Interview with Miguel Barnet 

Transcribed from the radio program

“Night Moves”

By Edmundo García

1210 AM, Monday to Friday, 9 to 10 p.m.

Miami

 

September 2007

 

A CubaNews translation by Ana Portela.
Edited by Walter Lippmann. Spanish original:
http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs1700-e.html

Miguel Barnet Lanza was born in Havana, Cuba, on January 28, 1940. He is a Cuban writer and ethnologist. He is known mostly for his novel-testimony Biografía de un cimarrón (1966). He is one of the Cuban writers with greater international renown and his work has been translated into several languages. In 1994 he obtained the Cuban National Award of Literature. 

As an ethnologist he has specialized in Afro-Cuban culture. He gathered several oral narrations in Akeké y la Jutía (1978). He has also studied Santeria and other aspects of black culture in Cuba. 

His poetry is in a conversational style as well as with frequent use of Afro-Cuban mythology. His narratives, primarily in his Biografía de un cimarrón are based on oral stories of an old cimarrón (runaway slave) slave, Esteban Montejo. Other novels have been widely distributed: such is the case of Gallego and Canción de Rachel, both adapted to films (the second with the title of La bella del Alhambra). 

In 1994 he founded the Fernando Ortiz foundation of which he is the president. Since 1999 he directs the Cuban journal of anthropology, Catauro. In 2006 he obtained the Juan Rulfo award in the category of stories for his book "Fátima o el parque de la fraternidad", which tells the life of a transvestite in Havana. 

Among his most important works are his novels Biografía de un cimarrón (1966), Canción de Rachel (1969), Gallego (1983), La vida real (1986), Oficio de ángel (1989); his poetry with La piedra fina y el pavo real (1963), Isla de güijes (1964), La sagrada familia (1967), Orikis y otros poemas (1980), Carta de noche (1982), an anthology Viendo mi vida pasar (1987), Mapa del tiempo (1989), Poemas chinos (1993), Con pies de gato (anthology,1993), Actas del final (2000). Among his essays and ethnology are Akeké y la Jutía. Fábulas cubanas, Cultos Afrocubanos. La Regla de Ocha. La Regla de Palo Monte (1995), La fuente viva (1998),  

Symbols:

EG. Edmundo García.         

MB. Miguel Barnet.     

 

EG. Friends, very good evenings; we are in Montreal Canada taking part in the LASA event (Latin American Studies Association) and with us now is the Cuban poet, writer and anthropologist, Miguel Barnet with whom we are going to share this program for the public of southern Florida. Miguel, good evening and thank you very much for agreeing to this interview. 

 

MB. No, no; it is my pleasure and thank you.

 

EG. First, can you tell us your impressions of this LASA event being held in Montreal and, if you want, you can tell us why the Cuban delegation could not participate in the two previous events in the United States. What are your opinions?

 

MB. Well, I have participated in many LASA events. The first time was in '77 where I took part with many important and people who cared for Cuba; with Lourdes Casals, the historian Manuel Moreno Fraginal and other persons. It was my first trip to the United States after the revolution so my thanks go to LASA for being able to return to the United States. I lived there for a long time when I was at the Guggenheim* but, for almost 4 years, I have not been granted a visa. I don’t know, it seems I am an obstacle for something, I can’t imagine that it is for the stability of the country, because I don’t even like to kill an ant.

 

EG. Yes, you have never threatened national security, right?  

 

MB. In no way, I have not threatened any security or anyone. I have threatened some people but for personal questions… (laughter)

 

EG. Well, what do you think of the LASA organizers of taking the event out of the United States, primarily as an answer to the refusal to grant visas to Cuban academician delegations? 

 

MB. I think it was a correct and fair decision. I believe many people from the United States have come, friends and others not so friendly, close friends and people I don’t know but all have been agreeable, respectful the same as I to them. I like having Cubans come from all points of the globe, wherever they live because we Cubans must always be united, right? And not divided, not split apart. The fact that the event was held here, in this beautiful city, historical and ancient, is magnificent because it has given me the opportunity of knowing this city that I had never visited before. 

 

EG. What is you opinion on the relationship between Cuban and US scholars, historically?

