Diaz-Canel recalls a great Cuban intellectual on his birthday

 

HAVANA, Cuba, Jun 10 (ACN) On the 95th anniversary of Roberto Fernandez Retamar's birth, the President of the Republic of Cuba, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez, expressed on X a tribute message to the outstanding Cuban intellectual.

"We do not forget on his 95th anniversary that great Cuban intellectual who was and is Roberto Fernandez Retamar," wrote the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, highlighting the validity of the poet's literary and cultural legacy.

In his message, he quoted one of Retamar's emblematic verses: "(...) to those who make/ worlds and dreams", highlighting his commitment to creation and social transformation.

In this sense, the National Library of Cuba, served as a scenario to evoke the historical and cultural transcendence of such a great intellectual (1930-2019) 95 years after his birth.

Researcher Carlos Manuel Valenciaga Diaz, host and moderator of the tribute, told the Cuban News Agency that the institution has had a substantial collection for 35 years, provided by the former president of Casa de las Americas himself.

The prominent storyteller and daughter of the honoree, Laidi Fernandez de Juan, provided one of the most touching moments of the meeting, when she donated to the Jose Marti National Library the card of Honorary User of the National Library that her father had so proudly kept since 1999.

Roberto Fernandez Retamar, poet, essayist and president of Casa de las Americas for more than four decades, left an indelible mark on Cuban and Latin American literature.