Translation Rights TQE / Three Beautiful Cubans

One afternoon in the Havana of 1921, the diplomatic Miguel Celorio sat in Tosca cinema. Before the film began, he saw three beautiful and very young Cubans accompanied by a servant. The oldest one was magnificent, the youngest very restless and the middle one… seduced him. Shy by nature, Miguel chose to write her a letter: it was the first one of more than thirteen thousand letters he wrote to her, being married, through all his life. Rosita, Virginia and Ana María are those Three Beautiful Cubans; they are the mother and aunts of the author. Their adventures and stories, their ancestors and descendants, their exiles and fidelities, are the axis around which Gonzalo Celorio brilliantly weaves a familiar saga full of exciting characters, of prosperity and ruin, of deaths and loves.

Parallel to this, Gonzalo Celorio’s numerous travels to Cuba from 1974 allow us to relive the different periods of the Twentieth Century Cuban history. Through his narrative, we experience everyday life in the Caribbean island and the author’s admiration for Cuban writers such as Lezama Lima, Carpentier or Dulce María Loynaz; and also for those of the present novelist generation.

Rosita, Virginia and Ana María are the Three Beautiful Cubans –which is also the title of a song. One of them exiled to Miami, the other to Mexico D.C., and the other one living in Havana, faithful to the revolution. They all permit the author to balance the different and sometimes opposed attitudes towards Cuba, which are always complex. Three Beautiful Cubans mixes two genres: the memoirs and the account of journeys, this mixture introduces us to a new narrative status where history melts with fiction.

Gonzalo Celorio (Mexico, 1948) studied Spanish language and literature at the Faculty of Philosophy and Arts of the Autonomous National University of Mexico, where he is professor of Latin American Literature since 1974. He has also taught at the Iberoamericana University and in Mexico School. He is a member of the National System of Art Creators and is a number member of the Mexican Academy, which is follower of the Spanish one. Celorio has published ten books. Besides novels, his writings include essays, literature and architecture. His work has been translated to English, French, Italian and Portuguese. Gonzalo Celorio has obtained Prizes such as Two Oceans Prize in Biarritz, France (1997), or IMPAC-Conarte-ITESM Prize (1999).