...
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Irony
Irony (), in its broadest sense, is the juxtaposition of what on the surface appears to be the case and what is actually the case or to be expected; it is an important rhetorical device and literary technique. Irony can be categorized into different types, including ''verbal irony'', ''dramatic irony'', and ''situational irony''. Verbal, dramatic, and situational irony are often used for emphasis in the assertion of a truth. The ironic form of simile, used in sarcasm, and some forms of litotes can emphasize one's meaning by the deliberate use of language which states the opposite of the truth, denies the contrary of the truth, or drastically and obviously understates a factual connection. Definitions Henry Watson Fowler, in ''The King's English'', says, "any definition of irony—though hundreds might be given, and very few of them would be accepted—must include this, that the surface meaning and the underlying meaning of what is said are not the same." Also, Eric Partrid ...
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Literary Persona
A persona (plural personae or personas), depending on the context, is the public image of one's personality, the social role that one adopts, or simply a fictional character. The word derives from Latin, where it originally referred to a theatrical mask. On the social web, users develop virtual personas as online identities. Etymology The Latin word probably derived from the Etruscan word "", with the same meaning, and that from the Greek ('). Its meaning in the latter Roman period changed to indicate a "character" of a theatrical performance or court of law, when it became apparent that different individuals could assume the same role and that legal attributes such as rights, powers, and duties followed the role. The same individuals as actors could play different roles, each with its own legal attributes, sometimes even in the same court appearance. According to other sources, which also admit that the origin of the term is not completely clear, ''persona'' could be ...
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Special Period
The Special Period ( es, Período especial, link=no), officially the Special Period in the Time of Peace (), was an extended period of economic crisis in Cuba that began in 1991 primarily due to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and, by extension, the Comecon. The economic depression of the Special Period was at its most severe in the early to mid-1990s, before slightly declining in severity towards the end of the decade once Hugo Chávez's Venezuela emerged as Cuba's primary trading partner and diplomatic ally, and especially after the year 2000 once Cuba–Russia relations improved under the presidency of Vladimir Putin. It was defined primarily by extreme reductions of rationed foods at state-subsidized prices, the severe shortages of hydrocarbon energy resources in the form of gasoline, diesel, and other petroleum derivatives that occurred upon the implosion of economic agreements between the petroleum-rich Soviet Union and Cuba, and the shrinking of an economy overdepen ...
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Picaresque
The picaresque novel (Spanish: ''picaresca'', from ''pícaro'', for " rogue" or "rascal") is a genre of prose fiction. It depicts the adventures of a roguish, but "appealing hero", usually of low social class, who lives by his wits in a corrupt society. Picaresque novels typically adopt a realistic style. There are often some elements of comedy and satire. While the term "picaresque novel" was only coined in 1810, the picaresque novel originated in Imperial Rome during the 1st-2nd century CE, in particular with works such as the Satyricon of Petronius and later, and more particularly with authors such as Apuleius in Roman Numidia. It would see a revival in Spain during the Spanish Golden Age in 1554. Early Spanish contributors included Mateo Alemán and Francisco de Quevedo, who were influenced in particular by Apuleius' 2nd century work. Other notable ancient influences of the modern picaresque genre include Roman playwrights such as Plautus and Terence. The Golden Ass of Apu ...
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Cuban Journalists
Cuban may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Cuba, a country in the Caribbean * Cubans, people from Cuba, or of Cuban descent ** Cuban exile, a person who left Cuba for political reasons, or a descendant thereof * Cuban citizen, a person who is part of the Cuban population, see Demographics of Cuba * Cuban Spanish, the dialect of Cuba * Cuban Americans, citizens of the United States who are of Cuban descent * Cuban cigar, often referred to as "Cubans" * Cuban culture * Cuban cuisine ** Cuban sandwich * Cuban-eight, a type of aerobatic maneuver People with the surname * Brian Cuban (born 1961), American lawyer and activist * Mark Cuban (born 1958), American entrepreneur See also * Cuban Missile Crisis * List of Cubans * * Cuban Boys, a British music act * Kuban (other) * Cubane Cubane () is a synthetic hydrocarbon compound that consists of eight carbon atoms arranged at the corners of a cube, with one hydrogen atom attached to each carbon atom. A solid c ...
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