Chely Lima

Writer Chely Lima was born in Havana, Cuba. Lima studied at the University of Havana, going on to work for the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry. He is the author of over a dozen books, including Lo que les dijo el licantropo/What the Werewolf Told Them (trans. by Margaret Randall, Operating System, 2017), Lucrecia quiere decir perfidia (approximately translated “Lucretia Wants to Speak Treachery”; Ediciones Bagua, 2015); Discurso de la amante (“Lover’s Discourse”; Imagine Cloud Editions, 2013), Confesiones nocturnas (“Nocturnal Confessions”; Grupo Editorial Planeta, 1994), and Triángulos mágicos (“Magic Triangles”; Grupo Editorial Planeta Méxicana, 1994). Lima’s first book, Tiempo nuestro (“Our Time”; 1981), won the University of Havana’s 13 de Marzo Prize, and his next book, Monólogo con lluvia (“Monologue with Rain”; Unión de Escritores y Artistas de Cuba, 1981), won Cuba’s Premio David prize. In 1998 he won the Juan Rulfo Award in Children’s Literature for his story “El cerdito que amaba el ballet” (“The Pig that Loved Ballet”). Lima’s work has been translated into Russian, German, English, French, Italian, Czech, and Esperanto.

Lima and his second husband, the writer Alberto Serret, were collaborators on many projects, including Violente, the first Cuban rock opera, and Espacio abierto (approximately translated “Open Space”; Letras Cubanas, 1983), a collection of science-fiction short stories. They also wrote for television shows such as Shiralad. El regreso de los dioses (“Shiralad: Return of the Gods”; 1995), a science-fiction series about a student and an android whose spaceship crashlands, stranding them in an Iron Age civilization. In an interview with Alejandro Langape for Alas Tensas,¹ Lima describes his relationship with Serret:

Serret was gay, all his friends and most people who knew him knew this, so the manner of our relationship was strange for those who didn’t know I was trans, which was practically the rest of the world.

Ours was a peculiar union between men because we took advantage of people thinking that I was a woman to jump the barriers that would be in our way in other circumstances. And we shared everything, absolutely everything: bed and table, personal and work life, friends and close relationships. Everything. We were wild lovers and brothers and partners in crime.

In 2000, Serret died in Ecuador, where the couple had been living since 1992. Lima lived in Buenos Aires for some years before taking an internship at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, California, in 2006. After two years, Lima moved to Miami, Florida, where he spent the remaining years of his life producing theater reviews, guiding young authors, and writing for himself.