Description
Book SynopsisWinner, 2020 Herbert H. Lehman Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in New York history
Honorable Mention, 2019 CASA Literary Prize for Studies on Latinos in the United States, given by La Casa de las Américas
The dramatic story of the origins of the Cuban community in nineteenth-century New York.
More than one hundred years before the Cuban Revolution of 1959 sparked an exodus that created today's prominent Cuban American presence, Cubans were settling in New York City in what became largest community of Latin Americans in the nineteenth-century Northeast. This book brings this community to vivid life, tracing its formation and how it was shaped by both the sugar trade and the long struggle for independence from Spain. New York City's refineries bought vast quantities of raw sugar from Cuba, ultimately creating an important center of commerce for Cuban émigrés as the island tumbled into the tumultuous decades that would close out t
Trade Review
"En prosa clara y precisa, Lisandro Pérez cuenta la historia de los cubanos del siglo XIX en Nueva York con rigor y una dosis exacta de empatía hacia los protagonistas. Este libro académico, sin duda un aporte incalculable a la historiografía cubana, se lee, sin embargo, como si fuera una novela." * Uva de Aragón, El Nuevo Herald *
"In this colorful and scrupulously researched history, Pérez . . . traces the 19th-century origins of Cuban New York. [His] engrossing work showcases a little-discussed facet of New York City's rich history." * Publishers Weekly *
"Pérez vividly describes how the tightly knit Cuban émigré community reproduced the political cleavages and social mores of its homeland." * Foreign Affairs *
"With a wealth of new data and illustrations, Pérez provides a fascinating narrative of Cuban migration to New York… Recommended for Latin Americanists and students of New York history." -- Choice
"In the 18th century a sugar trade sprang up between New York and Cuba, and with it a Cuban community grew in Gotham. Its evolution down to the 1898 war with Spain has heretofore been only lightly sketched. Now Lisandro Pérezs splendid study offers a full blown portrait. His research drills down to bedrock, and his absorbing narrative, which focuses on individual actors as well as sweeping historical forces, is engagingly written." -- Mike Wallace, Pulitzer prize winning historian of New York City
"A riveting history of exile and migration. More than a century before the rise of Miami, New York City was home to a vibrant transnational Cuban community. Its members lived in the city, using it to feed their business ventures, their intellectual and artistic pursuits, and their political visions, which were wide-ranging enough to include plots to annex the island to the United States and dreams of nationalist revolution. Lisandro Pérez provides a vivid glimpse into a relatively little-known Cuban and Latino New York in the nineteenth century." -- Ada Ferrer, author of Freedom's Mirror: Cuba and Haiti in the Age of Revolution
"Few people are aware that during the nineteenth century, Cubans constituted the major immigrant Hispanic community in New York. Lisandro Pérez, through exhaustive and well documented research, brings into focus the outstanding political, economic and cultural significance of this presence in the history of the city as well as in Cuban history." -- Oscar Zanetti, Universidad de La Habana
"A fascinating excursion into nineteenth-century New York . . . serves as a comprehensive guide to the social, cultural, and political lives of the transnational community of wealthy Cuban plantation owners and their immigrant compatriots . . .Great spiritedness animates the prose . . . a lively and multifaceted record of Cuban communities in New York City." * Foreword Reviews *
"A thoroughly researched study on the early history of Cubans in New York… Sugar, Cigars, and Revolution makes an important contribution to Cuban diasporic history in New York and Pérez’s attention to detail and crafting of narrative is impressive." * New West Indian Guide *
"In Sugar, Cigars, and Revolution, Lisandro Pérez has written an immensely enjoyable book . . . SCR is a captivating account, refreshingly free of polemic and academic jargon. Pérez expertly sets up scenes, weaves together the lives of characters, and introduces and analyzes texts, knowing exactly when and how to step back to summarize the broad sweep of events and politics . . . the book is brimming with insights and is eminently assignable. It would make an excellent gift for readers outside the academy who are interested in Cuban history or forgotten stories of old New York." * Cuban Studies *