 

MB. Historically, going way back there was a bridge, a great communication and I believe from Raúl Roa, Herminio Portel Vilá and other scholars … Dr. Rosario Rexach, all of them … there was a great communication that broke through that horrible wall that has been lifted between Cuba and the United States since this president has been in power.

 

EG. Miguel, you received news yesterday; even the Cuban delegation was very happy because it was announced that you had received an award in Chile, a prize that also previous winners were of acknowledged literary prestige. Tell me about this prize and how come you received it.

 

MB. See, Montreal has been a good step for me. As soon as I stepped off the plane they called me from Chile; I thought it was a call from Cuba because I am only called from Cuba. I thought my little dog may have had a problem or a family matter…

 

EG. Are you still the head of the chihuahua association of Cuba?

 

MB. Well, I am the honorary president of the Cuban society of chihuahuas.

 

EG. Is this a boutade or a frivolity ... to head an organization of chihuahuas when you are so many other things?

 

MB. Neither boutade nor frivolity.

 

EG. Then it was just to call attention?

 

MB. No, it is not to call attention. Those that call attention are my dogs because they are beautiful and high class because their phenotype has a pedigree… What’s wrong with that? 

 

EG. No, I just ask; I’m not going to pass judgment. Tell me about the award, Miguel.

 

MB. It is the José Donoso award**. José Donoso, as you know died years ago and then in Chile, in the city of Talca of the Talca University the award was set up for the life work of an author. Previously it was awarded to Ricardo Piglia, Beatriz Sarlo, to José Emilio Pacheco and Isabel Allende… 

             

EG. I believe that Galeano also received it.

 

MB. Well, I don’t know, I’m not sure but perhaps he has. I haven’t seen the list yet.

 

EG. Is it a prize won in a contest?

 

MB. No, I am 67 years old and don’t participate in contests, that is in bad taste. 

 

EG. But since it is common in Cuba to mention writers of 40 some odd years to be “young promises”...

 

MB. That is a boutade, but I do not participate in contests. This is the now of life. I was told and was surprised mostly because one has not participated in such an important prize. To receive this distinction is very stimulating.

 

EG. Although when it is the now of life one has to think of the almanac when receiving all those honors, regardless if is a worthy work.

 

MB. That really worries me because I would like to live 200 years.

 

EG. Miguel, I hadn’t seen you for 10 years. What is moves you most, the poet, the anthropologist, the novelist or the public man that you also are?

 

MB. Well, everything, forming a necessary balance to survive because, in fact, what I write most is poetry although I do my anthropological studies, I direct a journal called “Catauro” that is the magazine of the Fernando Ortiz Foundation that I formed 14 year ago. There we publish books, hold workshops, seminars about studying Cuban culture, Ibero American or Latin American culture. But I don’t know what is strongest in me because one day I wake up and write a poem but another day I write an article, another day I may have to go to the National Assembly and everything, something like that song… … “las penas que a mi me matan, son tantas que me atropellan y como de matarme tratan, se agolpan unas a otras y por eso no me matan” (the sorrows that kill me are so many and since they try to kill me, they get jumbled and that is why they can’t kill me)… so what I try to do is establish a balance and equilibrium.

 

EG. Where is that passionate narrator of the “Canción de Rachel”, “Biografía de un Cimarrón”, of “Gallego” and all the other works that appeared one after another, in a short period? Has the devil of the narrative abandoned you?

 

MB. What hasn’t left me is the devil….

 

EG. It’s just that you no longer write novels and you almost killed to write one…

 

MB. Yes, that’s true, I no longer write novels because I have many responsibilities… and a novel requires meditation. A novel is like sitting down with an Habano, as they say in Spain and to meditate and, what I do most is write poetry, chronicles and articles… direct the Fernando Ortiz Foundation and also, a bit te Cuban National Union of Artists and Writers, in which I am the first vice president and we are now preparing the seventh congress.

 

EG. That is what I wanted to talk to you about, about the preparation of the seventh congress…

 

MB. … I am frustrated because I haven’t written another novel since “Oficio de ángel”…

 

EG. Will another appear? After all, many years have gone by…

 

MB. Yes, many years, I don’t remember how many and wish I had the time to write a novel I have in mind about a Chinese family in Cuba, in the Chinese Barrio…I have a lot of material collected…

 

EG. Well Soledad Valdés has written about that…

 

MB. ¿Oh yes?, I haven’t read it.

