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.

My mother had been educated at a convent, and she had been converted to communism by my father during Stalin's most rampant period, at the beginning of the 1930s. So she had two gods, God in heaven and god on earth.

I think that I've tried many times to get Cuba in my writings, especially Havana, which was once a great and fascinating city.

I don't much believe in the idea of characters. I write with words, that is all. Whether those words are put in the mouth of this or that character does not matter to me

There were influences in my life that were more important than journalism, such as comic strips and radio.

I think writers rush in where everybody is very frightened to tread

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