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Tee hee

The failure of the attack eventually landed Castro in prison. Naty Revuelta sustained his morale by sending him books, including a copy of Somerset Maugham’s Cakes and Ale with its cover replaced by a picture of a portrait of her. She also posted him her favourite poem, Kipling’s If, and an envelope filled with sand to remind him of the beach. “Despite the distance,” she wrote, “you are very good company.”

In his turn, Castro penned letters to her which, though necessarily guarded as they had to undergo censorship, revealed some of his rarely seen private passions. “I am on fire,” he told her in 1954. “Write to me, for I cannot be without your letters. I love you very much.” He asked her to stop using a typewriter, so that he could see her handwritten script – “so delicate, feminine, unmistakable”.

At the same time, however, he was also writing to his wife, Mirta Diaz-Balart. One day – perhaps through mischief-making by the prison governor – she received an envelope intended for Revuelta and vice versa.

6 thoughts on “Tee hee”

  1. So Much for Subtlety

    a copy of Somerset Maugham’s Cakes and Ale with its cover replaced by a picture of a portrait of her. She also posted him her favourite poem, Kipling’s If, and an envelope filled with sand to remind him of the beach. “Despite the distance,” she wrote, “you are very good company.”

    Kipling and Maugham? It is a bit heteronormative and Imperialistic isn’t it?

    Still, girls do like a bad boy. Evil has an appeal all its own.

  2. Classic nasty Alpha male gets the girl–and she pawns her jewels for him etc, etc. Were Castro a nice, steady, loving, good-natured beta-provider she wouldn’t have pissed on him were he on fire.

  3. bloke (not) in spain

    “Naty Revuelta had already decided to throw in her lot with those opposing the corrupt regime of Fulgencio Batista, and, when Castro asked if he could indoctrinate her, she coolly invited him to call on her at home any afternoon after five. ”

    Now there’s a very useable euphemism, right there. Must remember that one. “I gave her a brief indoctrination & left her dialectically satisfied. Went down the pub.”

  4. I have to concede John77 is right .And I am wrong.Oh dear.It suppose it had to happen eventually.
    ( I still find it hard to believe that a woman would make the macho recruiting anthem “If” her favourite poem.)

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