I teach a couple of courses on 20th century history in what
is meant to be an elite global university. I wish my students would read this
book before our class on the Cuban Missile Crisis (just as I wish they would
read The Quiet American before our
class on the Vietnam War). However, I have the feeling that my students have
the attention-span of a goldfish and cannot cope with many of the books and
movies that I suggest they read and watch (one of them even told me that, as
far as historical movies go, my Battle of
Algiers and Deer Hunter pale in
comparison to her Pearl Harbor).
Our Man in Havana is one of those books that made me laugh out loud,
much to the surprise and worry of my wife. Yet, when you realize that the lives
of Cifuentes, Wormold, Hasselbacher etc. might really be in danger, you just
want to get to the last page of the book as quickly as you can to make sure
they are all ok in the end. Sadly, not all of them are.
The book’s last-line is, to me, as wonderful as it gets.
As far as tales of misunderstandings and mistaken attempts on innocents’
lives go, this might even beat North by
Northwest.
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