 

EG. ¿Or simply you don’t want to read it?

 

MB. No, I have read her work but not that book. I didn’t know she had written about the Chinese. There are other Cuban writers who have written about the Chinese like Leonardo Padura, but I want to write a large novel about a Chinese family in Cuba, like that famous novel Barrio Chino.

 

EG. The Barrio Chino in Zanja street…

 

MB. …The one about the Chinaman Tang in the Barrio Chino was a novel that I liked very much written in Chinatown in the United States … Perhaps one day I will do it if I have time and health to take it on.

EG. You just mentioned Leonardo Padura who became prolific novelist in the past few years…

 

MB. Yes he is very hard working; he is very prolific; I think his novels are very interesting. He creates a detective, Mario Conde, and has written a novel on homosexuality and covers a broad scenario that is very interesting and I think that he is top rank.

 

 

EG. Talking about writers and rebel subjects, Pedro Luis Gutiérrez has written a group of books that border on the scandalous and bothers others ... What is your opinion on this kind of literature that some call dirty?

 

MB. It doesn’t bother me at all; I think it is greatly disturbing and he has been called the Cuban Bukwoski. Well, I have read Bukwoski and there are some points of contact but the texture he reveals in his literature is very rich, very realistic and that some people call dirty realism and people have the habit of putting labels and icons to the things… 

 

EG.  Do you like the books by Pedro Luis Gutiérrez?

 

MB. I do like them; I enjoy them very much; I think they are very realistic and reflect an aspect of Cuban reality that must be shown. I have just written something that won me the Juan Rulfo award. It is a long story, almost a novelette, “Fatima, la reina de la noche”… 

 

EG. Now I ask myself…

 

MB. … it has that tessitura because it is a monologue of a transvestite in Cuba that is a phenomenon that has recently risen with plenty of strength in Cuba. 

 

EG. But I ask myself, why did it take so long for Cuban literature to be free of so many hang ups to deal with subjects of reality? 

 

MB. Well, reality must be digested, one must deal with it in depth and it is not bad that it has taken time. Products today are more decanted. During the sixties or seventies I wouldn’t have written Fatima …understand that today – by the way, it is being taken to the theater in Cuba – but I believe that the mission of a writer is to open Pandora’s box… literature is not that romantic idea that Plato had of beauty for the beauty of education, educational. Literature is reflecting all the beauty and all the allegedly ugly that also is part of the esthetic category and I believe that, in that sense, Cubans, Cuban writers of my generation and the younger ones have known how to enter that very complex and so colorful world.  

 

EG. To say it somehow, Cuban literature has stripped itself of petty morals forever?

 

MB. I think that is so absolutely. Not only Cuban literature but also the studies on sexology, those of sociology. I believe that figures such as Mariela Castro Espín has opened many breaches in this sense. 

 

EG. I have asked the president of the Cuban National Assembly of Popular Power, Ricardo Alarcon, how, for the first time, a person who is not precisely of high Cuban officialdom talk of political issues, of the health of Fidel, of possible transformations. What is Mariela in Cuban reality, how does Miguel Barnet see her? I won’t tell you what Ricardo Alarcon told me in a very broad answer. I would like to know how Miguel Barnet sees the manner of participation of Mariela as an unofficial spokeswoman for Cuba in different forums? 

 

MB. I don’t know if it is official or not; I don’t know if she is a spokeswoman or not; I only know that she is a great scientists and we all know that she is the daughter of Raúl Castro and Vilma Espín and I believe she deserves, in fact, coming from such brave and decorous lineage, she deserves respect but, also, she carries a message of science to Cuba society. 

 

EG. The most critical of the Cuban process, although applauding this fact, do not forget that period that gave birth to UMAP (Military Aid for Production Units). I know that this has been broadly debated in Cuba. What consensus, if there is a consensus, is there between Cuban intellectuality looking back to that period of UMAP? 

