Alejo Carpentier

Alejo Carpentier y Valmont was a Cuban novelist, essayist, and musicologist who greatly influenced Latin American literature during its famous "boom" period. Born in Lausanne, Switzerland, of French and Russian parentage, Carpentier grew up in Havana, Cuba, and despite his European birthplace, he strongly identified as Cuban throughout his life. He traveled extensively, particularly in France, and to South America and Mexico, where he met prominent members of the Latin American cultural and artistic community. Carpentier took a keen interest in Latin American politics and often aligned himself with revolutionary movements, such as Fidel Castro's Communist Revolution in Cuba in the mid-20th century. Carpentier was jailed and exiled for his leftist political philosophies.

26 December 1904

Born on the same birth day (26 December): Ahmed Barusso • Alan King • Denis Cheryshev • Earle Brown • George Dewey • Gray Davis • Hugo Lloris • Joe Alexander • Johann Georg Pisendel • John Walsh (television host) • Lord George Gordon • Marcelo Ríos • Matt Gordy • Matt Zoller Seitz • Souleymane Coulibaly • William Loeb III

Born in the same month (December 1904): Antonín Novotný • Dmitry Kabalevsky • George Stevens • Gerhard Herzberg • Joseph M. Juran • Kuvempu • Paul Cadmus • Virginia Coffey • Yevgenia Ginzburg • Ève Curie