Cuba is “Different” From Venezuela and the Ukraine

21 thoughts on “Cuba is “Different” From Venezuela and the Ukraine”

• Padura’s assessment rings true. The state of the opposition is different in Cuba. That stands to reason as Cuba is in a different place with it’s economy and personal freedoms. The average Cuban is not looking for whole sale regime change. He is looking for more economic freedom to elevate his life. This is the will of the common man looking for a little better life. A very human desire.

• I perfectly happy to hear your personal opinions on Padura, or any other Cuban writers. That’s why I share my personal opinions on Cuban literature. It’s odd that you pre-emptively self-censor your own comments in expectation of criticisms I have never made. I think that’s called “projection”.

  I didn’t ignore your examples, I addressed them, and dismissed them as examples of “strong criticism”. They’re mild criticisms of safe targets. The Castro regime is always denouncing corruption of public officials. Having such characters in his novels is a cautious way to write and is hardly an example of brave or outspoken criticism. On the other hand, you have ignored my examples and accuse me of saying things I did not say.

  Let me be clear on this point: nowhere did I say that Padura must write what I think he should write.

  You are quite correct, official attitudes toward writers have varied greatly over the years. After a very brief period of liberation and experimentation in Cuban literature, the Castro regime quickly clamped down on not only dissident or critical writers, but also on content they declared was decadent or immoral. Since the 1990’s the attitudes have softened a little bit, but not much. Writers can now address issues like homosexuality and official corruption, provided they stay clear of accusing actual high officials of those problems. Writers are still banned, arrested, harassed and jailed in Cuba today and the works of great Cuban writers such as Guillermo Cabrera Infante and Reinaldo Arenas are officially banned.

  I happen to think that’s a terrible tragedy, one of many, inflicted on the Cuban people by the Castro regime who have imposed a cultural embargo on the Cuban people.

  According to PEN Canada, only China, Iran & Burma imprison more writers than does Cuba. In a report from 2010, of the 30 writers imprisoned for their work in the Western hemisphere, 26 of them were in Cuba. The writer and blogger Ángel Santiesteban Prats languishes in a Cuban jail on trumped up charges because his writing was too critical for the regime.

  That is why I take exception to the comments Padura made pointing to his own cautious work as an example of growing artistic freedom in Cuba. It simply is not so.

• Right, you really have pissed me off now. I have read all the Conde novels. I quoted the blurb as an independent third party, because if I had stated the same thing myself, all you would have said “that’s only your opinion, he’s not really a high ranking official bla, bla, bla, etc “. I didn’t want to give too much of the plot away for other potential readers, but many of the books have very negative portrayals of high ranking officials (including Havana Red).
  He is writing fiction not a political speech. You seem to think it necessary for him to pepper the text with the words “dictator” in order to be strongly critical.
  I agree that there have been many examples of injustices, but it’s not the whole picture. Things have varied over the years and there have been plenty of examples of strong criticisms as well as mild criticisms. You ignore the example I gave. Of course this doesn’t fit in with your world view.

• I read his novels, not just the blurb. The ministry of industry official is revealed to be corrupt and ready to jump to Miami: a safe target. Havana Red touches on the issue of homophobia but it was written only long after the regime de-criminalized homosexuality. All you have to do is look at how Arenas and Pineiro were treated to know how vicious the Castros & Che were toward gays.

  Again, I have to point out, I did not say anywhere that Padura must write this it that. I merely point out his writing is not strongly critical as he claimed it is.

  Strawberry & Chocolate is a beautiful film. Now consider how many of the artists mentioned obliquely were treated.

  There have been several artists who’s criticisms became stronger over the years, so true. And like the example I gave above, and many others, once they cross a certain line they are anathema to the regime. Just try to find Arenas’ books in Cuba today! Or Piniero. Or dozens of other fine Cuban writers in exile, like Infante or Zoe Valdez. Censorship and intellectual repression persists in Cuba today.

• What I find annoying is that you assume Padura would say everything you want him to (including naming names), but doesn’t because he is being cautious. He doesn’t criticise the embargo either. Is that because he is being cautious in case of a future US administration?

  But as it happens I don’t agree that he hasn’t made strong criticisms of the regime. For example Havana Blue the blurb states “Rafael Morín Rodríguez, a high-level official in the ministry for industry” who is strongly criticised. In Havana Red the father of the transvestite is a high level official who is criticised as well. The series is all very negative about most things in cuban society but then the genre is noir.

