FOL Book & Author Luncheon Enlightened and Entertained

Life as a boy during the Castro Revolution, and a small suburban town where the woman lose their sex drive.  

These concepts may still be food for thought for those who attended the . Featuring prize-winning memoir author Carlos Eire and best-selling novelist , the event took place at the Clubhouse at Harbor Links on May 13.

Author and Port Washington resident , a previous speaker at an FOL luncheon, made the introductions.

First up was Eire, author of two memoirs, “Waiting for Snow in Havana” which detailed his childhood in Cuba before and during the Castro revolution, and “Learning to Die in Miami: Confessions of a Refugee Boy,” which continued his story from 1962, when he was airlifted from Cuba, until 1965 when he finally reunited with his mother.

A history professor at Yale University, Eire said that in his profession, “it is considered a sin to write something like a memoir.” Yet he was driven to do just that.

Noting links between history and memory, he explained the “Pedro Pan” airlift program that ran between the end of 1960 and the fall of 1962. Back then, parents sent 14,000-plus children from Cuba into American foster homes. Parents, including Eire’s, anticipated only a brief separation from their children, but in late 1962 the gateway between the two countries shut, and thousands of parents were stuck in Cuba, separated from their children. Over 80,000 more Cuban children had visas to leave Cuba when the airlifts ceased. Eire and his brother came to the United States in 1962, placed in two separate foster homes. Eire struggled with assimilating, learning the language and culture, and dealing with being so far from his parents. Although he was reunited with his mother in 1965, his father never made it out of Cuba.

“We’re all exiles from childhood,” Eire pointed out. “It’s a world you can never return to.”

Writing the books enabled Eire to “bear witness to the sacrifice our parents made.”

“Cuba,” he said, “is a place that steals your mind and soul; your identity. To live there is to live without any freedom whatsoever.” Eire also read a passage from “Learning to Die in Miami.”

Next up was author Wolitzer, the daughter of novelist and previous FOL Luncheon speaker Hilma Wolitzer.

Meg Wolitzer addressed the ups and downs of an author, including responding when asks, “Would I have heard of you?” Wolitzer’s retort – “in a more just world.”

Wolitzer had the audience in stitches, recalling her Long Island childhood. “We shopped at the Walt Whitman Mall,” she said. “Is there a bigger oxymoron than that!?” Pausing, she added, “I suppose it would be the Edna St. Vincent Millay Water Park.”

Wolitzer spoke about her latest “magical realism” book, “The Uncoupling.” It describes a fictional New Jersey town where women lose their sexual desire simultaneously when the new high school drama teacher produces the ancient Greek sex comedy Lysistrata."  It’s a book where characters confront a sudden change on their relationships, and the various ways that each character does so.

After the presentations, the authors fielded questions from an appreciative audience.