MIAMI, United States. – The Cuban writer Leonardo Padura, National Prize for Literature in 2012 and Princess of Asturias Award in 2015, told the newspaper Clarionfrom Argentina, that on the island there is “a process of making his work invisible” because no news is given of his presentations.
“I am a National Literature Prize winner, although I am a writer who is never talked about in the Cuban media or is talked about very little, I have spent 10 years without appearing on television,” said the renowned writer.
In that sense, he added: “There is a process of making my work invisible, because there is no news of my presentations in Cuba. Officially, no one has known that I have published this book and I am the only Cuban writer with a Princess of Asturias award, which should be significant. It is a very complex situation and the most painful thing is that access to my books is precisely more complicated in the country where I would like them to circulate more and better”.
Padura refers to his last published book, decent peoplewhich follows the saga of detective Mario Conde and is currently being presented in Argentina.
The writer also said that when publishing in Cuba The man who loved the dogs, believed that he was attending an event that he never thought he would attend. However, the novel was presented, won the Critics’ Award and the following year Padura received the National Literature Award.
“It is a very strange situation because sometimes the strict logic that a consequence of causes and effects could have is not fulfilled,” said the creator of Mario Conde.
At another point in the interview, he assured that he had chosen to stay in Cuba. “I take it not as a punishment but as the result of an attitude. I do not share certain ways of thinking of the Cuban official policy and I express it. In my books, I make examinations of Cuban society that can be a bit stinging for certain sensitivities, I delve into the past and recent history of Cuba and bring to light certain processes, moments, attitudes that have occurred, such as that dark decade of the years 70”, he defended.
Likewise, he assured that he needs “Cuba to write”, even though he has a “difficult relationship” with certain institutions.
“I am the first in the municipality where I live to pay taxes in the year. I pay every penny of the corresponding taxes and I am a decent person with decent behavior, since it is a personal, cultural and human decision to live in Cuba”, he said.
“I have the possibility of living anywhere in the world and I have decided to live and write in Cuba for family, cultural, spiritual reasons and because it would be strange if I lived outside of Cuba or had to live outside of Cuba. Why would I have to leave Cuba? It is the most difficult question and the one that many other Cuban writers who have left have had to face,” he also pointed out.
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