  I don’t really care whether you want to put him in the category of dissident or not. I don’t see things as simplistic as that. There are plenty of examples of artists and works of art that are critical eg Strawberry and Chocolate and there are artists who have become more critical over the years. The scope of intellectual freedom isn’t as bleak as you like to portray.

• Again, as a Leftist, you seem to have no idea how free speech works. It goes like this:

  I say whatever I think.

  You say whatever you think.

  Padura says what he thinks. (except in Cuba, he has to be careful).

  The real risk for a writer in Cuba is if he or she offends the political rulers, the writer will find himself or herself arrested, banned or exiled. There have been many, many Cuban writers who were abused, arrested, jailed, repressed, banned and exiled by the Castro regime.

  Consider the case of Raúl Rivero Castañeda: for a while he was a hero of the Cuban government, lavished with awards and official praise and perks. Then he stepped outside the line for daring to call for the release of political prisoners and holding democratic elections. From that moment on he was banned, denounced, harassed and driven into exile.

  And where did I condemn Padura? When did I tell him what he has to write? Far from it. I praised his books and his talent as a writer.

  Are you suggesting Padura is a dissident writer? Not even Padura calls himself a dissident. Padura claimed his books make strong criticism of the regime. Really? Can you please provide one example from any of his books where he does this? I have not found any.

  So fine, Padura will continue to write his cautious books, hinting at abuses and excesses, while steering clear of actual dissent. But don’t tell me he is an example of a brave outspoken writer speaking truth to power or that the Castro regime’s tolerance of him is proof of their liberal attitudes toward intellectual freedom.

• …and yet Maduro came out on national TV to say he had identified those “companeros” who voted against him and made vague threats against them. Supposedly this was not possible with their electronic voting system. Yes, a truly “free and fair” election. His Cuban handlers were probably slapping their foreheads and saying what an idiot to go on TV and say that!

• This election as previous ones was monitored by international observers including Jimmy Carter, who stated that the voting was ‘free and fair’ and that Venezuela has “the most excellent voting system”.

• And you are doing it again – condemning Padura for not following your line. It’s not up to you to tell him what he should or shouldn’t say. He doesn’t have to name names if he doesn’t want to. An artist can easily risk destroying his own work if he starts writing propaganda rather than describing situations and portraying characters. You have a problem as he hasn’t been arrested and has won a National Literature Award and this situation doesn’t fit in neatly with a simplistic view of a dictatorship stamping on all dissent.

• Actually this vote was not monitored and there were many irregularities. And just in case you didn’t know how incompetent Maduro was he came out and announced on national TV that he had identified those who voted against him. His Cuban handlers must have been having a hissy fit!

• You made several personal attacks at me for the sin of expressing my opinion. I did not “attack” Padura for being timid. I merely contradicted his claim to have made some strong critiques if the system. Certainly he would know better than I how to walk the very careful line a writer in Cuba must do.

  Another writer who carefully walks that line is Pedro Juan Guttierez. Writing in the “dirty realist” style he describes the intolerable conditions of life in Havana and the things people are forced to do to survive. Like Padura, Guttierez avoids naming names. I guess that’s the limit one must not cross.

  Latour, as an exile, writes about the lives of exiles in Miami & Toronto. He steers clear of the political diatribes and focuses on the human side of life as an exile, within the context of crime fiction.

• Sorry if it came across as a vicious attack; I was merely criticizing why you would attack Padura for being timid. To me, such ciriticism seem irrelevant. Would his writing be any better if he made an out-and-out attack on the Revolution? Hardly. It would only make life more difficult, and distract from his primary goal as a writer. Moreover, he is far more effective telling his stories and making his observations while living in Cuba, rather than as an exile in Miami or New York or Toronto. Once a writer, or musician, or artist goes into exile, his or her art no longer reflects the life or spirit of her homeland; rather, it becomes a hybrid, intermixed with that of the adopted community (not that this is either good n
  or bad–just a different dimension).

• Gosh! Why you attack me so viciously?

  As it happens, I’m a big fan of Padura’s writing and have read most everything he has published (in English). I’m half way through “The Man Who Loved Dogs” right now and I consider it his best work yet. I particularly appreciate the mock-heroic tone when relating the life of the exiled Leon Trotsky. It is satirical, isn’t it? I am very much looking forward to reading “Heretics” when it is published in English.

