A short life of the author
Oscar Hijuelos (1951–2013) was born on 24 August 1951 in New York City to Cuban immigrant parents. He grew up in Morningside Heights, Manhattan, and studied at the City College of New York.
Life and Career
Our House in the Last World (1983) — his debut — is a semi-autobiographical novel about a Cuban family in New York. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (1989) made him famous: the story of two Cuban brothers, César and Nestor Castillo, who come to New York in the 1940s and form a mambo band. The novel’s lush, sensuous prose — infused with the rhythms of Cuban music — won the Pulitzer Prize, making Hijuelos the first Hispanic writer to receive the award.
The novel was adapted into a 1992 film starring Armand Assante and Antonio Banderas.
Major Works and Themes
Hijuelos wrote about the Cuban-American immigrant experience — about nostalgia for a lost homeland, the difficulty of assimilation, and the consolations of music, food, and family. His prose style is generous, sensual, and rhythmically attuned to Cuban music.
Key Works
- The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (1989) — Pulitzer Prize
- Our House in the Last World (1983)
- The Fourteen Sisters of Emilio Montez O’Brien (1993)
Collecting Hijuelos
Our House in the Last World (1983, Persea Books) — the debut — is scarce: $30–$100. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (1989, Farrar, Straus and Giroux) — the Pulitzer winner — brings $30–$80. Hijuelos died in 2013; signed copies are finite.