Celia Hart interview

This video interview with Cuban Trotskyist Celia Hart was conducted in an hotel in Havana. I’ll be writing it up for the next issue of Socialist Resistance. The camera work isn’t quite John Ford standard. It’s rather dark and there is background noise including a guest appearance from a very loud coffee machine plus a…

Liam

August 18, 2007

1–2 minutes

Cuba, Latin America, Marxism

We talk about Celia’s invitation to Caracas by the Venezuelan government to attend a conference on Trotsky. The second video is a clip of Celia on Telesur with Trotsky’s grandson Esteban Volkov talking about it. We raise a glass to celebrate Fidel Castro’s 81st birthday and discuss both his role and what happens next. As you may imagine there is some desire in Cuba to follow the Chinese model following Castro’s death. Celia explains why this would be a disaster and describes Che Guevara as Cuba’s Trotsky.

Let me know what you think.

Technorati Tags: Cuban, revolution, revolutionary, Marxism, Marxist, Trotskyism, socialist

4 responses to “Celia Hart interview”

Adam

August 19, 2007 at 4:03 pm

Apparently George Galloway is doing a speaking tour in October with the son of Che – sounds like a cowboy film.

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Jorge

August 20, 2007 at 2:41 pm

hi Liam,

camera work is the least of your problems! 😉 what is Ewa Jazniewsky doing at the end of the video, was she also in Cuba?

jokes to one side, the interview loses a lot in the translation (not the fault of the translator, mind you, Celia is difficult to understand, uses quite a lot of Cuban Spanish words, talks in riddles and in very long sentences….)

but if you are going to use this material you need to get it transcribed by someone who understands Spanish, two examples:

– she says economic growth was 12% and it is translated as 2%
– she says revolution is not just on this side (in Latin America) and that we need the help of the Left in Europe and America (US), and this is translated as we need the help of the Left against the US

I am glad you made it back safely though!

Jorge

PS, the other video is not from telesur but rather from VTV, the state’s main channel (BBC ONE)

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Jorge

August 20, 2007 at 3:46 pm

and here’s a partial transcript of the main points made at the VTV interview with Celia, Volkov and Napurí (http://www.marxist.com/caracas-leon-trotsky-assassination200807.htm)

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Liam

August 20, 2007 at 9:16 pm

Are you offering Jorge? The interview wasn’t conducted in ideal circumstances but I’ll try and render it as best I can. Ewa is on there because of sloppy editing.

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Liam redux