Guillermo Cabrera Infante biography
Synopsis
Cuban born writer Guillermo Infante was a success for many works, including Tres tristes tigres, winning the Miguel Cervantes literary prize in 1997. Infante's literature often addressed Cuba before the revolution, seediness and all. In addition to writing literature, Infante was respected for translations into Spanish, like James Joyce's Dubliners.
Writing Career
Writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante was born on April 22, 1929, in Gibara, Cuba. He studied at Havana University, and emigrated to England in 1966, later taking British citizenship. Film critic, journalist and translator of Joyce's Dubliners (1972), he is known chiefly for his fiction, particularly Tres tristes tigres (1967, Three Sad Tigers), an evocation of seedy nightlife in pre-revolutionary Havana.
He returned to the same themes and characters in his 1996 novel, Ella Cantaba Boleros. Other novels include the semi-autobiographical La Habana para un infante defunto (1979, trans Infante's Inferno). He also wrote screenplays and adapted his own Tres tristes tigres for The Lost City (2005). Among other works was a collection of short stories, Asà en la Paz como en la Guerra (1960), a history of tobacco Holy Smoke (1985), and a volume of political essays, Mea Culpa (1993). In 1997, he was honoured with the Miguel de Cervantes literary prize. He died on February 21, 2005, in London.