DATA OF INTEREST

GUESTS:
KATHERINE BISQUET
AMIR VALLE

HOST:
ANAELI IBARRA


Synopsis:

A conversation with the writers Katherine Bisquet and Amir Valle about their experiences of forced exile. The testimonies of both writers, exiled under different circumstances, evidence the strategies of the Cuban regime to control expressions of dissent internally. The dialogue looks at exile as a practice historically situated post-1959, which takes on different forms but always implies the erasure of any legal or political action; that is, the elimination of any trace of evidence that would expose the Cuban State´s policies of exile following 1959.

Bios:

Katherine Bisquet
(Ciudad Nuclear-Cuba, 1992)

Katherine Bisquet is a writer with a degree in Literature from the University of Havana. She has published the books of poetry Algo aquí se descompone (Colección Sur Editores, Havana, 2014) and Ciudad Nuclear mon amour (Ediciones Sinsentido, Havana, 2020). She is organizer and curator of the #00 Bienal 2018 of Havana and also participated in the San Isidro hunger strike. Selected for the writers ́ residency Can Serrat Primavera 2020, Barcelona. In 2021 she was awarded the Beca Antonia Eiriz (Enlace interno a Beca) grant to work on the non-fiction book Los Mojados by the Instituto Internacional de Artivismo Hannah Arendt (Instar) for artists and independent intellectuals. She has published poetry, articles and interviews in publications such as Vice en Español, El Estornudo, Hyperallergic, Hypermedia. She is co-creator of the column Cine Cubano en Cuarentena 2020 (Cuban Film in Quarantine 2020) in Rialta Magazine, an initiative for the revival, promotion and investigation of Cuban film.


Amir Valle
(Cuba, 1967)

Amir Valle is a writer, journalist and editor. His narrative work has received praise from the Nobel Prizes Gabriel García Márquez, Gunter Grass, Herta Müller and Mario Vargas Llosa. He was launched into international recognition by the European success of his crime series «El descenso a los infiernos» about contemporary life in Havana, which includes the books Las puertas de la noche (2001), Si Cristo te desnuda (2002), Entre el miedo y las sombras (2003), Últimas noticias del infierno (2004), Santuario de sombras (2006), Largas noches con Flavia (2008) and Los nudos invisibles (2021).

His book Jineteras (Habana Babilonia), published by Planeta, was honored in 2006 with the Premio Internacional Rodolfo Walsh 2007 for best work of non-fiction published in Spanish. Also in 2006 he won the Premio Internacional de Novela Mario Vargas Llosa for his historical fiction novel Las palabras y los muertos (Seix Barral, 2006). His most recent books are the novels Hugo Spadafora - Bajo la piel del hombre (Aguilar, 2013), Nunca dejes que te vean llorar (Grijalbo, 2015), the book of short stories Nostalgias, ironías y otras alucinaciones (Betania, 2018), and the collection of essays La estrategia del verdugo. Breve panorama de la censura cultural en Cuba (2020). He resides in Berlin, where he works for the television news agency Deutsche Welle for Latin America and directs the publisher Ilíada Ediciones and the journal OtroLunes, Revista Hispanoamericana de Cultura.

VIDEO

Destierros: Katherine Bisquet y Amir Valle

PODCAST