English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Silvio Rodriguez enlightens us about the Five Grey Years and the late censor Luis Pavón: In the time when Pavon led the National Council of Culture, there was injustice with some writers and artists, because of narrow views. I believe his responsibility for that has been exaggerated. I think it is necessary to analyze what … Continue reading “The Embarrassment / Enrique Del Risco”
By Víctor Manuel Domínguez HAVANA, Cuba, February, http://www.cubanet.org. History repeats itself. Another Cuban writer will be sent to prison. Angel Santiesteban, author of the blog The Children Nobody Wanted, was sentenced to five years in prison under the crime of housebreaking and injury. The Supreme Court upheld the penalty. According to what Santiesteban said to … Continue reading “The Children The Revolution Didn’t Want / Ángel Santiesteban”
Things are heating up… really, I believe one should not stay silent under things like these. I applaud from my heart Desiderio Navarro and all of those people who write their name when they are giving their word. I didn’t live in the television era nor do I remember “El quinquenio gris” — the five … Continue reading “Message from Marcos García / POLEMICA: The 2007 Intellectual Debate”
I recently heard Carlos Alberto Montaner in a presentation on art and literature in exile which I had the good fortune to attend. According to Montaner, one of the points on which the Cuban regime undoubtedly has been shrewd, is the negative connotation they have managed to associate with the terms “anti-Castro” in global eyes, … Continue reading “Cuba Yes, Dictators No / Ernesto Morales Licea”
Left behind was the romantic stage, when a notable majority of leftist intellectuals pinned their hopes on the Revolutionary hurricane of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. A Cuba that clouded the reason of heavyweights in the world of letters such as Jean Paul Sartre, Julio Cortázar and José Saramago has lost its steam. The “snob … Continue reading “The Cuban Revolution No Longer Enchants / Iván García”
For Antón de Milián Many friends, and others who are not friends, have approached me, interested in my opinion about this debate on the parameters or simply, the fact that non-participation in it could be interpreted as indifference, apathy or in the worst of cases… cowardice. Those who really know me know that I do … Continue reading “The Period of the Silent Scandal / José Milián / Polemica, The 2007 Intellectual Debate”
14ymedio, Juan Izquierdo, Havana, April 27, 2024 — After 65 years operating as a kind of second ministry of culture, Casa de las Américas longs for the time when the institution was more powerful and influenced the cultural debates of the continent. On the eve of the anniversary, its president, cultural commissioner Abel Prieto, regrets … Continue reading “Casa de las Americas Licks Its Wounds on Its 65th Anniversary and Longs for Its Influence in the Region”
Jeovany Jimenez Vega, 5 May 2023 — How was it possible, after the worst plane crash in our recent history, [Cubana de Aviación Flight 972 crashed in May 2018 at Santiago de las Vegas with loss of 112 lives], after the fatal collapse of the balconies that took the lives of three girls in a … Continue reading “Cuba: You Must Be Having a Laugh Diaz-Canel… / Jeovany Jimenez Vega”
14ymedio, Xavier Carbonell, Salamanca, 9 April 2023 – The apathy of Cuban intellectuals after the death of Jorge Edwards contributed to the fact that the regime’s censorship managed to render him invisible. The machinery of the Cuban press lives by a certain law of fiction, and that fiction selects, redacts, patches over and twists the … Continue reading “Jorge Edwards in Cuba: A Spy in the Land of Slogans”
14ymedio, Yunior García Aguilera, Madrid, 12 October 2022 — On August 23, 1973, in the Swedish city of Stockholm, Jan-Erik Olsson attempted to rob a bank. His four hostages, despite the violence and threats to their lives, ended up protecting their captor and demonstrating vehement empathy toward him. Upon seeing this strange reaction of the … Continue reading “Cuba: The ‘Stockholm Letter’”
By Carlos Manuel Álvarez, published in Univision News, 19 May 2016 Published in Malaletra, a Blog Made in Cuba, Regina Coyula, 11 July 2016 He looks like a god but is a heretic. He seems carved in stone, but is a nervous wreck. He looks like the first among men, but is just the last … Continue reading “The Reclusive Poet / Carlos Manuel Alvarez, Regina Coyula”
14ymedio, Xavier Carbonell, Salamanca, May 22, 2022–Those who think that all ciberclarias* are slick and anonymous are mistaken. Some come with pedigree and martial ranks. There is a group of ever-loyal comrades, trained in military or Party schools, who do not understand the Five Grey Years, nor the special periods, nor have they foreseen crises … Continue reading “Remnants of the Cuban Censor Who Attends Me”
“This house has to be torn down!” Drink, in ‘The night of the murderers’, by Pepe Triana 14ymedio, Madrid, Yunior García Aguilera, December 21 2021 — In 2013 I had the good fortune to meet one of the greatest Cuban playwrights of all time: José Triana. I found myself visiting London for the premiere of Feast, … Continue reading “The Honorable Allure of Censorship”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 14 November 2021 — The playwright Yunior García Aguilera could not carry out his plan to walk dressed in white with a rose in his hand at 3 o’clock in the afternoon down 23rd Street in El Vedado to the Malecón in Havana. Police and State Security agents and members of the … Continue reading “Cuba: A Violent Crowd Surrounds Yunior Garcia’s House and Threatens the Foreign Press”
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, November 2, 2021 — The dictatorship’s most frequently recurring formula to impede or interfere with changes that do not align with their interests has been to incarcerate. They’ve raised the bar in two ways: first, by presenting as apocalyptic the results of anything they consider a “return to the past,” and … Continue reading “A Brief Chronology of Disregard and Intolerance in Cuba”
