Carlos Aguilera returns to Hannover for a public reading

The reading was organised by the Literature House and the Department of Romance Languages at the Leibniz-University and was part of the ‘Against Framing’ conference which took place between June 9th- 10th. It focused on the development of Aguilera’s work and his involvement in cultural projects over the last ten years and included a presentation on ‘literary terror’ against the harsh government-led punishments faced by dissident Cuban voices in 2003. The event was an impressive combination of poetry performance, combined with historical film sequences on Mao’s regime in China, produced by a Cuban film maker, as well as Aguilera’s own reflections on Cuba’s current political situation and cultural policies. The discussions were moderated by Christoph Singler, a professor in Latin American Studies at the University of Besançon, and Natascha Rempel, a PhD Fellow in Romance Studies in Hannover.

Carlos Aguilera’s career began in 1990 in his native Cuba through his work on the magazine Diáspora(s) (1997-2002) in collaboration with other likeminded Cuban authors of his generation. The project, however, came to an end following the exile of most of the writers involved in it. This included Aguilera who was banned from re-entering Cuba following his participation in protests against the imprisonment of 75 authors and intellectuals in spring 2003.

The wide-ranging work of Aguilera includes written work such as poetry, essays, and narrative texts. Amongst those published during his time in Cuba are Retrato de A. Hopper y su esposa (Cuba,1996) and Das Kapital (Cuba,1997). Whilst in a new Diáspora(s) , Carlos Aguilera published the collection of essays and poetry Die Chinamaschine (Graz, 2004) and the novel Teoría del alma china (Mexico, 2006; Leipzig, 2007) which were translated into other languages such as English, French, and Croatian. In addition, Aguilera is the editor of numerous anthologies addressing post-Soviet totalitarianism in Cuba and deconstructing myths surrounding the issue in a literary way.

Before becoming an ICORN resident, Carlos Aguilera spent two years in Graz, Austria as an IPW writer between 2003 and 2005. His first ICORN residency (2007-2009) was in Frankfurt, Germany, where he continued his literary activities which included writing a play which was later staged in German theatres. From Frankfurt, Carlos moved to Hannover for his second ICORN residency (2010-2012) where he successfully completed literary projects and networked. Today, Aguilera remains prolific in his work from his new home in Prague from where he runs the online platform InCUBAdora, a multimedia archive of Cuban contemporary and counterculture. In addition, he regularly publishes columns on the online portal RIALTA and teaches Spanish and Literature at Charles University in the capital of the Czech Republic.

For further information, please read Carlos Aguilera’s ICORN resident profile here.