As part of the library’s “tour of Cuba” month, exploring the rich history, arts and culture of Cuba, Pulitzer Prize Winning writer, Ada Ferrer, will discuss her book Cuba: An American History. Cuba details the epic, sweeping history of Cuba and its complex ties to the United States—from before the arrival of Columbus to the present day. Kirkus, in a starred review, applauds Ferrer for unwrapping a “wonderfully nuanced history of the island nation and its often troubled dealings with its gigantic and voracious neighbor.” This program is supported by the William B. Eldredge Permanent Memorial.

In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba, where a momentous revolution had taken power three years earlier. For more than half a century, the standoff continued—through the tenure of ten American presidents and the fifty-year rule of Fidel Castro. Spanning more than five centuries, Cuba provides readers with a front-row seat to witness the evolution of the modern nation, with its dramatic record of conquest and colonization, of slavery and freedom, of independence and revolutions made and unmade. Drawing on more than thirty years of research in Cuba, Spain, and the United States, Ferrer documents the troubled intimacy between the two countries, from the perspectives of the influence of the United States on Cuba, but also in the many ways the island has been a recurring presence in US affairs.

Ada Ferrer is Julius Silver Professor of History and Latin American and Caribbean Studies at New York University, where she has taught since 1995. She is the author of Insurgent Cuba: Race, Nation, and Revolution, 1868–1898, winner of the Berkshire Book Prize for the best first book by a woman in any field of history, and Freedom’s Mirror: Cuba and Haiti in the Age of Revolution, which won the Frederick Douglass Book Prize from the Gilder Lehrman Center at Yale University as well as multiple prizes from the American Historical Association. Born in Cuba and raised in the United States, she has been traveling to and conducting research on the island since 1990.

Registration for this event is required and a valid email address is required at the time of registration. Participants will receive an email invitation a day before the program begins.

If you have any questions, please email [email protected] or call (330) 653.6658 x1010.