Troubled Lands
Stories of Mexico and Cuba as Translated by Langston Hughes
Langston Hughes translator Ricardo Wilson II editor
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Princeton University Press
Published:28th Apr '26
Should be back in stock very soon
A landmark book—the first complete publication of Langston Hughes’s translations of thirty-three stories by eighteen Mexican and Cuban writers
In late 1934, Langston Hughes, already established as a leading voice of literary Black America, traveled to Mexico City, where he stayed for more than five months and began translating short fiction by prominent Mexican and Cuban writers. These stories, as he wrote to a friend, explore “the revolutions and uprisings, sugar cane, Negroes, Indians, corrupt generals, [and] American imperialists,” and are “mostly all left stories, because practically all the writers down here are left these days.” But when Hughes proposed publishing the stories as a book, to be titled Troubled Lands, his agent discouraged him from further pursuing the project and it remained unpublished, until now, with only a handful of the translations making their way into contemporary magazines. This volume presents Hughes’s translations of these stories together for the first time as he originally envisioned. Edited by Ricardo Wilson, the book also features an introduction and brief biographies of the included writers.
Troubled Lands features thirty-three stories by eighteen writers, including Rafael Felipe Muñoz, Nellie Campobello, Lino Novás Calvo, Luis Felipe Rodríguez, Germán List Arzubide, Pablo de la Torriente-Brau, and Juan de la Cabada. The collection depicts Mexico in the wake of its revolution and Cuba in the years between the brutal regimes of Machado and Batista.
Hughes was a noted translator of poetry, but his commitment to translating fiction is less well known. Troubled Lands provides a window into this important dimension of his work and illuminates his deep interest in Mexico and Cuba.
"Highly recommend. . . . [A] great book."---Jo Livingstone, Reading Writers podcast
"It is wondrous . . . to read a newly published work translated by one of the greatest writers in the English language. . . . Framed by a wonderfully informative introduction. . . . Troubled Lands not only calls attention to Hughes’s underappreciated talent as a translator, but rightfully delivers these stories which, due to their radical political engagement, were once intercepted from reaching an English-speaking readership. Hughes’s immersion in the Mexican literary scene shows that the loss of such a publication precluded not only literary exchange and scholarship of Cuban and Mexican literature, but important hemispheric connections of solidarity across communities of writers on the left. To read it today is to wish that it had entered the record sooner, while also feeling that perhaps today is just the right time."---Liliana Torpey, Asymptote Journal
"The publication of this book is undoubtedly a significant literary event."---Terry Potter, The Letterpress Project
"This collection of short stories is a landmark—the first complete publication of Hughes’s translations from the Spanish of 33 stories by 18 Mexican and Cuban writers."---Gavin O’Toole, Latin American Review of Books
"The collection reveals the interconnections between Black America as a continental and diasporic identity, asking if there are possibilities for a more expansive world revolution. . . . While it is a shame the collection didn’t make its way into the hands of U.S. audiences until now, the provocations and celebrations of these stories will resonate with writers and thinkers of today."---Kassy Lee, Poetry Project
"Apart from broadening our picture of Hughes and his polyglot imagination, Troubled Lands is a gathering of many writers who deserve their introduction to an anglophone audience."---Benjamin Shull, Times Literary Supplement
"[These] stories have a power and an energy that blaze on the page. . . . The collection is a valuable document of Hughes and his era and a brilliant snapshot of early 20th-century Hispanic literature."---Frank Wynne, Irish Times
"Bringing Troubled Lands to readers at last is a real service to the study of Black internationalism and to the larger conversation about how literature crosses the borders of language, nation, and race."---Santiago Juan-Navarro, Ethnic and Racial Studies
ISBN: 9780691268415
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: 499g
296 pages