Editing Reinaldo Arenas

{{short description|Cuban writer}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Reinaldo Arenas
| caption = Reinaldo Arenas in 1986
| pseudonym = 
| birth_name = Reinaldo Arenas Fuentes 
| birth_date = July 16, 1943<ref name="New Yorker">{{cite magazine |url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-literature-of-uprootedness-an-interview-with-reinaldo-arenas |title=The Literature of Uprootedness: An Interview with Reinaldo Arenas |author=Ann Tashi Slater |date=December 5, 2013 |magazine=[[The New Yorker]] |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150106060211/https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-literature-of-uprootedness-an-interview-with-reinaldo-arenas |archive-date=January 6, 2015}}</ref><ref name="dies" />
| birth_place = [[Aguas Claras]], [[Holguín Province]], Cuba<ref name="dies" />
| death_date = {{death date and age|1990|12|7|1943|7|16}}<ref name="dies" /><ref name="matters" />
| death_place = [[Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan|Hell's Kitchen]], New York, United States
| occupation = Writer
| period = 1966–1990
| genre = [[poetry]], [[novel]], [[drama]]
| subject = 
| movement = 
| notableworks = ''[[Pentagonia]]''<br />''[[Before Night Falls]]''
| spouse = 
| partner = 
| children = 
| relatives = 
| awards = 
| signature = 
| website = 
| image =
}}

'''Reinaldo Arenas''' (July 16, 1943 – December 7, 1990)<ref name="New Yorker" /> was a Cuban [[poet]], [[novelist]], and [[playwright]] who is known as a vocal critic of [[Fidel Castro]], the [[Cuban Revolution]], and the [[Cuban government]]. His memoir of the [[Cuban dissident movement]] and of being a [[political prisoner]], ''Before Night Falls'', was dictated after his escape to the [[United States]] during the 1980 [[Mariel boatlift]] and published posthumously. Arenas, who was dying of [[AIDS]], killed himself in 1990.<ref name="post">{{cite news |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/books/1993/11/07/last-days-of-reinaldo-arenas/82376cee-472f-43e7-b1fb-f4047de4811e/ |title=Last Days of Reinaldo Arenas |last=Manrique |first=Jaime |date=November 7, 1993 |newspaper=The Washington Post |access-date=August 14, 2023}}</ref>

== Life ==
Arenas was born in the countryside of Newport Beach, [[Aguas Claras]], [[Holguín Province]], [[Cuba]], and later moved to the city of [[Holguín]] as a teenager. He was six years old when he started school, attending Rural School 91 in Perronales County. There, his interest in boys flourished. He later wrote about his [[masturbation|sexual exploration with himself]]. He talked openly of how the first times he had [[straight sex]], while incomplete, was with his cousin, Dulce Maria. He also shared that his first act of [[gay sex]] was at 8 with his cousin Orlando, who was 12. Arenas stated, "In the country, sexual energy generally overcomes all prejudice, repression, and punishment.... Physical desire overpowers whatever feelings of machismo our fathers take upon themselves to instill in us."<ref>{{cite thesis |title=The Politics of Sensations: Body and Texture in Contemporary Cinema and Literature (Argentina - Cuba - Ireland) |publisher=Louisiana State University |url=https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2549&context=gradschool_dissertations |date=2016 |author=Guillermo Abel Severiche |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211212022232/https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2549&context=gradschool_dissertations |archive-date=December 12, 2021}}</ref>

After moving to Holguín when he was a teen, Arenas got a job at a guava paste factory. When conditions in the city started to get worse, around 1958, he decided that he wanted to join the guerillas (Castro and his movement). When he was 14, he walked to Velasco, where he met Cuco Sánchez, who took him to the pro-Soviet [[26th of July Movement|Cuban guerrilla]] headquarters in the [[Sierra Gibara]]. A guerilla commander, Eddy Suñol, interviewed Arenas and said, "We have plenty of guerrillas; what we need is weapons."<ref name="night">{{cite web |url=https://mg.co.za/friday/2020-10-22-before-night-falls-rearenas-breaks-down-in-fidel-castros-cuba/ |title='Before Night Falls': Reinaldo Arenas breaks down (in) Fidel Castro's Cuba |last=Zvomuya |first=Percy |date=October 22, 2020 |website=Mail & Guardian |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201024075725/https://mg.co.za/friday/2020-10-22-before-night-falls-rearenas-breaks-down-in-fidel-castros-cuba/ |archive-date=October 24, 2020}}</ref>

