In La casa y la isla (The House and the Island) Ronaldo Menéndez chronicles inequality, disappointment and resistance to individualism in the Havana of his youth.
Every Cuban writer writing today seems sure that it was during their adolescence, whether it occurred in the 60s, 70s, 80s or even more recently, that the revolution lost its innocence. Ronaldo Menéndez believes that the age of dust came in the eighties “and I have objective information that leads me to believe that I did indeed witness the historic moment when the course of collective happiness led to the loss of innocence. The collapse of the socialist world was the definitive disappointment.” La casa y la isla (The House and the Island), the new novel by Menéndez (published by AdN) is, among other things, a chronicle of the rebellious youth who started school with a pioneer’s kerchief around his neck and came out obsessed with the songs of Queen and the taste of Coca-Cola.”
Translation by The Spanish Bookstage
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