Against all hope
a memoir of life in Castro's gulag
by Armando Valladares
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Against All Hope is Armando Valladares' account of over twenty years in Fidel Castro's tropical gulag. Arrested in 1960 for being philosophically and religiously opposed to communism, Valladares was not released until 1982, by which time he had become one of the world's most celebrated "prisoners of conscience." Interned all those years at the infamous Isla de Pinos prison (from whose windows he watched the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion), Valladares suffered endless days of violence, putrid food and squalid living conditions, while listening to Castro's firing squads eliminating "counter revolutionaries" in the courtyard below his cell. Valladares survived by prayer and by writing poetry whose publication in Europe brought his case to the attention of international figures such as French President Francois Mitterand and to human rights organizations whose constant pressure on the Castro regime finally led to his release.
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Subjects
Politics and government, Political prisoners, Imprisonment, Cuban Poets, Biography, Prisons, cuba, Politics, practical, Fiction, general, Erlebnisbericht, Politischer GefangenerPeople
Armando ValladaresPlaces
CubaTimes
1959-, 1959-1990, 20th centuryShowing 4 featured editions. View all 12 editions?
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Against all hope: a memoir of life in Castro's gulag
2001, Encounter Books
in English
- 1st pbk. ed
1893554198 9781893554191
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Against all hope: the prison memoirs of Armando Valladares
1986, Knopf, Distributed by Random House
in English
- 1st ed.
0394534255 9780394534251
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Book Details
Edition Notes
Translation of: Contra toda esperanza
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Work Description
CONTRA TODA ESPERANZA relata las vivencias del autor desde la noche de su detención hasta su liberación, ventidós años más tarde. En este testimonio, rigurosamente histórico, se narran las condiciones infrahumanas en que se ha mantenido y mantiene a los presos políticos cubanos, así como la agonía de las víctimas, la violencia de un régimen carcelario que tiene como objetivo la destrucción espiritual y física del prisionero. Sin sentimentalismos, el autor va describiendo, año tras año, todo el mundo enajenante y kafkiano de un sistema que conserva todavía para muchos una imagen de humanismo. Este libro habla del sacrificio de anónimos defensores a ultranza de la libertad, la justicia y la disgnidad plena del hombre frente al totalitarismo castrista.
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- Created October 11, 2008
- 12 revisions
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| July 21, 2025 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
| March 7, 2023 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
| December 4, 2022 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
| November 16, 2022 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
| October 11, 2008 | Created by ImportBot | Imported from Miami University of Ohio MARC record |