Jorge Olivera Castillo Explained

Jorge Olivera Castillo
Birth Place:Havanna, Cuba
Occupation:Activist, poet, writer
Language:Spanish
Genre:poetry
Genres:-->
Years Active:1994-present

Jorge Olivera Castillo (b. Havana, Cuba, 1961) is a Cuban poet and dissident.

He worked as a journalist for the Cuban state-run television station ICRT for 10 years.[1] He was briefly detained in 1992 for trying to leave the country on a raft; in 1993, he left his position at ICRT and began writing reports for Radio Martí, a U.S.-funded, Miami-based station critical of the Cuban government.[2] [3] With two other journalists, he founded an independent news agency, Havana Press, in 1995, and later became the director.[1]

Olivera Castillo was arrested in 2003 as part of the Black Spring crackdown and sentenced to eighteen years in prison for writing articles "against national independence and Cuba's economy".[4] In prison, he spent nine months in solitary confinement, and suffered from a range of health problems.[3] He began writing poetry and fiction while in prison as a coping mechanism.[3] His wife, Nancy Alfaya, became a member of the Ladies in White, agitating for his release.[5] [3] After international pressure,[6] he was released for health reasons after serving only 18 months of his sentence, but remained under close supervision.[3] [4] He is currently a visiting scholar at Harvard University.[7]

Works

Poetry

, 2010. (Spanish and French)

Short stories

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Journalist Jorge Olivera Castillo released on medical grounds . IFEX . 9 December 2004 . 3 March 2017.
  2. Web site: Jorge Olivera Castillo (1961) . 2024-01-31 . www.memoryofnations.eu . en.
  3. Web site: Mineo . Liz . Out of 'the wolf's mouth' . Harvard Gazette . 6 December 2016 . 3 March 2017.
  4. Web site: Olivera Castillo. Jorge. From Dream to Reality. English PEN. 1 February 2017.
  5. Web site: Nancy . Mujeres Coraje . 3 March 2010 . es . 3 March 2017.
  6. Book: Congressional Record Proceedings and Debates of the 108th Congress Second Session . 1954 . Government Printing Office . 978-0-16-082001-4 . 8730.
  7. Web site: Jorge Olivera Castillo . Department of Comparative Literature, Harvard University. 3 March 2017.