CubaPLUS Magazine

July 2 marks the 59th anniversary of the death of the writer and journalist Ernest Miller Hemingway (1899-1961). Author of great classics of universal literature, he continues to represent a benchmark for the new generations of novelists and readers.

His work was developed mainly in the period between 1925 and 1955, and in two countries mainly: the United States and Cuba. He has a close and special relationship with the largest of the Antilles, because Hemingway lived intermittently for several years in Havana.

First, he stayed at the Ambos Mundos Hotel and then he rented and bought Finca Vigía, a place that he welcomed as his second home. Here he wrote a considerable part of his masterpieces: "For Whom the Bell Tolls" (1940), "Across the River and Among the Trees" (1950) and "The Old Man and the Sea" (1958). 

The latter earned him the Pulitzer Prize awarded by Columbia University (USA) in 1952 and, catapulted him, towards the awarding of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1958. His narrative art is characterized by concise and direct prose and the most frequent themes in his collection are love, nature, loss and nostalgia. 

In Havana, he frequently visited the Bodeguita del Medio and the Bar Floridita, where he tasted the daiquirí while sitting down to write. El Floridita welcomes inspiration from his figure and his representativeness for Cuban culture.

Next to the counter rests a bronze sculpture of his figure, by the Cuban artist José Villa Soberón. In the cocktail menu for his part, the Daiquiri Papa pays homage to the nickname with which he was known.

After Hemingway's death, the residence at Finca Vigía became a museum. In it the original furniture is preserved, as well as the personal library made up of thousands of books, property of the renowned writer.