From our Bureau of Potentially Lethal Books with some assistance from our Bureau of Suitable Gifts for Masochists Who Absolutely Love to be Tortured
Ay! Babalu would like to warn its readers about a book that could kill any Cuban or make them go stark raving mad. Imagine being tied to a chair and having someone read all of the Fidel speeches contained in this book, word for word. Truly unimaginable torture. Simply reading the blurb from Colombian bootlicker Gabriel García Márquez repeatedly could cause brain damage, insanity, or death. Consequently, one must assume whoever translated these speeches must have suffered greatly while completing this onerous task, unless they were a diehard non-Cuban communist .
The two editors — diehard American communists David Deutschmann and Deborah Shnookal — were naturally immune to the potentially lethal effects of the speeches. Their idolatrous faith in Fidel and Che and their red-hot Marxist missionary zeal is boundless, providing them both with a thick Teflon coating.
Here’s what the publisher has to say about the contents of the book:
A comprehensive anthology of more than thirty speeches by Fidel Castro, given over five decades, proving that he was, as Gabriel García Márquez described him, a “master of the spoken word.”
Emerging in the 1960s as a leading voice in support of anticolonial struggles, then continuing to play a role in the antiglobalization movement in the subsequent decades, Fidel Castro was an articulate and penetrating — if controversial — political thinker and leader, who outlasted ten US presidents.
Covering five decades of Fidel’s speeches, this selection begins with his famous courtroom defense (“History will Absolve Me”), and also includes his speech on learning of Che Guevara’s death in Bolivia, his analysis of the collapse of the Soviet Union, and his response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. With his declining health and the emergence of new leaders such as Hugo Chávez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia, this book sheds light not just on Castro’s mighty role in Latin America’s past, but also on his legacy for the future. Love him or hate him, this anthology demonstrates that Fidel Castro was one of history’s greatest orators.
The Fidel Castro Reader includes a chronology of the Cuban Revolution, an extensive glossary and index as well as twenty-four pages of photos.
Well, Mein Kampf and Das Kapital are available, so why not this perverse and venomous BS?
“Gabo” was ultimately stupid. He didn’t need to be a panting lap dog for Fidel Castro; he was plenty of a celebrity on his own as a writer. Sooner or later he will be judged negatively for being the servile stooge of a totalitarian tyrant, and his reputation will suffer accordingly. He could still have played the leftist intellectual without stooping so low for so long. But maybe it wasn’t stupidity; maybe it was “love,” same as for Chávez.
If his speeches are being published unexpurgated as given, that would document his countless lies and false promises–which not only never came true, but were never intended to. He lied habitually all his life,