Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography
by Ignacio Ramonet, Fidel Castro

Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography
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Book Summary Information

Author: Fidel Castro, Ignacio Ramonet
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-01-08
ISBN: 1416553282
Number of pages: 736
Publisher: Scribner

Book Reviews of Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

Book Review: Castro's infomercial
Summary: 2 Stars

"My Life" is essentially Fidel Castro doing an infomercial about himself. The entire book is literally one long question and answer interview.

Castro chose for this verbal autobiogrpahy, the uncritical Ignacio Ramonet. With the exception of questions regarding the death penalty, Ramonet is mostly apolitcal, but at least he had the deceny to admit as much in his introduction.

Also, in his introduciton, Ramonet states he felt that "family questions" were obviously considered "out of bounds." Now, I understand "family issues" are considered very private in the Hispanic culture, but after reading "My Life" I still don't know anything about Mrs. Castro or even if there is a Fidel Jr.

Through his telling to Ramonet, Castro does make some persuasive points. Not to "spoil the ending" but to avoid hundred of pages of dry reading, here are some of the highlights:

1) Castro has sincerely worked to avoid a "cult of personality". There are no statues of him erected in his honor, he is not pictured on Cuban currency, his photogrpah does not hang in government offices etc.

2) He is against mistreating prisoners of war (e.g. during the revolution) because, besides being "wrong," mistreating prisoners plays into the "enemy's hand."

3) Sending doctors to improvished areas thorughout the world, not only is the "right" thing to do, it helps bolster Cuba's standing in the international community.

4) Providing free health care and education (even college/vocational school for laid off sugar care workers) genuinely endears him to many, if not most, of his people.

However, Castro is not presuasive when he argues that the immigration policy of the United States is the cause of great suffering for the Cuban people, that the Cuban constiution provides meaningful "referendum rights" to the poeple, and that Marxism is "good" and capitalism is "bad".

Besides these persuasive and not-so persuasive points, "My Life" has little to offer the general reader. It is essentially humorless and there are few "human interest" stories. In short, like most informercials, "My Life" is repetitive and boring. So, unless you truly NEED a book on Castro, buy something else.




Summary of Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

Fidel Castro is perhaps the most charismatic and controversial head of state in modern times. A dictatorial pariah to some, he has become a hero and inspiration for many of the world's poor, defiantly charting an independent and revolutionary path for Cuba over nearly half a century.

Numerous attempts have been made to get Castro to tell his own story. But only now, in the twilight of his years, has he been prepared to set out the details of his remarkable biography for the world to read. This book is nothing less than his living testament. As he told reporters, his desire to finish checking its text was the one thing that kept him going through his recent illness. He presented a copy of the book in its Spanish edition to his compadre President Hugo Ch?vez of Venezuela.

In these pages, Castro narrates a compelling chronicle that spans the harshness of his elementary school teachers; the early failures of the revolution; his intense comradeship with Che Guevara and their astonishing, against-all-odds victory over the dictator Batista; the Cuban perspective on the Bay of Pigs and the ensuing missile crisis; the active role of Cuba in African independence movements (especially its large military involvement in fighting apartheid South Africa in Angola); his relations with prominent public figures such as Boris Yeltsin, Pope John Paul II, and Saddam Hussein; and his dealings with no less than ten successive American presidents, from Eisenhower to George W. Bush.

Castro talks proudly of increasing life expectancy in Cuba (now longer than in the United States); of the half million students in Cuban universities; and of the training of seventy thousand Cuban doctors nearly half of whom work abroad, assisting the poor in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. He is confronted with a number of thorny issues, including democracy and human rights, discrimination toward homosexuals, and the continuing presence of the death penalty on Cuban statute books. Along the way he shares intimacies about more personal matters: the benevolent strictness of his father, his successful attempt to give up cigars, his love of Ernest Hemingway's novels, and his calculation that by not shaving he saves up to ten working days each year.

Drawing on more than one hundred hours of interviews with Ignacio Ramonet, a knowledgeable and trusted interlocutor, this spoken autobiography will stand as the definitive record of an extraordinary life lived in turbulent times.

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