Tres tristes tigres (novel)

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Tres tristes tigres
Tres tristes tigres (Guillermo Cabrera Infante).png
1967 first edition dust jacket (Seix Barral, Barcelona)
AuthorGuillermo Cabrera Infante
Working titleVista de amanecer en el trópico
TranslatorDonald Gardner
Suzanne Jill Levine
CountrySpain
LanguageCuban Spanish
Set inHavana in 1958
PublisherSeix Barral
Publication date
1967
Published in English
1971
Media typePrint (paperback)
Pages451
OCLC1210202
LC ClassPQ7389.C233 T7

Tres tristes tigres (Spanish: Tres tristes tigres, lit. 'Three Sad Tigers'), abbreviated as TTT,[1] is the debut novel by Cuban writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante.[2][3][4] The novel was first published in Spain in 1967. It was later translated into English by Donald Gardner and Suzanne Jill Levine and published in 1971 as Three Trapped Tigers.

It is considered a classic of the Latin American Boom.[5][6]

Background[]

After Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba in 1959, writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante, who had supported the Cuban Revolution, became a cultural leader. He was appointed as director of Lunes de Revolución, a weekly literary supplement to the Cuban magazine Revolución. Cabrera Infante's relations with the Castro regime deteriorated and the literary supplement was shut down by the government in 1961. In 1962, he was sent to Belgium to serve as a cultural attaché to the Cuban embassy in Brussels.[7][8]

It was in Brussels that Cabrera Infante wrote the first manuscript of what would become Tres tristes tigres. [7] Cabrera Infante's manuscript novel, titled Vista de amanecer en el trópico, won the 1964 Premio Biblioteca Breve, a literary award given by the Spanish publisher Editorial Seix Barral to the best unpublished novel in the Spanish language.[9] Mario Vargas Llosa was one of the jurors of the award at the time.[10] In 1965, Cabrera Infante returned to Cuba upon learning that his mother was ill. However, he did not arrive in time before her death and instead attended her funeral. When he attempted to fly back to Belgium with his two daughters, he was detained by authorities for four months without explanation. He eventually left Cuba, and went into exile in Spain followed by London.[7] Tres tristes tigres was written before 1968, the year Cabrera Infante publicly disassociated himself from the Cuban regime with an interview by Tomás Eloy Martínez for the Argentine weekly Primera Plana.[7][11]

After winning the Premio Biblioteca Breve, the novel underwent the process of censorship by the government of Francisco Franco. In 1965, Cabrera Infante was able to revise the galley proofs of the novel and decided to rewrite several passages. The novel was originally intended for publication in 1965 but, for this reason, the printing of Vista de amanecer en el trópico was delayed for a few years and ultimately retitled Tres tristes tigres.[10]

In early 1967, the novel was finally published in Barcelona by Editorial Seix Barral with some resistance from Cabrera Infante due to the twenty-two instances of censorship carried out by Francoist censors.[10][12] These deletions were not replaced in the successive editions in Spanish. However, the deleted passages were finally restored in 1990 when Cabrera Infante completely revised his book, restoring it for the collection of the Biblioteca Ayacucho in Venezuela.[10][6]

The novel's title is taken from a classic Spanish-language tongue-twister.[10]

Summary[]

The novel is set in 1958 and centers around three young people within the nightlife of pre-revolutionary Havana.[13] It is intentionally written in the Cuban Spanish vernacular.[14] It has been described as a book in which language is the protagonist.[10] It is a highly experimental, Joycean novel, playful and rich in literary allusions. Cabrera Infante intended to do for Cuban Spanish what Mark Twain had done for American English, recording the great variety of its colloquial variations.[9]

Reception[]

In his review for The New York Times, David Gallagher praised the English translation and its humor, calling it "one of the most inventive novels" to come out of Latin America.[14]

Translations[]

The novel has been translated into several languages, including into Japanese by Ryukichi Terao. The English translation was written by Donald Gardner and Suzanne Jill Levine and published in 1971 as Three Trapped Tigers.

Awards[]

The novel won the Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger in 1970, for Albert Bensoussan's translation of the novel into French. Bensoussan's translation was published as Trois tristes tigres by Éditions Gallimard in 1970.[15]

Adaptations[]

Main article: Three Sad Tigers

In 1967, the novel was adapted into a play of the same name by Chilean playwright Alejandro Sieveking. In 1968, Sieveking's play was in turn adapted into the film of the same name by Chilean director Raúl Ruiz.[16]

Further reading[]

English[]

  • Cabrera Infante's Tres tristes tigres: the trapping effect of the signifier over subject and text / Hartman, Carmen Teresa., 2003
  • A critical study of Tres tristes tigres by Guillermo Cabrera Infante / C.A.H.J Scheybeler., 1977

Spanish[]

  • Guillermo Cabrera Infante y Tres tristes tigres / Reynaldo L Jiménez., 1977
  • La nueva novela hispanoamericana y Tres tristes tigres / José Sánchez-Boudy., 1971

References[]

  1. ^ Levine, Suzanne Jill. "Writing the Self via Translation". Latin American Literature Today.
  2. ^ Medina, Pablo (25 June 2012). "In Old Havana, A Story Of Sunlight And Mystery". NPR. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  3. ^ "Three Trapped Tigers by Guillermo Cabrera Infante". Kirkus Reviews (September 1, 1971 ed.). Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  4. ^ Sale, Roger. "Keeping Up with the News". The New York Review of Books (December 16, 1971 ed.). Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  5. ^ "Una edición de "Tres tristes tigres" acerca la novela más audaz del "boom"" (in Spanish). EFE. 28 June 2010. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  6. ^ a b Cabrera Infante, Guillermo (March–April 1989). "Censor obseso, obsceno. Tres tristes tigres acosados, cazados por la censura". Simplemente América Latina - NUSO Nº 100 (in Spanish). Nueva Sociedad. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  7. ^ a b c d Mendoza, Ana (13 November 2013). "El libro "Mapa dibujado por un espía" le sirvió de catarsis a Cabrera Infante" (in European Spanish). EFE. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  8. ^ "A Conversation with G. Cabrera Infante By Marie-Lise Gazarian Gautier". Dalkey Archive Press. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  9. ^ a b Obiols, Isabel (15 April 1999). "El mexicano Jorge Volpi gana el Biblioteca Breve en la 'resurrección' del premio" [The Mexican Jorge Volpi Wins the Biblioteca Breve in the 'Resurrection' of the Award]. El País (in Spanish). Barcelona. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  10. ^ a b c d e f "Tres tristes tigres". El Comercio (in Spanish). 30 December 2007. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  11. ^ Bergareche, Borja (13 November 2013). ""Los Castro son unos gánsteres que han destruido el alma cubana"". ABC (in Spanish). Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  12. ^ "Lo que "tres tristes tigres" debe al censor". elPeriódico de Guatemala (in Spanish). 5 February 2017. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  13. ^ "Exiled Cuban writer dies aged 75". BBC News. 22 February 2005. Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  14. ^ a b Gallagher, David (17 October 1971). "Nightlife in Havana before Castro". The New York Times. Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  15. ^ "Trois tristes tigres". Gallimard.fr. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  16. ^ Valeria de los Ríos (2010). El Cine de Raúl Ruiz: Fantasmas, simulacros y artificios. UQBAR. p. 209. ISBN 978-956-8601-78-2.
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