Alejo Carpentier
Alejo Carpentier Valmont ( born December 26, 1904 in Lausanne, Switzerland, † April 24, 1980 in Paris) was a Cuban- French author.
Life
Carpentier was the son of a French architect and a Russian professor of languages. Immediately after his birth in Lausanne, he moved with his family to Havana. He studied architecture, literature and musicology. Carpentier was a staff member and editor of several newspapers and magazines.
After a short stay in prison for political activities, he went in 1927/28 for 11 years in exile in Paris. He moved among the Surrealists André Breton, Tristan Tzara, Louis Aragon and Pablo Picasso. With the victory of fascism in Europe in 1939 Carpentier returned to Havana back, was a professor of musicology at the University, wrote newspaper articles and worked for a State broadcaster. From 1945 to 1959 he lived in exile in Caracas Venezuela.
In the preface to his novel El reino de este mundo 1949 (Eng. The Kingdom of This World, 1964), Carpentier formulated his concept of "Wonderful Real " (Spanish: "Lo real maravilloso " ), the basic idea of magical realism ( spanish: realismo mágico ), which had a great influence on the independent development of Latin American literature: "Everywhere I met the wonderful reality. But I also thought that this presence and validity of the wonderful real privilege Haiti was not, but heritage of all America. The wonderful Real can be found at every turn in people's lives. " Latin America was for Carpentier, was controlled precisely at a time when Europe from totalitarian systems to a positive utopia, in which the miraculous not only in the designs of artists, but can be found in reality.
1959 returned Carpentier returned to Cuba, where he worked as a professor of literature at the University of Havana. 1967 appointed him Secretary of State Fidel Castro and entrusted him with the management of the Cuban publishing house. From 1966 lived Carpentier as cultural attaché of the Cuban government in Paris. As such, he died there at the age of 76 years on 24 April 1980. He was buried in the cemetery Cementerio Cristóbal Colón in Havana.
1977 Alejo Carpentier was awarded the Cervantespreis.
Works
- ¡ Ecue - Yamba -O! . In 1933, Roman
- El reino de este mundo. 1949 Roman ( German: The kingdom of this world in 1964. )
- La música en Cuba. 1946 musicological nonfiction
- Los pasos perdidos. 1953 Roman ( German: The Lost Tracks 1982, ISBN 3-518-39744-3. )
- El acoso. 1956 Roman ( German: Finale in Cuba 1960; hunt 1989.. )
- El siglo de las luces. 1962 Roman ( German: Explosion in the Cathedral in 1964. )
- El recurso del método. 1974 Roman ( German: Reasons of State 1976 The method of power in 1989.. )
- Concierto barroco. 1974 amendment ( German: Baroque concert in 1976. )
- La consagración de la primavera. 1978 Roman ( German: . Le Sacre du Printemps 1993)
- El arpa y la sombra. 1979, Roman ( German: The Harp and the Shadow 1979. )
- El amor a la ciudad. Narrative ( German: My Havana; Amman Verlag; 2000, ISBN 3-250-30001-2 )