                                             

MB. The UMAP period of 1964 has been looked on perhaps late, perhaps we delayed the exorcism of that period that was a negative period, a dark and black period and what I believe is that we always nee to find a balance. I believe that that film … “Calle Mayor” Bardem***, of that person who stands in front of the window and says ... the equilibrium …how important equilibrium is!…I think that now Cuban society is in a stage of equilibrium capable of seeing things with objectivity, calmly and in depth. I am happy that it is so, in these debates, in these crossed wars, in these crossed fires of email that has occurred in Cuba on the subject of the “gray quinquennia” that for some were seen with benevolence and for others – like for me – a black period… 

 

EG. You were a victim of that gray period for who knows how long, as it is called today, such as the case of Amuchástegui who says that it was a debate of ideas because, also, there was no official position, their were pure positions of heterodoxy or orthodoxy, but there was everything and you suffered this? 

 

MB. Yes, of course I suffered.

 

EG. And how is it that someone who suffered could decant and solve?, tell me, what did you suffer?

 

MB. Because of my love for Cuba and my confidence in my country, for my confidence in the Cuban revolution, for my deep belief in socialism; because of all this I resisted and here I am and yes, I suffered, but I don’t want to profit from it.

 

EG. And did you suffer much?… without being seen as a profit, an exhibition of wounds… 

                      

MB. Enough to have marked me but no a mark of bitterness, it did not leave bitterness, hate, because while this was happening I concentrated on my studies, I took refuge in literature, in poetry. Look, during that time I wrote “Canción de Rachel”, “Gallego”, I wrote “Claves por Rita Montaner”, many things. No? Cuba always saves me. 

 

EG. And you had protectors such as Nicolás Guillén or Alejo Carpentier?

 

MB. …  Cuba always saves me…

 

EG. During that period Guillén and Carpentier saved you?

 

MB. Well, Carpentier supported my work…

 

EG. Perhaps because of them you weren’t sent to UMAP?…

 

MB. No, there was no reason to be sent to UMAP, I was not a marginal person or …

 

EG. Others weren’t either and they went…

 

MB. Enough but I don’t believe anyone saved me or, perhaps I was saved by Eleguá…

 

EG. In your darkest nights did you ever think of abandoning Cuba, of leaving Cuba?

 

MB. You ask me such questions!… knowing me as you do you know that it has never crossed my mind and not because there is any merit in it, not because I can understand or justify many who left Cuba and…

 

EG. That was my next question.  How do you handle the relationship between those who left and those who stayed?

 

MB. I respect those who left because they were dissatisfied and felt cornered or sad … that was not your case because you were not cornered, nor sad. You were a face on Cuban television when you left… 

 

EG. … no, for two years I had no program… 

 

MB. Well, I don’t know, you had no program for two years perhaps for other reasons but everyone in Cuba remembers you and knows you.

 

EG. Well, that’s all well and good but it is true that I was out of television for two years, in other word, separated from my work that is what I knew how to do…

 

MB. Of course, it is just that you are very mischievous, very naughty…

 

EG. But that is also good…

 

MB. Yes, of course… but… all told you’re a bright boy and do well being like that…

 

EG. Miguel, lets go on to the projection of the Cuban Union of Writers and Artists (UNEAC) from this coming congress. The president of the organizing committee said that you were taking upon yourself the organization of the event…where is the Union of Writers and Artists going in the new times?

 

MB. Well the president of the organizing commission of this congress is a person that I admire and deeply respect and he is not joining, he is recuperating. I have had to assume a period of temporary president but I am, in fact, first vice president.

 

EG. Yes and you are not interested in such a large post, true?

 

MB. Yes, I am not interested in such a position and everyone knows it. I do not need it because, as you must understand, that requires a lot of work, more obligations; I have the Fernando Ortiz Foundation, I have my own work, my own invitations, my trips and this could limit my movements and I would like that during the years left for me to live I can move wherever I want, freely.

 

EG. In the midst of the debate … 

 

MB. But I want you to know that this seventh congress is going to be much more important than the sixth congress. The sixth congress occurred during what became known as “the special period” that I am not sure if we have completely surpassed or not. Some say we are surpassing it. I hope. But in this congress ideas have matured most, many subjects have been channeled in other directions, by other institutions like the Fernando Ortiz Foundation, the Juan Marinello Center, the Ministry of Culture and the debate is going to deal with very varied subjects because there are thirteen commissions created on a national level. For example: the Culture and Society Commission, the Economics of Culture Commission, the Commission of the Media, of the city and urbanism, of complaints… there are many commissions.