After ten days with the guerilla, Arenas went back to Holguín with the intention of killing a guard and taking his weapon. When he made it back to the city, he went home to see his grandparents who were not so happy to see him. Because he made the mistake of leaving a note saying that he was going to join the guerillas, the women who lived with his grandparents spread the news like wildfire. [[Fulgencio Batista]]'s [[secret police]], the [[Bureau for the Repression of Communist Activities]], were on the lookout for him. His brief trip home made him realize that he could not stay and so he trekked back to Velasco to the rebel encampment. It now had to accept him.<ref name="night" />

When he was 16, he was awarded a scholarship at La Pantoja, the Batista military camp that had been converted into a [[polytechnic institute]]. There, one of the most important courses was on [[Marxist–Leninism]]. Students had to master ''Manual of the [[Soviet Academy of Sciences]]'', ''Manual of Political Economy'' by Pyotr Ivanovich Nikitin, and ''Foundations of Socialism in Cuba'' by [[Blas Roca Calderio]]. Arenas graduated as an agricultural accountant but later described his schooling as "communist [[indoctrination]]."{{citation needed|date=July 2021}}

The first time that Arenas was in [[Havana]] was in 1960. He returned later when he enrolled in a planning course at the [[University of Havana]] and reported to the ''[[Hotel Nacional de Cuba]]''. While in the program, he worked for the [[Instituto Nacional de Reforma Agraria|National Institute for Agrarian Reform]]. It was not until around 1963 that Arenas started to live his life as a gay man, but even then, it was still a life in extreme secrecy. He feared ending up in one of the [[Military Units to Aid Production]], which were [[concentration camps]] for [[LGBT]] people, [[Christians]], and suspected members of the [[Cuban dissident movement]]. A relationship with a man named Miguel, who was later arrested and taken to a UMAP camp, was the beginning of Arenas's life of being known as a gay man by the Cuban [[Committees for the Defense of the Revolution]].

Throughout his life, Arenas became friends with and had relationships with many gay men. He went so far as to say that at one point, he had had sex with at least 5,000 men.<ref name="night" /> He watched as various friends and acquaintances pledged their allegiance to the regime in exchange for safety. They became informers for the government and reported other men, often former friends or relations. The intention was to find gay and bisexual men and either prosecute and jail them or turn them into other informers. The reward for co-operating with the regime was having life being spared. Those who became informers, however, often had to participate in public and very humiliating [[acts of repudiation]] that publicly denounced their anti-regime beliefs or their homosexuality.

Arenas watched that happen with Herberto Padilla, who had written a book that was critical of the [[Cuban Revolution]] to an official competition. Padilla was arrested in 1971, and after 30 days in a cell, he decided to speak. Various Cuban intellectuals were invited by the [[Dirección de Inteligencia|state security]] to hear what he had to say. Padilla stood in front of everyone and apologized for everything that he had done. He painted himself as a coward and a traitor, apologized for his previous work, and threw blame on himself. He publicly denounced his friends and his wife and said that they had [[counterrevolutionary]] attitudes. Those whom he named were forced to go to the microphone, accept blame for their actions, and say that they were traitors as well. {{citation needed|date=July 2021}}

In 1963, he moved to [[Havana]] to enroll in the School of Planification and later in the Faculty of Letters at the [[Universidad de La Habana]], where he studied philosophy and literature without completing a degree. The following year, he began working at the [[National Library José Martí]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.cubacenter.org/media/arenas.html |title=Reinaldo Arenas |website=Cuba Center |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060215050518/http://www.cubacenter.org/media/arenas.html |archive-date=February 15, 2006}}</ref><ref name="dies" /> During his time working for the National Institute for Agrarian Reform, he spent much time at the National Library. After writing a short story and presenting it to a committee, he received a telegram that it was interested in talking to him. When he went, he met María Teresa Freye de Andrade, the director of the National Library. She orchestrated Arenas's move from the institute to the library. He then became employed there. After María Teresa lost her job and was replaced by Castro's police, Captain Sidroc Ramos, Arenas decided the library was not where he wanted to be. {{citation needed|date=July 2021}} It was around then that his talent was noticed, and he received a literary award for his novel, ''Singing from the Well'', at the Cirilo Villaverde National Competition, which was held by the [[National Union of Cuban Writers and Artists]].

