ESSAY|WRITING
Virgilio Piñera: a Hundred and Twelve Years On From His Birth
Cuba’s foremost writer’s work still lives on
(This is a series of three essays on the life and work of the Cuban writer Virgilio Piñera. The first one appeared in 2012 in the El Prisma newspaper)
“The fish from the tower swims on tarmac” is the line of a poem in the work “Aire Frío” (Cold Air) that choreographer Marianela Boán chose as the title for her six-dancer piece, which premièred in 1992 at the Avellaneda Hall of Havana’s National Theatre, in Cuba.
She used it because she wanted to explore what it meant to be Cuban in the midst of a crisis and the“contemplative capability, minimal resistance to pathos, search for immediate catharsis, refuge in exorcism-like humour”.
And the life and work of Virgilio Piñera was an escape from this pathos.
Piñera was born on the 4th of August 1912 in Cárdenas, Matanzas. His father was secretary of the Education Board and then later an administrator for the Cárdenas Aqueduct. His mother was a teacher at Public School Number 8. In 1923 the family moved to Havana, but a couple of years later they then went to live in Camagüey.
