Dmitri Prieto’s Diary

Cuba’s Silvio Rodriguez and Anarchism

In a previous post, I wrote about the blog of Cuban troubadour Silvio Rodríguez. At that time I celebrated his anti-bureaucratic commitment, since what particularly appealed to me was his phrase “Libya deserves something better than Qaddafi.”

The End of Two Cuban Cats and a Few Rabbits

I was recently on my way to work walking along the streets of Old Havana, the ones between the Loma del Angel and Avenida del Puerto. On the pavement in front of me I spotted a small black cat laying into a ball, as cats often do when they sleep.

OMNI Asks for Help

The non-government Cuban art project OMNI-Zona Franca has issued a call for solidary assistance. The group has circulated an email asking for participation, grass roots assistance, financial support and friendship for the holding of this year’s Festival Poesia Sin Fin (Endless poetry festival).

One Less Lie

“USSR: four letters, four lies,” said Cornelius Castoriadis. This year Russia was deprived of a word that was also a part of its revolutionary heritage, and most certainly a lie. The Russian “Militia” was renamed in accordance to what it has been all along: “The police.”

Missing Shakira

The Latin Recording Academy in the USA elected Shakira as the most significant figure in the music industry in 2011. I couldn’t help thinking back to the early songs of that daughter of a country at war.

A Cuban Imprint on Cornelius Castoriadis’s Thinking?

He suggested making a critique of capitalism and modernity beyond the classical propositions of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud. He included in his analysis a decided questioning of the so-called “real socialism,” bitterly re-interpreting the abbreviation “USSR” as “four letters, four lies.”