His ''El mundo alucinante'' (''This Hallucinatory World'', published in the US as ''The Ill-Fated Peregrinations of Fray Servando'') was awarded "first Honorable Mention" in 1966. However, as the judges could find no better entry and they refused to award it to Arenas, no First Prize was awarded that year. His writings and openly gay life were by 1967 bringing him into conflict with the [[communist]] government. He left the library and became an editor for the Cuban Book Institute until 1968. From 1968 to 1974, he was a journalist and editor for the literary magazine ''La Gaceta de Cuba''.

In 1974, he was sent to prison after being charged and convicted of "ideological deviation" and for publishing abroad without official consent.<ref name="dies" /><ref name="matters">{{cite web |url=https://www.americasquarterly.org/article/why-reinaldo-arenas-still-matters-for-cubas-lgbt-community/ |title=Why Reinaldo Arenas Still Matters for Cuba's LGBT Community |last=O'Boyle |first=Brendan |date=December 7, 2016 |website=America's Quarterly |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728164933/https://www.americasquarterly.org/article/why-reinaldo-arenas-still-matters-for-cubas-lgbt-community/ |archive-date=July 28, 2020}}</ref> He escaped the prison and tried to leave Cuba by launching himself from the shore on a tire inner tube, but he was rearrested near [[Parque Lenin|Lenin Park]] and imprisoned at the notorious [[Castillo de los Tres Reyes Del Morro)|El Morro Castle]] alongside murderers and rapists.<ref name="night" /> He survived by helping the inmates to write letters to wives and lovers. He collected enough paper that way to continue his writing. However, his attempts to smuggle his work out of prison were discovered, and he was severely punished. Threatened with death, he was forced to renounce his work and was released in 1976.<ref name="matters" /><ref>{{cite web |url=http://myweb.lsbu.ac.uk/stafflag/reinaldoarenas.html |title=Reinaldo Arenas |website=The Knitting Circle: Literature |access-date=August 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040627090109/http://myweb.lsbu.ac.uk/stafflag/reinaldoarenas.html |archive-date=June 27, 2004}}</ref>

In 1980, as part of the [[Mariel Boatlift]], he fled to the [[United States]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://libweb.princeton.edu/libraries/firestone/rbsc/aids/arenas.html |title=Reinaldo Arenas Papers |publisher=Princeton Libraries |access-date=August 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080512073242/http://libweb.princeton.edu/libraries/firestone/rbsc/aids/arenas.html |archive-date=May 12, 2008}}</ref> He came on the ''San Lázaro'', a boat captained by the Cuban émigré Roberto Agüero.

== Death ==
In 1987, Arenas was diagnosed with [[AIDS]]<ref name="New Yorker" /> but continued to write and speak out against the [[Cuban government]]. He mentored many [[Cuban exile]] writers, including John O'Donnell-Rosales. Arenas died on December 7, 1990, in [[New York City]].<ref name="post" /><ref name="dies">{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/09/obituaries/reinaldo-arenas-47-writer-who-fled-cuba-dies.html |title=Reinaldo Arenas, 47, Writer Who Fled Cuba, Dies |last=McDowell |first=Edwin |date=December 9, 1990 |website=The New York Times |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090831113933/https://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/09/obituaries/reinaldo-arenas-47-writer-who-fled-cuba-dies.html |archive-date=August 31, 2009}}</ref>  The cause of death was [[suicide]].<ref name="post" />

In 2012, Arenas was inducted into the [[Legacy Walk]], an outdoor public display that celebrates LGBT history and people.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.legacyprojectchicago.org/2012_INDUCTEES.html |title=2012 Inductees |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120614154640/http://www.legacyprojectchicago.org/2012_INDUCTEES.html |archive-date=June 14, 2012 |access-date=August 11, 2021}}</ref> 
== Writings ==
Despite his short life and the hardships that were imposed during his imprisonment, Arenas produced a significant body of work. In addition to significant poetic efforts ("El Central", "Leprosorio"), his ''[[Pentagonia]]'' is a set of five novels that comprise a "secret history" of post-revolutionary Cuba. It includes ''Singing from the Well'' (in Spanish also titled "Celestino before Dawn"),<ref name="New Yorker" /> ''[[Farewell to the Sea]]'' (whose literal translation is "The Sea Once More"),<ref name="dies" /> ''[[Palace of the White Skunks]]'', the [[Rabelais]]ian ''Color of Summer'', and ''The Assault''. In those novels, his style ranges from a stark realist narrative and high modernist experimental prose to absurd satiric humor. His second novel, ''Hallucinations'' ("El Mundo Alucinante"), rewrites the story of the colonial dissident priest [[Servando Teresa de Mier|Fray Servando Teresa de Mier]].

