A state-of-the-art restoration centre has opened in Havana with the aim of preserving Ernest Hemingway’s literary legacy.
La Bodeguita del Medio in Havana, Cuba was a favourite haunt of Ernest Hemingway. Photo by Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via Getty
The American writer moved to Cuba in 1939, living part-time in his house called Finca Vigia. He wrote much of his two most famous works – For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and the Sea – at the house which has now been turned into a museum. The new restoration centre sits on the grounds of the property, which Hemingway donated to the people of Cuba when he left the island for good in 1960.
The donation also included the thousands of documents he left behind, including 10,000 letters and 5000 photos, and the house has more or less been left untouched since Hemingway left. The restoration centre, which includes new laboratories and an air-conditioned vault, will help clean and preserve the items for generations of visitors to come.
The interior of Ernest Hemingway’s house. Photo by Giannis Papanikos/Shutterstock
The project is a successful collaboration between Cuba’s National Cultural Heritage Council and the US-based Finca Vigia Foundation, despite a setback in diplomatic relations between the two countries in the last couple of years. The inauguration was attended by Massachusetts Congressman Jim McGovern who praised the cooperation saying “when we come together, when we work together, we can do positive and amazing things.”
Grisell Fraga, director of the Ernest Hemingway Museum, told AP News “the laboratory we’re inaugurating today is the only one in Cuba with this capacity and it will allow us to contribute to safeguarding the legacy of Ernest Hemingway in Cuba.”
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