Legna Rodríguez Iglesias was born in Camagüey in central Cuba in 1984 and currently lives in Miami, Florida. As well as poetry she has written theatre, short stories, children’s books and a novel. Her poetry has been translated into Portuguese, German, Italian and English.
In 2019 the PTC published A Little Body are Many Parts, the most comprehensive anthology of her poetry in any language, with Bloodaxe Books. This bilingual anthology features a selection of poems from all eight of Legna’s collections, offering readers a thorough insight into the oeuvre of this prolific poet. Following publication, Legna Toured the UK with her translators, the award-winning UK poet Abigail Parry and Havana based translator Serafina Vick.
Legna has always written; she was first published in her early twenties, bursting onto the Cuban literary scene with all the ferocity of a stampeding elephant. A contemporary Cuban artist said: ‘Suddenly, out of nowhere, this girl from Camagüey was winning all the literary prizes. Her poetry was unmistakably unique, so personal and shocking.’
Legna’s highly original voice attracted notice and over the next decade or so she was awarded a number of prestigious prizes, both at home and abroad. In 2015 Legna moved to Miami, where she continues to receive literary acclaim. Her first novel, My Favourite Girlfriend was a French Bulldog, will be published in the USA in 2019.
Contemporary Cuban poetry is as diverse and indefinable as contemporary poetry in any other country, but Legna does belong to a particular generation of poets. Generación O, formed mainly of poets born after 1975, is founded on the shared experience of growing up after the fall of the Soviet Union, when Cuba was launched into extreme deprivation.