  It’s odd you should accuse me of being a cultural commissar, when that is the position you so ably occupy. I merely offer my opinion on a particular writer. That’s called freedom of speech. As a committed Leftist, you probably don’t understand the concept of free speech very well. To clarify then: freedom OF speech is when people are free to say whatever they want. Freedom FROM speech, is when people of a given political ideology insist on NOT hearing anything they don’t agree with. The former is the essential trait of a free society, while the latter denotes totalitarianism. I think we both know where the Castros sit on that spectrum. How about you?

  I certainly never suggested Padura was a bad writer, or that he should be banned, jailed, or exiled. As it happens, the cultural commissars of the Castro regime have banned, jailed and exiled writers who failed to meet their political parameters. And they continue to do so today. For that reason I find it ironic that you accuse me of opposing intellectual freedom, when it is you who defend those who stifle artistic expression, and I who speak for the artist’s right to express him as he will.

  Now, perhaps you are right and I fail to recognize good writing, and therefore have no right to express my opinion. Or maybe it’s because, in your opinion, I appreciate the wrong sort of writers. I have read as much Cuban fiction and prose as I can find, regardless of political orientation: everything from Villaverde, Marti, Carpentier, Cabrera Infante, Reinaldo Arenas, Heberto Padilla, Zoe Valdes, Jose Lezamo Lima, Virgilio Piñera, Pedro Juan Gutiérrez, Carlos Eire, Achy Obejas, Ángel Santiesteba and so on. Indeed, the Cuba literary tradition is so dazzling, so rich and brilliant and daring! Perhaps it is because I have read these other Cuban authors, that I don’t quite see the exceptional genius in a cautious, careful writer like Padura. Talented, yes. Genius, no. Or maybe he’s been hiding his candle under a bushel all this time? Still, I would never condemn him for his meekness. I merely point it out, in my opinion, exercising my right to freedom of speech. Are you ok with all that?

  To be sure, Leonardo Padura is rather cautious in his criticism of the Cuban political scene. He knows best how to survive in that climate. Another Cuban writer of crime fiction, Jose Latour, was not quite so cautious as Padura. After submitting a novel to his Cuban publisher, word was passed down to him that not only would his book not be published, but that he might find it useful to work cutting sugar cane for a while. Latour eventually fled Cuba and settled in Toronto, where I had the fine pleasure of hearing him speak at a local public library. If you are into Cuban fiction, I highly recommend his books. Some are available for download from his website, others through Amazon, etc.

  http://www.joselatourauthor.com

• US immigration fees and processing times are universal. Current immigration reform legislation in the US hopes to resolve most of these problems. Cubans do not leave Cuba, by plane or raft, because of the Wet foot/Dry foot policy. They leave Cuba because of the quality of their life in Cuba. Ask a Cuban. Not a police state? When was the last time a Cuban brought a lawsuit against the police and won in Cuba? I spoke “laid” and my voice software ‘corrected’ it to “allayed”. But thanks for the heads up.

• Seems like Griffin is holding Padura to some sort of ideological litmus test, much like the Cuban cultural commissars did to their own writers during the “grey decades,”‘ except in this case Cuban writers must meet the approval of Griffin and his friends (i.e. Cuban writers must demostrate their dissident bona fides). In reality, great writing, like Padura’s, has little to do with ideology or towing the Party line (whether it be P.C.C.’s or that of Griffin’s Miami troglodytes). Instead, it has to do with how they tell their stories and what they have to say. Although opposite my political viewpoint, for example, one of my favorite writers from the 1930’s and 1940’s is Luis Ferdinand Celine, who started out a leftie, but by W.W.II had become an extreme rightie (so much so, he collaborated with the Vichy regime). Griffin seems to be so poisoned and resentful that he fails to see good writing. For the kind of stories where the ideological messages prevail, I recommend he read Ilf and Petrov’s “A Soviet Robinson Carusoe,” though it is a satire. Then again, except for Aristophanies and a few other subsequent conservatives, righties don’t particularly specialize in satire and irony. As Gore Vidal once said, “America: the home of the free–and the land of the literal!” (although I am well aware that Griffin claims to be Canandian).

• Back in 1918 the U.S. along with a couple of European nations invaded the Soviet Union because it didn’t like the idea of communism -a democratic economy- .
  Then back around 1960 the US invaded Cuba at Playa Giron to do the same thing as it did back in 1918 and also failed and so had to engage in the economic war against Cuba for the last 55 years or so .
  Now, isn’t THAT an interesting coincidence ?

• Where can you find a “freezing cell ” in sub-tropical Cuba ?
  By what criteria can Cuba be considered socialist ?

