Listen in as celebrated Cuban writer Leonardo Padura talks with Dain Borges and Agnes Lugo-Ortíz from the University of Chicago.

At this talk, Leonardo Padura, author of the novel The Man Who Loved Dogs, reflects on the investigation of historical processes and the inclusion of historical characters in a work of fiction. The novel required several years of research to get a coherent picture of the events described it describes and a detailed frame of reference for two different historical characters in the work: Leon Trotsky, a very public figure, with a life that has been the subject of many biographies, and his murderer Ramón Mercader, a man without history and multiple identities—a creature of darkness.

Recorded Monday, April 4, 2011 at the Instituto Cervantes Auditorium.