Monsignor Juan de la CaridadGarcía, the new archbishop of Havana, will continue the dialogue with the State with his professional, respectful and very straightforward style.

When last April 26 a note from the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Cuba announced the decision of the Holy See to accept the resignation of the Archbishop of Havana, Cardinal Jaime Ortega Alamino – presented since 2011 – and to appoint in his place Monsignor Juan de la CaridadGarcía, who since 2002 to date was the head of the Camagüey diocese, in the first messages and telephone calls there was a tone of perplexity that almost immediately was tainted by a frank enthusiasm.

The character created by Leonardo Padura is premiering its somersault from literature to TV and cinema.

The first public presentation of the Spanish-German-Cuban miniseries “Las cuatroestaciones” (The Four Seasons) in Havana, whose principal character is the tormented investigator Mario Conde, created by Cuban writer Leonardo Padura, took place at the 7th  International Series Mania Festival, held in Paris April 15-24.

Tannhäuser was premiered on October 19, 1845 in the Dresde Royal Theatre.

The recent celebration of Holy Week in Havana has been marked by singular features that border on what AlejoCarpentier called “magic realism” since it included the visit by U.S. President Barack Obama, the one-time concert of The Rolling Stones and to top it off, the premier on March 26 and 27 of the operatic drama Tannhäuser in a production by the National Opera Theatre of Cuba, with the support of the Richard Wagner Society of Germany and the Goethe Institute. The stage production in the Alicia Alonso Grand Theatre was directed by Andreas Baesler, while the music was conducted by well-known Walter Gugerbauer.

A new way of writing is emerging in Cuba which doesn’t have the island as the centre of its concerns.

Every time I have been a jury member in some of the many literary contests summoned in Cuba, I have become convinced that a young literature is opening a path in the country, a literature whose formal excellences and concerns alien to the sociologism of the 1990s allows for appreciating a rupture with previous generations.