JACQUELINE LOSS is an Associate Professor of Latin American Literary and Cultural Studies at the University of Connecticut, USA. Her publications include Cosmopolitanisms and Latin America: Against the Destiny of Place (2005, Palgrave) and the co-edited collection, New Short Fiction from Cuba (2007, Northwestern University Press). Her book Dreaming in Russian that treats Cubans' memory of the Soviets in the arts is forthcoming from the University of Texas Press. JOSÉ MANUEL PRIETO was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1962. He is the author of several works of fiction and nonfiction including the internationally acclaimed Enciclopedia de una vida en Rusia (Encyclopedia of a life in Russia), Livadia (published in English as Nocturnal Butterflies of the Russian Empire), Rex, and El Tartamudo y la rusa (short stories). His Voz humana (Human Voice) is forthcoming. He has been a fellow at The New York Public Library's Center for Scholars and Writers and has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. José Manuel Prieto taught at the Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económica (CIDE) in Mexico City, Cornell University as a Visiting Professor, and at Princeton University as a Distinguished Lecturer. He currently teaches at Seton Hall University.