In interviews, his autobiography, and some of his fiction work, Arenas draws explicit connections between his own life experience and the identities and fates of his protagonists. As is evident and as critics such as Francisco Soto have pointed out, the "child narrator" in "Celestino," Fortunato in "The Palace...," Hector in "Farewell..," and the triply named "Gabriel/Reinaldo/Gloomy Skunk" character in "Color" appear to live progressive stages of a continuous life story that is also linked to Arenas's.<ref>{{cite book |last=Soto |first=Francisco |title=Reinaldo Arenas |publisher=Twayne Publishers  |location=London |date=1998 |isbn=0805745548}}</ref> 

In turn, Arenas consistently links his individual narrated life to the historical experience of a generation of Cubans. A constant theme in his novels and other writing is the condemnation of the Castro government, but Arenas also critiques the [[Catholic Church]] and American culture and politics. He also critiques a series of literary personalities in Havana and internationally, particularly those who he believed had betrayed him and suppressed his work ([[Severo Sarduy]] and [[Ángel Rama]] are notable examples). His "Thirty truculent Tongue-Twisters," which he claimed to have circulated in Havana and were reprinted in "The Color of Summer," mock everyone from personal friends, who he suggests may have spied on him, to figures such as Nicolás Guillén, Alejo Carpentier, Miguel Barnet, Sarduy, and of course Castro himself.

His autobiography ''[[Before Night Falls]]'' was on the ''[[New York Times]]'' list of the ten best books of the year in 1993.<ref name="New Yorker" /> In 2000, the work was [[Before Night Falls (film)|made into a film]], directed by [[Julian Schnabel]] in which Arenas was played by [[Javier Bardem]].<ref name="New Yorker" /> An opera based on the autobiography with libretto and music by the [[Cuban-American]] composer [[Jorge Martín (composer)|Jorge Martín]] premiered at the [[Fort Worth Opera]] on May 29, 2010, with baritone [[Wes Mason]] singing the role of Arenas.

The Reinaldo Arenas Papers are held at Princeton University Library. "The collection consists of personal and working papers of Reinaldo Arenas" and includes typescript and typescript drafts, essays, interviews, newspaper clippings, correspondence, and other documents.<ref>{{cite web |website=Princeton University Library |url=https://rbsc.princeton.edu/collections/reinaldo-arenas-papers |title=Reinaldo Arenas Papers |access-date=December 11, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230512003215/https://library.princeton.edu/special-collections/collections/reinaldo-arenas-papers |archive-date=May 12, 2023}}</ref>

== Notable works ==
* ''El mundo alucinante'' (1966) {{ISBN|978-84-8310-775-1}}, {{OCLC|421023}}; Scholarly edition by Enrico Mario Santí; English translation ''Hallucinations'' (2001 reissue) {{ISBN|978-0-14-200019-9}}.
* ''Cantando en el pozo'' (1982) (originally published as ''Celestino antes del alba'' (1967)) English translation  ''Singing from the Well''  (1987) {{ISBN|978-0-14-009444-2}}.
* ''El palacio de las blanquisimas mofetas''  (1982) English translation  ''The Palace of the White Skunks'' (1990) {{ISBN|978-0-14-009792-4}}.
* ''Otra vez el mar'' (1982) English translation  ''Farewell to the Sea'' (1987) {{ISBN|978-0-14-006636-4}}.
* ''El color del verano''  (1982) English translation  ''The Color of Summer'' (1990) {{ISBN|978-0-14-015719-2}}.
* ''El Asalto'' (1990) English translation  ''The Assault'' (1992) {{ISBN|978-0-14-015718-5}}.
* ''El portero'' (1987) English translation  ''The Doorman'' (1991) {{ISBN|978-0-8021-3405-9}}.
* ''Antes que anochezca'' (1992) English translation  ''Before Night Falls'' (1993) {{ISBN|978-0-14-015765-9}}.
* ''Mona and Other Tales'' (2001) {{ISBN|978-0-375-72730-6}} This is an English translation of a collection of short stories originally published in Spanish in Spain between 1995 and 2001
* ''Con los ojos cerrados'' (1972).
* ''La vieja Rosa'' (1980), English Translation ''Old Rosa'' (1989) {{ISBN|978-0-8021-3406-6}}.
* ''El central'' (1981), {{ISBN|978-0-380-86934-3}}.
* ''Termina el desfile'' (1981).
* ''Arturo, la estrella más brillante'' (1984).
* ''Cinco obras de teatro bajo el título Persecución'' (1986).
* ''Necesidad de libertad'' (1986).
* ''La Loma del Angel'' (1987), English Translation ''Graveyard of the Angels'' (1987) {{ISBN|978-0-380-75075-7}}.
* ''Voluntad de vivir manifestándose'' (1989) {{ISBN|978-987-9396-55-1}}.
* ''Viaje a La Habana'' (1990).  {{ISBN|978-0-89729-544-4}}.
* ''Final de un cuento (El Fantasma de la glorieta)'' (1991) {{ISBN|978-84-86842-38-3}}.
* ''Adiós a mamá'' (1996) {{ISBN|978-0-89729-791-2}}