 

EG. Years ago I was a member of UNEAC and I remember, although it was not elitist, access to the organization was pretty difficult. Has it become a more representative organization, more massive?

 

MB. UNEAC is an elective organization. The most representative figures of art and literature are members. It is not a mass organization.

 

EG. The intellectuals who are outside and who were members of UNEAC, those who have not left the country …does the Union of Writers and Artists continue to acknowledge them as a part or are they excluded?

 

MB. Well, that depends. The intellectuals and artists, that is the case of many painters and musicians who live outside of Cuba, who pay UNEAC dues and visit Cuba frequently, are legitimate members of UNEAC.

 

EG. In other words if I was a member of UNEAC and began sending my dues and visiting Cuba frequently…

 

MB. You would have to ask the president of the Film, Radio and Television Institute.

 

EG. I would also have to ask the president of the United States because I would be violating the embargo…

 

MB. Ah, well, I don’t know what kind of dialogue you have with that Mister…

 

EG. No, No, none… Miguel talking about the debate going on in Cuba at the moment on the Internet, that has become something underhanded but very dynamic, there are declarations of some figures, of a former Cuban ambassador such as Soledad Cruz who at one time was a hard liner and now appears with a totally reformist thought. Is this a political position that begins to filter out ideas to see how they are digested? What happens with that political debate?

 

MB. I think we all have a right to speak…

 

EG. In other words, these positions are allowed?

           

MB. … and to debate. We are debating ideas and not persons and everyone has the right to express their ideas, if they are not lacerating that go to the destruction of a country, of a system. I respect all opinions. Of course, I reserve my opinion about some persons who give opinions and now have jumped on the cart of lewd Internet… Human beings have the right to change their opinion but those who were once hardliners during the 60s and 70s and that have now invented a sweetened history … I don’t believe them. But that is me, that is what I am.

 

EG. Miguel, in the National Assembly of which you are a member, through which municipality were you a delegate, from Trinidad or Guanabacoa?

 

MB. Why are you so knowledgeable?… you know all the answers...

 

EG. That is my work Miguel. And that is what I am paid to do.

 

MB. Well, listen; I am very proud to have been elected three times to the National Assembly of Popular Power by a large majority of votes. First from Trinidad, always from historical municipalities, from municipalities that have to do with the identity of the Cuban nation and now from Guanabacoa.

 

EG. Come on, let me ask you something. Is this election of yours related to your ancestors or your gods? I understand that you are a very religious persons in African subjects…

 

MB. No, I’m not religious. I am an agnostic...

 

EG. OK, well you also have said that you are an agnostic and believe in everything…

 

MB. Well, agnostics have to believe in everything to doubt everything.

 

EG. Well, lets move on to the intellectual debate in Cuba, or rather, the debate on Cuban transformations. Raúl Castro spoke both in the National Assembly as in the past July 26 celebrations, of reforms and structural changes. This is the first time in Cuba that the words structural changes are mentioned publicly.

 

MB. Well, I don’t know where these changes are going, I don’t know where but any change in Cuba and this I can tell you, is now being studied, debated throughout the Island. The 26th of July speech by Raúl Castro is being debated. Any change occurring in Cuba will be of a structural character and must be, I believe, to improve socialism. We are talking of the 21st century in Cuba; we do not want the savage capitalism, a neo liberal capitalism. We want to improve socialism.

 

EG. But it seems to me that you are betting on a dogmatic socialism like in the past, stagnant. In other words there is a stagnation of relations even with the grass roots of the people.

 

MB. Well, a more open socialism is being proposed, more flexible, more democratic and more revolutionary. Said in other words, more socialist.

 

EG. A study of property has been announced and it may open up as occurred during the 90s that was erased with the stroke of a pen. It seems that the paladares are coming back, licenses, that you can sell your house, your car. Do you think that is possible?

 

MB. I think a lot of things are possible…

 

EG. This question I ask you is personal because one day you said…

 

MB. Well they are questions that are directed to a … I am an intellectual! I am an artist!…

 

EG. Well you told me 10 years ago that you wanted to open a sweet shop for bitter persons… And I ask, you haven’t done so for limitations of opening private enterprises?

