Havana, March 31 (RHC)-- The First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel, recalled this Monday the founding of the National Printing Press of Cuba in 1959.

On the occasion of the 66th anniversary of this event, the Cuban president wrote on his X account: "Fidel, Carpentier, the National Printing Press, Cuban Culture, names and works to honor, to nourish the spirit, to grow, and to love and defend the Revolution until our last breath."

Díaz-Canel added a message from writer Abel Prieto, president of Casa de las Américas, commemorating the event.

That message read: 
"On March 31, 1959, the National Printing Office of Cuba was founded.  It is Cuban Book Day.  In 1961, Fidel would say: "We do not tell the people to believe!  We say: 'Read'!" Prieto wrote on the same social network.

With novelist and essayist Alejo Carpentier at the helm, the institution began to systematically and widely publish books, magazines, and pamphlets, as well as other printed formats requested by the Cuban people.

The first printed book was "The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha" by Miguel de Cervantes, divided into four volumes and illustrated by the Frenchman Gustave Doré (1832-1883) and the Spanish Pablo Picasso (1881-1973).

This work inaugurated the People's Library Collection, dedicated to the classics of world literature.

The work of the National Printing Office, which became the National Publishing House in 1962, was decisive in the preparation and publication of the primers and manuals used in the Cuban Literacy Campaign (January 1, 1961 - December 22, 1961). 

(Source: ACN)