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Jose Quiroga Homosexualities in the Tropic of Revolutio n • CRYSTA L CUBA Few countries in Latin America have been as swamped as Cuba by so many who have chronicled the island to itself and to the world: sociologists , economists, political scientists , tourists, filmmakers, critics , histori ans . Since 1959 the Cuban Revolution and all of its aspects have been written about , analyzed , observed . A n ocea n o f pape r circumnavigate s th e island, an d th e revolutio n beckon s thos e armie s o f th e lette r relentlessly , with sometime s dramati c panache. "Come t o Cuba , come to se e what w e have done"—so goes the inscription, popular in tourist brochures, naming a revolutionary spectacle , a pride in achievements that may not, under an y circumstances, be left unrecorded. But this invitation also signals a mode, a construction, a network of desires, a spectacle that by no means started i n 1959. On the contrary, at some level Cuban history can be read in all of its messy complexity as an utterance, a disputation that seeks the complicity of others. Thus, the firs t socialis t republi c i n Lati n America wa s establishe d on a n islan d whos e particula r relationshi p t o th e Unite d State s alway s * 13 3 9 134 • Jose Quiroga played on the libido, articulated by means of tropical cliches of paradise and sex. From th e playgroun d o f wealth y Nort h American s seekin g fu n an d frolic in their very own backyard, Cuba, after 195 9 took upon itself a much wider representation—tha t o f freedo m fro m imperia l machination s o f socialism without ideology but with a rhythmic beat and cadence.1 Befor e and after, Cuba has always been linked to the outside world by the threads of desire. What I want to explore—and ultimately link to the Cuban social theater, is the one issue that has placed itself at the center of Cuban cultural discourse: th e polemica l relationshi p o f homosexualit y t o revolutionar y culture. Surveyin g th e literatur e sinc e th e earl y 1960s , on e realize s tha t homosexuality has been at the center of the social process—a process that articulated a critique of all things Cuban in terms of class, culture, and gender but that, when confronted wit h the issue of sexuality, confined al l difference (mainly, homosexuality) to the realm of the private, defining homosexual subjects as disloyal to the brotherhood and solidarity entailed by the revolution, and as suspicious or perverse.2 With thi s contex t i n mind , ther e ar e tw o point s o f departur e fo r thi s revisitation o n the issue of homosexuality i n Cuba. The first i s the recen t film Fresa y chocolate, by Tomas Gutierrez Alea, based on Senel Paz's short story "E l lobo, el bosque y e l hombre nuevo. " By officially sanctionin g a film that zeroes in on one of the more polemical aspects of the revolution, one that gives credence to most of its "enemies" and puts its past apologists in a sort o f no-man's-land , th e Cuba n governmen t ha s sough t t o presen t openly a situation that, on the one hand, plays on the affective subversio n of th e forbidden bu t that , o n th e other , falls behin d th e socia l realities of the moment . Tha t Toma s Gutierre z Alea , th e world-fame d directo r o f Memorias del subdesarrolio, decide d to film Fresa y chocolate is not without significance. In both, the central character is meant to stand for something at a given moment in revolutionary history: in Memorias, th e intellectual i s literall y throw n ou t o f hi s petit-bourgeoi s worl d an d force d t o ponder his alienation when faced wit h the growing class consciousness of the population; in Fresa, the homosexual mourns the cultural myopia of the Cuban bureaucracy . Wherea s th e intellectua l i n th e forme r fil m walk s through the streets of Havana like a parasite who merely recirculates him self i n...

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