                             

MB. If I have the chance to open on I open it above all to offer pumpkin flan that is so delicious…

 

EG. To whom would you offer the pumpkin flan?

 

MB. Well, you know that I don’t have a very Christian view of life. I know I would only offer it to those people who have been true to their principles and their life…

 

EG. You said something important…

 

MB. … But I do we must be close to friends to know them well and place our silver salvers because one should also be close to the enemies. In that I am somewhat like the Godfather, my philosophy is a bit in the direction of the Godfather. 

 

EG. Miguel, you went from being seen as an intellectual, an anthropologist, like a poet and now those who have no love for you just see your political aspect, of your participation in the Cuban revolution. I ask myself: a writer, because you insist on being seen as a writer, should function as an organ and an organ does functions of an aura… 

 

MB. Look, I don’t insist on anything…let them see me however they want.

 

EG. But don’t you think that a writer should limit himself to do just that?

 

MB. Well, I think the main mission of a writer, of an anthropologist and of a poet is to write, but if that literature has been a production that has ancillary aspects that touch society and politics … well, I want it to be seen as such because I think I am purely a writer but I am also a writer with a political vocation and I am not ashamed of it, I am not ashamed of being a writer of the Cuban revolution.

 

EG. However, you have never claimed to be a Marxist or a Communist.

 

MB. No, No, because I am not a militant of any party.

 

EG. But you never professed being a Marxist or a communist. You had a revolutionary position but not as a Marxist or Communist.

 

MB. I am a Cuban writer who has always professed an integral, full and dialectical point of view of Cuban identity and respect all sources of Cuban identity. Then, since I belong to no party and since there is only one party and we have enough with that one … if there were two or three what would become of us!… Well, there is only one party and I have never been a militant but that does not mean that I am not a Marxist. From an anthropological point of view of history, I do believe that that historical view is historical materialism.

 

EG. What positive influence do you find in the possibility that Cubans who live outside of Cuba could – of course now we are forbidden due to US restrictions – of having a permanent contact with our culture, our country of origin? What would be a benefit for us and how can we receive feedback?

 

MB. I don’t know how you can live without feedback, I don’t understand it and it is very hard. I believe it is painful and dramatic and perhaps it is one of the reasons why it never entered my mind to leave Cuba because all my sources of inspiration, my bank of ideas and motivations are in Cuba. Then whatever happens, come hell or high water… I will always live in Cuba. 

 

EG. Do you find an increasingly normal relationship between the new generations of Cuba who live abroad?

 

MB. That is what I would want, my aspirations, my wishes. Well meaning Cubans, Cubans of good will and even Cubans who want to invest in Cuba.

 

EG. How would you view a Cuban family in the country to invest with a Cuban family from abroad?

 

MB. I would find it good, but of course, that does not depend on me, I do not make those decisions.

 

EG. Do you have family abroad?

 

MB. Yes I do.

 

EG. And would they help you with your café?

 

MB. This business about the cafeteria is a boutade. Don’t start picking radishes by its leaves...

 

EG. You are part of a generation that lived two important moments: the revolutionary era and later, during economic advantages of the 80s. But there is a generation, perhaps a majority in Cuba who did not live any of those two stages, who is born during the “special period” or a little before who only knew restrictions, blackout, limitations who have no memory of that profit at the beginning, nor the epic moments. How do you believe that the Cuban revolution will be able to transmit to then the philosophy that has maintained the revolution? How will these young persons, with no reference, who lived during the hardest time of all, how will they know?

 

MB. That has always happened. That is what history is about, in other processes. It has occurred in the whole world. In Europe it occurred during the Second World War. The people who did not live during the Second World War did not have these references.

 

EG. But Europe changed later…

 

MB. Yes it changed and gave birth to existentialism and other tendencies. I would want all Cubans to understand and to have that knowledge in some manner. Perhaps it is a duty of my generation and of the previous ones, to bring this message to the youth. I do believe that everything begins with love for the homeland although it may seem to be Wagnerian, love for the homeland, the one proclaimed by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes and Martí…Whoever feels love for their country and country is not only humanity, as Martí said, the home one lives in, the family we see every day, he referred to the homeland of humanistic values that is very important and I believe that the revolution has many respectable human values and believe that our most immediate mission, the most important, is to teach these values to the new generations.

