Before A Mirror, The City

Nancy Morejon is one of the best-known poets of Cuba. Her work addresses contemporary issues of ethnicity, gender, history, and Afro-Cuban identity. She is currently the Director of Caribbean Studies at Casa de las Americas in Havana, Cuba. David Frye is a professor of Anthropology at the University of Michigan and a translator of many books from Spanish. His recent works of translation include: Super Extra Grande, by Yoss, The Weeping Woman by Zoe Valdes, and Simone: A Novel by Eduardo Lalo.Juanamaria Cordones-Cook is a professor of Romance languages at the University of Missouri. Cordones-Cook extensive scholarly work includes research and publications on Spanish American writers and artists such as Luisa Valenzuela, Nancy Morejón, Jorge Luis Borges, Roberto Zurbano, and Belkis Ayón among others.

“Morejon’s poetry is infused with an understanding of her African heritage and modern Cuban identity. Her poems capture the essence of encounters with family, friends, literature, art, landscapes, politics, history, and Cuban reality. Her poems are lyrical, compassionate, complex and dazzling in their subtleties. This fine translated version of her work will encourage more research, more critical analysis and more dialog among scholars of poetry and Latin American culture.” —Jayne Cortez “Nancy Morejon’s poetry gives us a mighty Cuba. A laughing Cuba. A determined Cuba. I see the politics of people’s eyes. Hands. Bodies. Living. Surviving. Being. Walking in beauty in their country. Undefeated.” —Sonia Sanchez“A collection of exquisite sensibility, masterfully edited by Juanamaría Cordones-Cook and translated by David Frye. In these poems, Nancy Morejón's voice dazzles and moves us. She carries us off to a luminous island and an unforgettable Havana. I am moved by this book, by this poetry, and by the voice of one of the great poets of the Americas.” —Marjorie Agosin