Verwandte Artikel zu Cuba Diaries

Cuba Diaries - Softcover

Tattlin, Isadora

 
9780553824896: Cuba Diaries

Inhaltsangabe

The face of modern-day Cuba is in many respects still frozen in the 1950s, with its classic American cars, horse-drawn carriages and colonial Spanish architecture. In a country where taxi drivers earn more than doctors, understanding Cuba is a compelling but never-ending task.

In the early 1990s, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Cuba was plunged into crisis. Having been subsidized by the Soviet Union to the tune of $3 million a day, the country's economy entered freefall. The ban on the US dollar was lifted, the floodgates of tourism opened and the salaries of Cubans in contact with foreigners went into orbit.

Into Castro's fortress of dollar-fuelled hedonism and communist austerity came the American wife of a European energy consultant posted to Havana, and their two small children. Isadora Tattlin befriended Cubans from all walks of life, gave dozens of parties - even Fidel Castro came to dinner! - and kept a daily diary. The result is a remarkable testimony to a unique period in Cuba's history when el triunfo de la revolucion was beginning to clash with the powerful lure of multinational consumerism.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Isadora Tattlin was born and raised in California and spent her early adulthood in New York City. She lives wherever her husband's job takes them and their two young children.

Von der hinteren Coverseite

Isadora Tattlin was accustomed to relocating often for her husband's work. But when he accepted a post in Cuba in the early 1990s, she resolved to keep a detailed diary of her time there, recording her daily experiences as a wife, mother, and foreigner in a land of contraband. The result is a striking, rare glimpse into a tiny country of enormous splendor and squalor. Though the Tattlins are provided with a well-staffed Havana mansion, the store shelves are bare. On the streets, beggars plead for soap, not coins. A vet with few real medical supplies operates on a carved mahogany coffee table in a Louis XIV-style drawing room. The people adore festivity, but Christmas trees are banned. And when Isadora hosts a dinner party whose guest list includes Fidel Castro himself, she observes the ultimate contradiction at the very heart of Cuba. Vividly capturing Cuba's simultaneously appalling and enchanting essence, "Cuba Diaries casts an irresistible spell and lifts the enigma of an island that is trapped in time, but not in spirit.

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.