Carlos Ripoll
THE CUBAN SCENE:
CENSORS AND DISSENTERS
There are two categories of writers in Cuba today: those
who police their own work and that of their colleagues, and those
who are silenced, jailed, and unable to participate in Cuba's cultural
life. The existence ofthese two categories, indeed the entire course of
Cuban letters since the revolution, can only be understood in the
light of the political events that have occurred since 1959.
The overthrow of Fulgencio Batista's dictatorship in 1959
brought new works and vigor to Cuban letters as young writers in–
corporated themselves into artistic life and those living in exile
abroad returned. Very soon, however, a struggle began between two
forces that held opposing views about the function ofliterature: Fidel
Castro's former associates, who advanced ideals of liberty and demo–
cratic pluralism and were eager to open Cuban culture to all con–
temporary trends, and the Communists, who sought to bring every
aspect of society under strict control and to press literature into the
service of society. The second group was small in number, but not in
aspirations. The liberal reformers, deceived by their own false
hopes, fell short in the defense of their principles.
The first victories of the Communist ideologues came in the
wake of the severing of diplomatic ties between the United States
and Cuba. The break occurred in 1961 and was accompanied by
Castro's declaration that the Cuban revolution was socialist. It was
at this time that the Marxists decided to make a strategic show of
strength by launching an attack on the newspaper
Revolucion,
the of–
ficial organ of the government, which antagonized Marxist ortho–
doxy by putting out a literary supplement that published texts of
Pasternak, Joyce, Camus, Mao, Lenin, and Trotsky together with
speeches by Castro and Che Guevara. The opportunity for attack
came when the government convened the so-called "conversations
with the intellectuals" to define the role of culture within the new so–
ciety. Old quarrels were renewed at these discussions and ultimately
the reformist cause and the humanistic spirit that had flourished
briefly were dealt a crushing blow: the literary supplement was ter-
