English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 5 September 2016 – A certain letter from Aristides Vega Chapu to the weekly Vanguardia, already quite old and that I believe I came into my hands in the middle of last July, set off a media frenzy last week. Knowing, as I do, that there is a lot … Continue reading “A Long Commitment To The Truth / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenchea, Santa Clara, 27 June 2016 – The Eva Tas Foundation, located in Amsterdam, publishes and promotes texts that have been and are censored, regardless of where or how. Indeed, as a part of this laudable and necessary work, this institution just published two books by one of the most important figures … Continue reading “Gagged Words / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenchea, Santa Clara, 29 May 2016 — With the shutdown of seven of its nine active sites, the 2016 sugar harvest is nearly complete in Villa Clara. It has emerged that the province that currently produces the most sugar in the country has fallen far short of the 250,000 metric tons programmed: as … Continue reading “Villa Clara Sugar Harvest Will Be Much Less Than In 2015 / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea Jose, Santa Clara, Cuba, 28 April 2016 – The World and My Cuba in ‘El Diario’ is a very difficult book to read, not for its style, which could not be more direct and comprehensive, but for the heavy emotional weight concentrated in each of its brief articles. The reader can … Continue reading “‘The World and my Cuba in El Diario’ by Uva de Aragon / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 31 March 2016 — On March 26, in my village of Encrucijada, Rafael Rodriguez Gonzalez died, Rafelito as all of us whom he honored with his friendship used to call him. He followed his wife, Caridad, who died at the end of last year, and to whom he was married for … Continue reading “The Hero / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 30 October 2015 – What do the socialism of Karl Marx and that of Nocolas Maduro have in common? Just like between the two men: nothing, or very little, perhaps the mutual membership in the human race and not much more. The difference between them, on the other hand, … Continue reading “Is 21st Century Socialism Marxist? / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenchea, Holguin, 15 August 2015 — For many, Fidel Castro has been “a light in the street and darkness at home.”* Although I don’t believe that either outside or inside Cuba’s borders this gentleman has illuminated a new path for humanity, I have to admit there is some truth in such a … Continue reading “Fidel Castro’s Legacy for Cuba / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Havana, 18 July 2015 — I remember it as if it were yesterday when my old man took me to see the first Elpidio Valdés feature film in 1974. Having just debuted in the city of Santa Clara, we had to jump through hoops to find a taxi willing to take … Continue reading “Authority as Exemplified by Elpidio Valdés / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 17 May 2015 – From the interpretation of a significant event in the history of a nation, the interpreters’ political orientation can be very well surmised. Here we have this date, 24 February 1895 – the day on which our ancestors departed for the last time to the scrubland, … Continue reading “Marti and His Myth / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 7 July 2015 — The printed edition of the weekly Vangaurdia* dared mess with hornets. In her article “Let him who does not know you buy you?” the young journalist Laura Rodríguez Fuentes identified several inconvenient truths that will surely make waves in the tiny world of Cuban letters. … Continue reading “Stirring Up the Book Publishing Hornet’s Nest / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 22 June 2015 – Why don’t our intellectuals act like so many foreign observers expect? Why don’t they try to intervene in the debate about the future of the country now that there is ever more open access to the Internet, whether directly or through the exchange of USB … Continue reading “The Intellectual, a Ruminant in the Castro Zoo / 14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea, Santa Clara, 5 May 2014 — Russia is not the West’s Enemy, with a capital “E.” And even if it were, it would not be taken seriously. Russia is no longer the industrial superpower of the ’70’s and ’80’s, nor is it a leader in innovation. Its population is dwindling to … Continue reading “Russia and Raúl Castro’s Mediating Role / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Havana, 28 January 2015 — It is true that in the writings of José Martí one can apparently find the justification for political aberrations like those we suffer since Fidel Castro took off his democratic and legalistic mask in mid-1959. And I highlight here the word “apparently.” To achieve a sufficient … Continue reading “The Immense Distortion of Martí / 14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, JOSÉ GABRIEL BARRENECHEA, Havana, 20 December 2014 – We Cubans continue to be as impressionable as ever. Thus, on the island, the masses seem to see the release of the three spies who were still in US prisons, and nothing else. Many opponents and exiles, for their part, only seem to see this bias … Continue reading “The beginning of the end of the Castro regime / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenechea”
14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea, Havana, 9 December 2014 – One of my earliest memories is of my young self, singing, Set fire, set fire to the lock [of hair], while riding in a bus operated by Havana’s public transportation system. The other passengers around me laugh and a lady with sweet and mirthful eyes exclaims … Continue reading “The Spell of Havana / 14ymedio, José Gabriel Barrenechea”
