Interview of Jay Lillie - With His New Novel HAVANA PASSAGE
Q: The name of your book is HAVANA PASSAGE?
A: That’s right. It’s a bit of a play on words. The “PASSAGE” denotes Gordon Cox’s and Kate Steven’s trip there to gather information for the President, but also the passing into history of the age of Fidel Castro.
Q: Why a woman President?
A: Why not? A woman will hold the position someday. In this case having a woman in the Presidency meant I didn’t need to constantly worry about the character sounding or appearing like any prior presidential person. It was also a lot of fun visualizing how a new leader would handle things. I think Rebecca did pretty well, don’t you?
Q: But some of your characters come down hard on the Embargo that every Administration since Jimmy Carter has supported aggressively.
A: Some more than others, but that’s fair comment. Maybe they think that if the embargo was really designed to force Castro to embrace democracy or even freedom, as it states in the preamble of the law, then it has certainly failed. The dictator actually seems to like it. It keeps his subjects economically impaired and easier to handle, while allowing him to blame the USA for all Cuba’s problems. If we’d opened up the country up to trade Fidel might have been gone long ago.
Q: Is Kate correct in thinking the Embargo against trade with Cuba, aimed against American citizens, is unconstitutional?
A: I don’t think her position is unreasonable. Under our Constitution there has to be a clear and present danger to national security to allow the government to exercise control over the freedom of our citizens to travel abroad, or to spend money while they’re there. I not sure we ever made the case. Suppose it had been Chirac’s France instead of Cuba that we were told we couldn’t visit and spend our money? In the darkest days of the Cold War, we were still allowed to travel to Russia. I did it lots of times on business for clients.
Q: So it’s the Cuban expatriate vote in Florida that has kept the Embargo in place to punish Castro?
A: The Cuban Americans that I’ve met are much too smart and savvy to believe the embargo directly punishes Fidel Castro. Maybe they like to show him the power they have and the high numbers of Cubans fleeing to Miami to get away from its effects. Or maybe they like the idea of Cuba remaining relatively undeveloped until they get a chance to go back in and reclaim what they believe is theirs.
Q: What about global terrorism?
A: This was never put forward as the reason for denying Americans the right to visit and trade with Cuba until February, 2004, during the last Presidential race, when the Administration beefed up enforcement of the restrictions on all Americans going to Cuba.
Q: Why make these points in a fictional piece?
A: Conflict feeds fiction as well as the news headlines. Fidel Castro is a demon, but he’s very clever. I placed the two protagonists in a Washington political setting, what-iffed a little about the Cuban Embargo, and let them look out for themselves. Different characters in the story see the world quite differently. HAVANA PASSAGE is also a love story, and Kate’s ire had to be aroused before the rest of her. I needed to get her good and mad.
Q: Your description of the homes and hotels in Havana seems very real. Did you go there and check things out?
A: Absolutely. Thanks to the People to People Program and the determination of friends. And I had to obtain permission from the Treasury Department. While there I interviewed people in and out of government. Havana is an interesting city, and the Cuban people are its biggest asset. If you don’t look hard, you might not even notice the oppression at large, but it’s there. No character in the book is drawn from anyone I met or spoke with in Havana, or anywhere else for that matter.
Q: Who was the prototype for the rascal, Santiago, Fidel’s ex-body guard, turned all American boy?
A: I guess you’re right about his being a rascal. His portrayal changed almost daily as I was writing the story. He’s critical to the story for many reasons. His personality links together every other character and situation evolving in Florida, Washington, and Havana. He’s the eyes of the reader walking the unlighted streets of Havana at night, he’s our view into the minds of the Cuban elite, he’s proof that the American way, with all its warts and pimples, truly works, and he’s a vital contrast to the charm and educated veneer of Kate Stevens. He and Kate grow and evolve in unison throughout the story, and together make things happen.
Q: Where do you get your ideas?
A: There are very few interesting places in South America, Asia or Europe in which as a lawyer I haven’t done some business. I’ve dealt with presidents, dictators, spies, diplomats, bureaucrats, and my share of scoundrels.
Q: Why not write those adventures as a non fiction history of your practice?
A: I couldn’t give that sort of writing what it would need without betraying confidences, Besides creating a novel out of whole cloth is much more fun and challenging.
Q: Do you target an audience?
A: Goodness no. I wouldn’t know where to start.
Q: You conjure up a couple of pretty good storms in the Gulf Stream. Is that from personal experience?
A: The Stream is a dynamic marine environment, and it plays a key role throughout this story, as it does every day in Cuban/American relations.
Q: When you are describing the sea state, and the scenes of life threatening ocean waves, is it from personal experience?
A: I’ve been out there in small boats in bad seas, and larger craft in a hurricane. That much is personal. I’ve never been in a life raft, except practicing drills in the Navy and to get my ticket punched to enter ocean races. Body surfing in big waves was a daily exercise when we were kids living near the ocean, so it’s all part of what I know. The terror is real, as well as the adrenaline rush that survival requires. The key to writing about it is to know what you don’t know.
Q: Did you have anyone in mind creating the President’s character?
A: No, she evolved. I guess I wanted to like her, and she had to be an iconoclast. That’s the only way the plot would work.
Q: So which of the characters didn’t you like?
A: Can’t you tell?
Q: Carlos, the Orphan, Diego?
A: Actually, I love that character. He’s totally fictional. He’s also what makes the plot balanced. He had a personal reason to hate Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution. In that sense he doesn’t stand alone in South Florida. He’s a victim of his past, like most of us. His temper gets the best of him sometimes.
Q: I could tell you liked the young Cuban girl, Ana.
A: You’re right about that, and she was the last character to come into my head and into the story. She’s a victim of everything that’s wrong with despotism. She stands for the resilience of youth and brains being able to survive the worst of times. I like her tough innocence, and hope she shines through as the future of our planet.
Q: Do you believe there’s an undercover insurgency in Cuba?
A: How could there not be. It’s too small a world for people to not realize when the rest of us are passing them by. And the Cubans are doers. They are result oriented. If you don’t believe that look at what some of them have accomplished given some freedom in Miami.
Q: Well good luck.
A: Thanks. I’ve enjoyed speaking with you.