 

EG. Miguel, as historian, what is your opinion of a revitalization after 40 years or more than 40 years of silence about a figure such as Eduardo Chibás?

 

MB. I always had Eduardo Chibás very much present. Do you know why?... because as a child I listened to the speeches of Eduardo Chibás and those rousing speeches, those of the speeches like barricades, that hour of  radio that I think was at 8 at night … my mother and father listened to them and once Chibás when I was a child, spoke of Antonio Guiteras and it was the first time I heard of the name of Antonio Guiteras Holmes and that is how I found out, researching him, more of an adolescent, with the triumph of the revolution who was Antonio Guiteras, that extraordinary figure, one of the most important in the political history of Cuba.

 

EG. 29 years old and he was already a minister…

 

MB. … One of the most important men in the history of Cuba, a man who tried to make radical changes and could not do so because of populism, of demography, because of the cowardice of Grau and all the entourage around him and since then I learned to respect Chibás when I learned well who Antonio Guiteras was and I took him as a model, as a paradigm of social struggles, of social reforms in the country. Then I was a Chibás sympathizer.

 

EG. How do you explain Cuban historiography that erased him for 40 years, what should we learn from that? And now he is reincorporated. What should we learn from both cases?

 

MB. Well, I don’t believe he was completely 

 

EG. Well, I learned a little about Chibás and those who followed later nothing…

 

MB. But Chibás has always been mentioned…

 

EG. But why wasn’t him given the place that he is now given?

           

MB. Because now is the centenary…

 

EG. And this sends a message or reinterpretation of history?… because I understand that there is also a search by Levi Marrero and Ramiro Guerra, on other issues, no?… even of Jorge Mañach trying to give him his rightful place. 

                                       

MB. I think they all have their place in the history of Cuba and it should be respected, as the place of Chibás should be respected and, of course, the place of Antonio Guiteras. The very important place occupied by Fidel Castro should be respected in the history of Cuba and whoever does not have that view, and who does not have that respect and who want to come over to cut heads off … those are very mistaken because it is not the sentiment of the people of Cuba. 

 

EG. Why aren’t you a militant of the Cuban Communist Party and why are there no other parties… if they admitted others like the ortodoxos, would you be a member? 

 

MB. I don’t think so; that party had is time and I do like it very much…

 

EG. Does it send a message… that was a boutade of mine… send a message of transformation of thought on the reinsertion of Chibás? 

 

MB. I believe so, it sends a message of reintegration, as you have said, a message of recognition of the role played by some figures who were not socialists, who were reformists and who contributed to the Cuba cultural conscience, that which Fernando Ortiz called cubanía that is the condition of being Cuban. 

 

EG. Could this happen with living artists and intellectuals who do not live in Cuba but have an important work? I am thinking, perhaps, of some dead ones. Perhaps Cabrera Infante but perhaps some that are alive such as Paquito Rivera, in other words, could Cuba begin to open the fan, an image, aside from political ideologies, regarding the work of the creators?

 

MB. I think so, if they are not recalcitrant, that are not destructive positions.

 

EG. But could there be an analysis of the creative work?

 

MB. I believe so, it is worthwhile. In fact, Cuba literature admits the presence of many writers who are not in Cuba, writers who do not live in Cuba. There is a dossier in “La Gaceta de Cuba”, in the “Unión” magazine of personalities who do not live in Cuba and (…) and who have worked for more than 20 years to rescue those names. 

 

EG. Miguel, there is a subject and I am not asking you as a deputy or anything else but simple as an observer of Cuban reality. There are signs of economic transformations and structural changes by Raúl Castro and a debate appears, however, there is an article by Fidel yesterday where he talks of supra-revolutionaries where he criticizes some forms that people interpret as changes in the economic projection. Is there a debate in Cuban direction about this? 

 

MB. I can’t speak about this because I don’t know anything about it. I am here in Montreal and haven’t even read the article.

 

EG. Do you feel that Raúl Castro is ruling in Cuba and that, right now, Raúl Castro is the one governing?

 

MB. I think today that Raúl Castro governs, that Fidel governs, that the Party governs. No one man governs … and don’t ask those questions because you so I am an artist and am not within that framework and I don’t know. 

