Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy, by Carlos Eire (2003)
Shortly after the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1962, Operation Petro Pan airlifted 14,000 children from Cuba. Their parents were to follow them soon after. Carlos Eire, along with his older brother, were two of the children in Pedro Pan. Carlos was 12 years old. It was several years before his mother was able to leave Cuba and join her sons. His father never left his beloved Cuba.
Until that day when he suddenly found himself alone in Miami, he was a child of privilege. His father was a wealthy Cuban judge. His family was among the elite. His father was convinced that he was Louis XVI in a past life and that his wife was Marie Antoinette. He and his brother ran around Havana terrorizing lizards by various means of boyhood antics.
In January 1959, Batista was removed from power and replaced by a young Fidel Castro. Life had changed overnight. Suddenly, the sounds of gunfire were heard on a regular basis.
Waiting for Snow in Havana is Eire's childhood's memories of a simpler time ~ a time when a young boy could be a young boy with no cares in the world. Eire remembers life with his eccentric father. He recalls the boy his father brings into the family house and adopts, the boy whose main objective is to terrorize Eire. He recalls his father's collection of porcelain figurines. His father's love for his collections was so strong, that he chose to remain in Cuba rather than follow his family to America.
Eire recently wrote a sequel, Learning to Die in Miami, which picks up with his memories of his early life and struggles in America. I look forward to reading it.
Carlos Eire is currently a professor of history and religious studies at Yale University. I would love to have the opportunity to take a class with him.
Read: January 12, 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment