Guillermo Cabrera Infante, 1929-2005 RIP

I noted the death of Infante a couple of days after his death and intended to write on it. Other things seemed to get in the way and then I promptly forgot. I shouldn't have; this was a life well lived, charged with intelligence though his politics (at least initially) were not to my liking.

Infante was born in Cuba in 1929. His parent's were founders of the Cuban Communist Party's "committee" and they moved to Havana in 1941. Infante initially wanted to be a physician, but began writing at the age of 18 and found (besides cinema) his true love. Infante enrolled in journalism school in 1950 and began a series of reporting on life in Cuba. In 1952 he was arrested for using english "profanities" and following a fine and jail term, became a staunch opponent of Fulgencio Batista and remained so until Castro overthrew Batista.

I was first exposed to Infante in college, reading him at the behest of one of my many roommates. His intitial writings were in praise of the revolution, however that changed. The Weekly Standard(subscription only, also in the print edition) has an excellent article on Infante by Stephen Schwartz. Following a number of tussles with the Cuban government of Castro/Gueverra, Infante fled Cuba and resided in England.

As Schwartz notes, his writings were frequently a "sharp polemical sword" used against "the crimes of the Castro Regime." Infante's death was met with silence in Cuba which is a shame, because Infante was one of the bright shining lights in Cuban and Spanish literature.