 

EG. To conclude lets go to the writers… I am going to mention writers who were close to you for one reason or another. You  answer with a comment. It is like brushstrokes… Nicolás Guillén.

                                

MB. Nicolás Guillén, deep, Caribbean writer; a man with a full social conscience and one of the greatest poets Cuban has had in all time.

 

EG. Dulce María Loinaz.

 

MB. From her voluntary self-exclusion she was like a bird who flew all around the world.

 

EG. Reinaldo Arenas.   

 

MB. A great sadness, personally, a writer of great fantasy, great imagination but very disturbed, too much.

 

EG. Antón Arrufat.

 

MB. A diaphanous man, very lucid, nothing cold. Everything that is satirical in him is due to his timidity but a brilliant essayist and I believe that he is a necessary writer.

 

EG. Pablo Armando Fernández.

 

MB. If he were a bird he would have thousands of wings.

 

EG. Lisandro Otero.

 

MB. An interesting and controversial man. One of the great Cuban novelists. A man plagued by contradictions with an important work. I think if we were to ask for a summary of Cuban novelistic writing, for me he is the most important novelist.

 

EG. Zoe Valdés.

 

MB. Why do you ask me about Zoe Valdés if you know my opinion of her?

 

EG. Just to get a comment…

 

MB. No, I don’t want to upset anyone.

 

EG. Carlos Victoria.

 

MB. I haven’t read his work, unfortunately but they have talked well of him. I think he is a good writer; I’d like to read his work because I haven’t been able to.

 

EG. Miguel Barnet.

 

MB. A fabulist, a survivor.

 

EG. Thank you very much Miguel. And now to conclude a comforting phrase for the Cubans outside and inside, equally for all and that serves as the conclusion of the interview…

 

MB. Well, I believe that our salvation, both who are in the Island and abroad is to re-think Martí and above all to love Cuba, above all else, above all our contradictions, our differences, to love Cuba. If you love Cuba half of the way is already saved. 

 

EG. Miguel, thank you for the interview … those famous handkerchiefs you used … you don’t like them now … I don’t see you wearing one … 

 

MB. It just isn’t too cold but I brought one. Now what I have is a collection of ties that I have been given…

 

EG. Thank you very much, Miguel.

 

Notes

 

* The Guggenheim museum in New York is the first created by the Salomon R. Guggenheim foundation, dedicated to modern art. It was founded in 1937 in the Upper East Side. It is one of the most recognized museums of the foundation and often simply called “The Guggenheim”.

 

At first it was considered a museum of non-objective art and was founded to exhibit vanguard art of early vanguard artists such as Kandinsky and Mondrian.

 

In 1959 it was moved to its current location (on the corner of 89th street and Fifth Avenue, in front of Central Park. It was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

 

** Juan Donoso Award. This prize organized by the Talca University and sponsored by Santander Santiago will be awarded by an international jury for the work of outstanding writer of Ibero American literature within the framework of the Talca Book Festival in Región del Maule, Chile.

 

                                                                                               
The Talca Book Fair has become one of the most important cultural events in Región del Maule. This activity gathers a great part of national and international literary work.

It includes publishing houses, booksellers, book professionals, writers, scholars and literary critics in activities related to the exhibition of texts, presentations, literary meetings and contests. It also develops a broad program of cultural activities.

 

 

*** Calle Mayor, a film by Spanish director, Juan Antonio Bardem.  In the spring of 1956 the inhabitants of Logroño found their routine lives changed with the filming of "Calle Mayor".

 

It was an event during the dark years of Logroño in the Franco regime. The Mayor plaza and Portales Street became a natural scenario to shoot the film by J. A. Bardem.

 

It obtained the “Grand prize of International Critics” in the XVII Venice Film Festival. It is the story of a country girl, victim of a joke of hooligan. The girl sees the years die and fades inside her house.

 

 Portales street, the Rúa Vieja and the Plaza de los Héroes del Alcázar are the natural scenarios. The protagonists, José Suárez and Betsy Blair and the Logroño inhabitants are the extras . The director Juan Antonio Bardem, who was jailed after a student protest on February 9, 1956, premiered the film precisely that same year.

 

Texto revisado y aprobado por la dirección de “La Noche se Mueve”

Miami, Diciembre 2007.