• Maduro was elected by the democratic majority of the Venezuelan vote which was internationally recognized as legitimate.
  If you believe what you read about Venezuela in the U.S. media , you’re a fool since the GOUSA is opposed to the leftist government and the corporate U.S. media will always reflect official government bias .
  Those who’d like to see some alternative views on Venezuela are invited to check out ZNet today and anytime by using their search engine.
  How the US Gov/corporate media report on Venezuela and how the (real) left reports on that subject contain massive differences that are well worth looking at to see just how your news is manipulated.
  This is one topic that is current , has not worked out to a resolution yet and one in which the two perspectives could not be more different.
  It would be a quick lesson on who is telling the truth and why.
  You are correct. The U.S. has a deliberate plan to :
  1) make life as hard as possible for every Cuban man, woman and child
  2) limit emigration to the U.S. with the huge fees and long delays when legally applying for a visa. at the U.S. Interests Section
  3) allow any Cuban who dares to , to float onto a Florida beach when they can’t do it legally and thereby embarrass the Cuban Revolution.
  The Cubans do not have a police state by any stretch of the imagination.
  You used the word “allayed” incorrectly.

• Ukraine & Venezuela go on a double date…

  http://es-us.noticias.yahoo.com/fotos/caricaturas-de-febrero-2014-slideshow/caricaturas-photo-1392908962942.html

  Here’s a funny coincidence: way back in 1953, Raul Castro travelled to a Marxist conference in Austria, where he met Soviet KGB agent Nikolai Leonov. After the Castro brothers obtained power in Cuba, Leonov became the KGB’s top man in Havana. He did so well at that job he was promoted up the ranks and back in Moscow he helped guide and train many young KGB agents.

  In December 2003, Leonov was elected to the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, as a member of the nationalist Rodina party. He is closely identified with the current Kremlin administration and is a long-time friend and mentor of his former KGB subordinate, President Vladimir Putin.

  Now, isn’t that an interesting coincidence?

• According to many Cubans, including my wife, emigration to the US has traditionally served as a ‘pressure-release valve’ for those Cubans so fed up with the regime that, absent favorable immigration policies for Cubans, would have erupted in the kinds of protests that we are witnessing in the Ukraine and Venezuela. Likewise, as you said, the police state in Cuba has a 55-year head start on any newborn protest project. To the Castros credit, they have skillfully allayed blame on external agents, not the least of which is the US embargo, for all that is wrong in Cuba. The trifecta of emigration, US embargo and an fearsome police state has kept the Cuban pot of suffering from boiling over…so far.

• Well, Leonardo Padura is a great writer and such understands how to use words very judiciously.

  “There isn’t a political project in Cuba that could oppose the government, the dissident movement itself is divided and has been deeply penetrated by Cuban intelligence.”

  But is he being honest or accurate to say that the political repression is less and that therefore political change is coming?

  During the CELAC conference, over 1000 dissidents were arrested, many were harassed and beaten, their homes set upon by repudiation mobs. Does Padura really believe that is indicative of an improving political scene in Cuba?

  The Castro regime arrested over 23 dissidents from the Cuban Patriotic Union (UNPACU) on Monday, February 17th, as they tried to gather for a regional meeting of the organization in the province of Villa Clara.

  Among those arrested was Sakharov Prize winner, Guillermo Farinas, who was savagely beaten and held in a freezing cell. Farinas suffered two broken ribs from the beating.

  http://www.diariodecuba.com/derechos-humanos/1392715438_7195.html

  Padura claims his Mario Conde novels contained “fairly strong criticisms”. Really? I’ve read all of those novels, and enjoyed them, but they are rather mild and circumspect in the critiques they offer. The subjects of his criticism are corrupt minor officials who betray the revolution (always a safe target) & complaints about food shortages (and yet Conde & his friends manage, heroically and in stoic Cuban style, to scrounge up enough for a good meal every now and then). Once there was even a cautiously critical comment against the past government persecution of homosexuals during the grey decade, errors which the Cuban leadership had apologized for by the time Padura wrote. All pretty tame stuff, really.

  To point to what is happening in Venezuela, and then to claim that it can’t happen in Cuba because conditions are better there, is a grotesque irony. The people in Venezuela are protesting against the Maduro government which they claim is too closely affiliated with Cuba, and that the pro-government vigilante groups, the “colectivos” were trained by Cuban agents.

  I don’t think that Havana’s association with the violence currently unleashed by the government of Venezuela makes Cuba a better or more legitimate socialist state. Quite the opposite, in fact. Perhaps there are no large protests in Cuba because the police state is far more entrenched and the people have little hope of changing their predicament?

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