Posted on 02/23/2005 2:43:47 PM PST by Rastus
LONDON - Cuban-born novelist Guillermo Cabrera Infante, regarded as one of the most original voices in 20th-century Spanish literature and an outspoken critic of Fidel Castro (news - web sites), has died in London. He was 75.
Cabrera died in a hospital Monday from septicemia, said Carmen Pinilla, a spokeswoman for his literary agents, the Balcells agency in Barcelona, Spain. Septicemia is a type of blood infection.
The writer, a London resident since 1966, had suffered a series of illnesses in recent years including diabetes as well as heart and kidney problems, Pinilla said in a phone interview Tuesday. She added that Cabrera's wife, Miriam, was by his side when he died.
Cabrera had long been lauded for his experimental use of language in his novels, essays and cinema criticism, and he won the 1997 Miguel de Cervantes prize for literature, the most prestigious literary award in the Spanish-speaking world.
"Perhaps his greatest originality was to turn cinema criticism into a new literary genre," said the Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa, who served on the jury that awarded the prize.
His most famous novel, "Three Trapped Tigers," an animated account of nightlife in Havana cabarets before Castro came to power, was published in 1967.
"Its success surprised me. It is half-written in Cuban (slang) and so most readers won't understand" he said in an interview with The Associated Press after winning the Cervantes prize.
Other titles include the author's favorite, "Twentieth Century Job" published in 1963, "Holy Smoke," published in English in 1985, and the 1997 essay "Cinema or Sardine."
Other fictional works include "A View of Dawn in the Tropics," 1965, and "Infante's Inferno," 1979. He translated James Joyce's "Dubliners" into Spanish in 1972.
Cabrera also wrote screenplays, including the adaptation of Malcolm Lowry's "Under the Volcano" for the film directed by John Houston.
"His verbal talent was extraordinary, both spoken and written, although this is something that anyone who has read his book knows," best-selling Spanish novelist Javier Marias, a friend of Cabrera, wrote in Spain's leading daily, El Pais.
Cabrera was born in Gibara, Cuba, in 1929, and his parents were founding members of the Cuban Communist Party. After the revolution in 1959, Cabrera became editor of the literary supplement to the new regime's mouthpiece, "Revolucion."
He fell out of favor after opposing the revolutionary government's decision to ban a documentary by his brother on Havana nightlife. Castro publicly rebuked him in a trial and he was forbidden to publish.
Cabrera was nevertheless appointed Cuba's cultural attache in Brussels in 1962. He returned to Cuba for his mother's funeral in 1965 but accepted he could not continue living there. He eventually settled in London, taking British citizenship. The themes of exile and alienation toward the Castro regime were present in much of his work.
In 1991, he published a collection of political writings under the title "Mea Cuba" that was harshly critical of Castro's government.
"I have not been back (to Cuba) since I left in 1965 and will not until Fidel Castro leaves power," he said in 1997.
There was no immediate response from the Cuban leadership, and news of his death was not announced in the island's government-run media.
But several Cuban writers on Tuesday praised Cabrera's literary skills while still rejecting his virulent opposition to Fidel Castro's government.
"Cabrera Infante lived his life consumed by animosity," said Lisandro Otero, president of the Cuban Academy of Letters. "I could be stronger in my judgments but I must respect the dead. He wrote some memorable pages."
Jaime Sarusky, awarded Cuba's National Literary Prize in 2004, recognized Cabrera as "one of this country's greatest writers" but said he "carried his political positions to extremes."
Cabrera also is survived by daughters Ana and Carola from his first wife, who divorced him in 1961. He married Miriam Gomez later that year.
A private funeral was planned. Cabrera's publishing house, Alfaguara, said his ashes would be sent to Cuba "when that country is free."
I call him Infante twice, they call him Cabrera throughout. Apologies for butchering the usage, but I'm not sure what the Infante denotes if it isn't a surname.
Cabrera wrote the screenplay to Andy Garcia's directional debut entitled "The Lost City" that is currently being screened in LA. There are big actors in this film including Bill Murray and Dustin Hoffman.
Andy has been trying to get this film done for about 15 years now. I almost got to see a screening of it but I got to the theater too late..too bad.
Sorry to hear it.
It may be his mother's last name.
Many hispanics have two last names or a middle name and a last name. This writer was always known as "Cabrera Infante"
RIP Sr. Cabrera!
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