HAVANA, Cuba.- Do not suppose that there is an oversight in the title, do not think that where I wrote little fair I should have written little fair. Although I would gladly do so, I am not going to approach Shakespeare or his work. I am not going to comment on a play and neither on a movie. There will be no comments here about Liz Taylor and her violet eyes. If something interests me, it is the fair of the book (International Book Fair of Havana) and some of its events.
The fair was already inaugurated a few days ago, I had to write birth, and the worst, with forceps. The delivery had a doubtful prognosis, a very high risk, almost fatal. The cradle of the little fair is not the same as before, at least not entirely. The little fair maintains the space of recent years, but also others. It turns out that the Fair now went to the streets, to the parks, to the neighborhoods. The Fair decongested a bit, it dispersed, they dispersed it. And without a doubt there are those who suppose that in its expansion it will become more popular, it will be democratized. There will be those who believe that the Fair was even in search of people, who did not wait for those people in their usual venue, but that is nothing serious, nothing true. The Havana Book Fair becomesand for good?
The Book Fair is no longer completely in La Cabaña, the Fair is only a little in La Cabaña, and perhaps we think that these changes have to do with how complicated “the thing with oil” is. And it could be true, in fact it is…, but also those galleries/galleys of La Cabaña are very closed, they are very dark, they are narrow, and they could even cause some sad memories, certain suspicions. And it is that those galleries/galleys have a very dark, very bloody history. There Che Guevara had his command, and there he committed thousands of outrages, endless vile acts that should not be remembered.
There, in that place of baseness and crimes, was the Fair, and there was its inauguration, but times are different, and many ghosts could reappear there, the ghosts of many dead, and who doubts that we will even listen to the orders to prepare weapons , to aim, the orders to fire, to unload continuous bursts of rifles, from rifles that are surely already prepared, oiled so that the projectile flows without interruptions, in whirlwinds. That’s how it will be, at least I think so, in each one of the seconds that the “book party” lasts. Ready, Aim, fire!; and then the discharges of rifles.
It is true that they tried to make us believe that such decisions have to do with how complicated “things” are with fuel, that La Cabaña as the only meeting point is a nest for COVID-19, and that any change is revolutionary, any expansion of the event, which will gain more and more popularity. The Fair, they would have us believe, approaches the house, goes in search of people, brings them books almost to the door. Can anything be more popular? Would something be more democratic and humane?
I think they had other reasons. I think they thought that the Fair in La Cabaña could become a 27N, a 11J, and hence the need for decentralization, dispersion. The Fair in any corner of the city, almost in the house of each one, without concentrations, without allowing the riots, the “quarrels”. And along with these strategies we also received other news. They announced that the Fund for Economic Culture of Mexico will open a new bookstore in that space where the Fernando Ortiz bookstore used to be, and which they called Tuxpan, the name of that point of Mexican geography from where the Granma yacht with Fidel Castro left. and eighty-odd other men, and that he would later disembark at “Las Coloradas”, a beach in the east of the country.
It is extremely curious that no one found this change of name for the Fernando Ortiz bookstore strange, that same Fernando who has long been called the second discoverer of Cuba. And no one, as far as I know, dared to give an opinion, to face such a decision, not even Miguel Barnet, who is supposed to be his best disciple, his reincarnation. Miguel Barnet was speechless, as every time, and ended up showing his customary acquiescence, his inclinations towards power, his kneeling.
It is very curious that in Cuba disappear, one after another, the many bookstores that Havana had, and the entire island, before the illiterate bearded men came down. It is incredible that this monument to reading that was “Modern Poetry”, that art deco temple, is falling apart today, and that those other two who escorted her from the other sidewalk are also evicted. It is sad that on Calle del Obispo there is only one small bookstore left, which a few years ago they called Fayad Jamís, a poet revered by the communists.
It is incredible that not even Miguel Barnet, “faithful devotee” of the wise Ortiz, and who is supposed to be his heir, almost his putative son, did not open his cloying mouth to defend the name that the one that will now be called Tuxpan had for years, as that point of the Mexican geography from where the yacht that carried our greatest misfortune left. Undoubtedly, this new name does not honor reading, but it does honor a Castroist and castrating “revolution.” A revolution of “tamed fairies”. And we will have to continue talking about this fierce Fair, we will have to closely follow the Tuxpán bookstore, and its titles, and the prices of those titles. Will I have to pay in USD, in Mexican pesos?
OPINION ARTICLE
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