I think that like all writers - and if any writer disagrees with this, then he is not a writer - I write primarily for myself

So I do not consider myself a chronicler of my fatherland or even a chronicler of Havana

Many of my books have begun with the title, because naming a work already in progress makes no sense to me.

No, absolutely not, writing doesn't have to be like a jigsaw puzzle, it can be a very linear undertaking.

Cigars must be smoked one at a time, peaceably, with all the leisure in the world. Cigarettes are of the instant, Cigars are for eternity.

I was never a true journalist, I was a movie critic.

Writers rush in where publishers fear to tread and where translators fear to tread