The New York City launch of The Apartment, a new novel by critically acclaimed Cuban-American writer Ana Menéndez. Examining exile, homesickness, and displacement, The Apartment asks what—in our violent and lonely century—do we owe one another? If alone we are powerless before sorrow and isolation, it is through community and the sharing of our stories that we may survive and persevere.
What the critics are saying:
Menéndez’s established place in the canon of Cuban American literature is further solidified by this new book.
–Joy Castro, Los Angeles Review of Books
Menéndez’s career as a fiction writer, as well as her wide ranging journalistic and academic careers, have shaped the global perspective and deep understanding of the craft of writing that shine through The Apartment.
–Jane Ciabattari, Literary Hub
The author will be introduced by Isabel Alvarez Borland, Distinguished Professor Emerita of Arts and Humanities in the Department of Spanish at the College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts., who will also moderate a Q&A session following the presentation. Prof. Alvarez Borland is part of our literature program and a member of the Board Directors of the CCCNY.
This event is part of our CreateNYC Language Access Series on Cuban History, Art, and Literature. It will be held in English.
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
School of International & Public Affairs
Conference Room 802
Amsterdam Ave. @ 118th St., NYC
SPACE IS LIMITED
FREE ADMISSION
RSVP at: aymara@cubanculturalcenter.org
ANA MENÉNDEZ has published four books of fiction: Adios, Happy Homeland!; The Last War; Loving Che; and In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd. She has worked as a journalist in the United States and abroad, most recently as a prize-winning columnist for The Miami Herald. As a reporter, she wrote about Cuba, Haiti, Kashmir, Afghanistan, and India. Her work has appeared in Vogue, BOMB, The New York Times, and Tin House and has been included in several anthologies, including The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature. She has a BA in English from Florida International University and an MFA from New York University. From 2008 to 2009, she lived in Cairo as a Fulbright Scholar. She has also lived in India, Turkey, Slovakia, and the Netherlands, where she designed a creative writing minor at Maastricht University in 2011. She is currently an associate professor at Florida International University with joint appointments in English and the Wolfsonian Public Humanities Lab.
ISABEL ÁLVAREZ-BORLAND is Distinguished Professor Emerita of 
Arts and Humanities in the Department of Spanish at the College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA. Her books include Cuban-American Literature of Exile: From Person to Persona (1999) and Discontinuidad y ruptura en Guillermo Cabrera Infante (1982). She is also co-editor of Negotiating Identities in Cuban American Art and Literature (2009) and Identity, Memory, and Diaspora (2008). She is currently Associate Editor of Hispania and was Co-Director of the 2006 NEH Seminar for College Teachers: Negotiating Identities in Art, Literature and Philosophy: Cuban Americans and American Culture. She has published essays on Cuban and Latin American Literature in scholarly journals such as Hispanic Review, MLN and Revista Iberoamericana.
This event is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
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