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Early life and education

Carpentier was born on December 26, 1904, in Lausanne, Switzerland, to Jorge Julián Carpentier, a French architect, and Lina Valmont, a Russian language teacher. For a long time it was believed that he was born in Havana, where his family moved immediately after his birth; however, following Carpentier's death, his birth certificate was found in Switzerland.

In 1912, Alejo and his family moved from Cuba to Paris. As an adolescent, he read Balzac, Flaubert, and Zola. In 1921, Carpentier attended the School of Architecture of the University of Havana. When he was 18, his parents' marriage broke up and his father left. The following year, Carpentier left his studies and tried to find work to support his mother. He turned to journalism, working for the Cuban newspapers Carteles and Social. He also studied music.

Though bilingual from an early age, Carpentier always spoke Spanish with a marked French accent.