Customer Reviews

The Reader's Companion to Cuba

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The Reader's Companion to Cuba is one of an excellent series in the Readers Companion books from Harvest. Edited by Alan Ryan, who edited all of the books in this series, this book is required reading for anyone expecting to travel to Cuba or to any student that is studying Cuba to any degree. The book is a chronicle of Cuba from the mid 1800s to the 90s seen through the eyes of various witnesses including such literary greats as Langston Hughes, Amiri Bakari(formally Leroi Jones, poet and playwrite of the such works as the Dutchman ). One simply can not write a book about Cuba without including something about the late legend, Ernest Hemingway. Arnold Samuelson, Norman Lewis, and Martha Gellhorn, one of Hemingway's many former wives fulfill this task beautifully. It also includes an account from sports great Tommy Lasorda who played in Cuba during the off season. There's even an account about mob activities during the reign of Fugencio Batista by Frank Ragano and Selwyn Raab.

A marvelous compilation and literary review by some of the best writers of our time (and sojourners to Cuba)presented in chronological order from 1859 to the present. Gives the reader an extremely interesting persective of the history of Cuba and the travails of its people. One gets a virtual picture of the political, social, economic, and everyday life of the Cuban people through the eyes of a very diverse range of observers across a wide timespan (from Anais Nin to Tommy Lasorda and Graham Green to Tom Miller, to mention a few). A must read for those who want to visit there and experience the complete kalidescope that is Cuba.

I bought this book just before my first trip to Cuba and found it a great way to take a historical look at the ways in which tourists have thought of Cuba for the past 300 years. I highly reccomend it.

This is a good book for the "armchair traveler", and represents the Havana experience. For real adventure, Havana-style, read "Holiday in Havana", by Malcom Massey, 0-595-09466-X. It will rock your socks!