Essay on Casa de las Americas founder to be published in Mexico

Havana, Sep 6 (Prensa Latina) The Havana-based Casa de las Americas on Monday highlighted the launch of the book "Traspasar los limites: Haydee Santamaria" (Trespassing the Limits: Haydee Santamaria), written by US poet Margaret Randall, who wrote a biographical essay on the president and founder of that Cuban institution.

According to the regional institution, the book will be presented to the Mexican readers by Randall herself, who will be accompanied by Carmen Avendaño and Paco Ignacio Taibo II, manager of Chile’s Ediciones Moneda and director of Mexico’s Fondo de Cultura Economica, respectively.

The book, which is part of the Collective Memory collection, deals with aspects of the heroine’s relationship with transcendental figures of the Cuban Revolution such as Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Camilo Cienfuegos; her participation in the attack on the Moncada garrison, where her brother and martyr Abel Santamaria was killed, according to La Ventana’s website.

It also highlights her period of imprisonment, her decisive participation in the dissemination of Fidel Castro’s plea “History will Absolve Me, as well as her guerrilla stage in the Sierra Maestra mountain range and her work in the United States to raise funds for the Revolution.

The text resulted from the friendship that united Randall with the founder and president of Casa de las Americas, who in 1967 invited her to participate in the Poetic Encounter with Ruben Dario, attended by writers and poets from the continent.

After her first visit, Randall became an advocate for Cuba and for decades she has fought to break the cultural blockade with which the governments of the United States have intended to isolate Cuba from the rest of Latin America, while denouncing numerous actions perpetrated against Cuba.