 Alejo Carpentier grew up in Havana, Cuba and was born on December 26, 1904 in Lausanne, Switzerland.He subsequently moved to France in 1933 (at the age of 29) and returned to Cuba six years later, in 1939.Once in Cuba, Carpentier joined a group of young writers whose goal was to establish a literature faithful to the New World, by recovering origins, history, and tradition.