ELYUMA: “If you read it, they will come”: Havana Real comes to Books & Books”, por Ted Henken

Last Saturday, August 6 @ 5 p.m., amid rainstorms and some minor technical difficulties, more than 200 people and I met up at Books and Books in Coral Gables, Miami to celebrate the publication of Yoani Sanchez's "Havana Real."  The book is an updated English edition of selections of Sanchez's blog posts from "Generation Y" from April 2007 through the end of 2010, as translated by the intrepid Mary Jo Porter. 
M.J. or "Maria," as Cuba's alternative bloggers whom she translates like to call her, also wrote a powerful introduction to the book telling the story of how she inadvertently became involved in the amazing "trabajo voluntario" of co-opertive translation.  That project now includes more than 200 voluntary translators in more than 20 countries (check out the twin sites Hemos Oido and Translating Cubato get into the translation act yourself).  It has also grown far beyond GY and now includes almost 40 Cuban blogs available at the portalVoces Cubanas.  (You can read more about how this all got started in this interview with M.J. - en espanol aqui).