’Cuentos negros de Cuba’, by Lydia Cabrera, will be presented two days before the closing ceremony
14ymedio, José Lassa/Juan Izquierdo, Havana, 15 February 2025 — Dozens of soldiers from the Armed Forces, in everyday uniform, entered this Saturday through the great gate of the Morro-Cabaña complex together with hundreds of Havana readers. The two colonial fortresses, whose walls were used for three centuries by firing squads and as a prison, serve every February as the venue for the Book Fair, held this year in the midst of a crippling energy crisis.
The most important cultural event of the year was inaugurated despite the total paralysis of the country this weekend. With several days of blackouts lasting more than 24 hours, climbing both castles was for Havana residents an escape from reality, rather than a love of reading. However, the fair has made mediocrity a habit and the sun, which reverberates off the pavement with a heat typical of August, makes the trip a torture.
The Fair’s directors were clear: to fill the pavilions, they had to “scrape” the warehouses of the Cuban Book Institute in search of copies printed even decades ago. New releases, only those that – thanks to the work and grace of the mules – are sold by individuals, with titles of dubious quality and always at exorbitant prices.
For those who do want a book to take home, disappointment has been the rule for years. The pavilions have also been subject to rationing and only one copy per person can be taken home. The “star” of the event, the relaunch of the so-called Biblioteca del Pueblo, is for sale in a limited-edition: for 50 pesos, after much jostling and displeasure, one could buy a single copy of La Edad de Oro or Winnie the Pooh.
“It looks like a Spanish-Literature book from high school,” said a young woman who managed to “hunt down” Cuentos negros de Cuba by Lydia Cabrera, the most sought-after book at the event because it is by an author that Fidel Castro censored for decades.
Cabrera’s book is one of the 10 books on sale from the Biblioteca del Pueblo. Some will have presentations, like this one –on Friday, February 21, two days before the closing ceremony– at the José Martí Memorial, one of the sub-venues of the fair. “It is a book with special treatment,” commented the employee of Editorial Oriente.
“This is nothing like what it used to be,” said an elderly woman who was leaving La Cabaña at full speed, with two school notebooks under her arm, at 11 in the morning. On the old drawbridge, others were waiting their turn to enter. “This is torture,” cried a woman who had already been waiting for 50 minutes in line under the overwhelming sun.
The guards are not bothered by the ever-increasing number of people gathering around the castle. Ready to withstand the siege, in uniform and immune to any pleas, they manage the line in dribs and drabs.
In the central tent – where, in theory, the few new releases from the People’s Library are found – “there are only two cashiers, the others have not arrived due to transport.” That is the explanation that runs from voice to voice under the no less agonizing blue light of the canvas. Everyone wonders how a book industry can be financed whose most valuable opportunity to sell the product is wasted with little staff and few resources.
Nobody looks at what are jokingly known as “template copies,” those books that no one wants to buy because of their content – generally memoirs of generals or anthologies of Fidel Castro.
The other “permanent” books are those brought by the embassies or the guest country of this years fair, South Africa, which are almost decorative or at prices that Cubans automatically discard. There were also pavilions for Venezuela, Guatemala, Vietnam, Iran and the Sahrawi Arab Republic.
It has also become a habit to go to the Fair to get the school supplies that the children need and a box of crayons to pamper them. This year you can buy 10 notebooks at 250 pesos each. Erasers are 200 pesos. To get any of these stationery items you have to withstand the lines and be patient.
Readers feel the only place they can be at a book fair in the best-sellers pavilion. The language spoken there is the dollar. A novel by the American Stephen King or a Harry Potter volume – as well as countless self-help pamphlets – can cost almost 40 dollars. “13,000 pesos for a book!” translates one reader, bringing the price down to the humble national currency.
“It would have to be a special edition or hardcover to cost that much,” said a young woman, familiar with the book market abroad. “They sell you Stephen King books as if it were his latest success, and those books they are selling are 40 years old.”
When the tours of the castle esplanade are over, readers face the last challenge of the Fair: returning to Havana. The operation is, in fact, worthy of a King horror novel, and cannot be resolved even with all the magic of Harry Potter.
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