Feature photo: peamasher; Photo above: Sami Keinanen
Amazon isn’t selling it, but if you head to the island yourself, this would be one hell of a souvenir.
There are lots of jokes about Fidel Castro. Most make some reference to his propensity for making lengthy speeches.
Throughout his 48 years in power, Castro became renowned for his ability to orate for hours and hours on end. Though you’d probably be tired if you were a Cuban standing in the audience, you could certainly say you witnessed history in the making: some of his speeches, such as “History Will Absolve Me” (given in 1953 before he took power), are widely anthologized in history books around the world.
Just in time for Fidel’s birthday–which is today– Cuban professor Salomon Susi Sarfati published the 339-page Diccionario de Pensamientos de Fidel Castro, or Dictionary of Fidel Castro’s Thoughts, which was released to the public in Cuba last Saturday.
The dictionary defines words based on references from Castro’s speeches.
Castro, who turns 83 today, is reported to be in ill health.
If you happen to head down to Havana, be sure to snag your own copy of the dictionary. It’ll be one hell of a souvenir.
In the meantime, check out Castro’s oratory style in this video:
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Wow! That is…disturbing? Fascinating? Definitely something I want to get my hands on. That’s up there with the book written by Ayatollah Khomeini — I forget the title, but it’s his great ruling doctrine–in which he offers advice on when it’s ok to have sex with a chicken, and then how to eat/kill the chicken. Literally. Azar Nafisi discusses this in “Reading Lolita in Tehran” and talks about how the book is a hot item for this very reason (not because people actually want this information, but because they get a huge kick out of it.)
Any other surreal books by/dedicated to leaders out there anyone knows about?
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