==See also==
{{Portal|Literature|Cuba|Poetry}}
* [[American literature in Spanish]]
* [[Cuban American literature]]
* [[Cuban dissident movement]]
* [[List of Cuban Americans|List of Famous Cuban-Americans]]
* [[List of Cuban American writers]]
* [[LGBT rights in Cuba]]

== References ==
{{Citations broken|section|date=July 2021}}
{{Reflist}}

== Further reading ==
''English''
* ''Reinaldo Arenas'' (Twayne's World Author Series) / Francisco Soto, 1998
* ''Reinaldo Arenas: The Pentagonía'' / Francisco Soto. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1994
* ''The postmodern poetic narrative of Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas'' / Ileana C Zéndegui, 2004
* ''The manufacture of an author: Reinaldo Arenas's literary world, his readers and other contemporaries'' / Claudio Canaparo, 2000
* ''Reinaldo Arenas: tradition and singularity'' / Francisco Soto, 1988
* ''Reinaldo Arenas: the agony is the ecstasy'' / Dinora Caridad Cardoso, 1997
* ''Cosmopolitanisms and Latin America: Against the Destiny of Place'' / Jacqueline Loss. NY: Palgrave MacMillan, 2005 [A detailed study of Reinaldo Arenas and Diamela Eltit's cosmopolitan aspects]
* "Lifewriting with a Vengeance: Truth, [[Subaltern (postcolonialism)|Subalternity]] and Autobiographical Determination in Reinaldo Arenas's ''Antes que anochezca,''"  By: Sandro R. Barros, ''Caribe: Revista de Cultura y Literatura'', 2006 Summer; 9 (1): 41–56.
* "A [[Postmodern]] 'Play' on a Nineteenth-Century Cuban Classic: Reinaldo Arenas's ''La Loma del Angel,''"  By: H. J. Manzari, ''Decimonónica: Journal of Nineteenth Century Hispanic Cultural Production'', 2006 Summer; 3 (2): 45–58.
* "The Molecular Poetics of ''Before Night Falls,''" By: Teresa Rizzo, ''Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge'', 2006 Spring; 11–12.
* "Queer Parody and [[Intertextuality]]: A [[Postmodern]] Reading of Reinaldo Arenas's ''El cometa Halley,''"  By: Francisco Soto, IN: Ingenschay, ''Desde aceras opuestas: Literatura/cultura gay y lesbiana en Latinoamérica''. Madrid, Spain; Frankfurt, Germany: Iberoamericana; Vervuert; 2006. pp.&nbsp;245–53
* "Revisiting the Circuitous Odyssey of the [[Baroque]] [[Picaresque]] Novel: Reinaldo Arenas's ''El mundo alucinante,''"  By: Angela L. Willis, ''Comparative Literature'', 2005 Winter; 57 (1): 61–83.
* "The Traumas of Unbelonging: Reinaldo Arenas's Recuperations of Cuba,"  By: Laurie Vickroy, ''MELUS: The Journal of the Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States'', 2005 Winter; 30 (4): 109–28.
* "Difficult Writings: AIDS and the Activist Aesthetic in Reinaldo Arenas' ''Before Night Falls,''"  By: Diana Davidson, ''Atenea'', 2003 December; 23 (2): 53–71.

'''''Spanish'''''
* ''Reinaldo Arenas : una apreciación política'' / Adolfo Cacheiro, 2000
* ''Reinaldo Arenas : recuerdo y presencia'' / Reinaldo Sánchez, 1994
* ''La escritura de la memoria : Reinaldo Arenas, textos, estudios y documentación'' / [[Ottmar Ette]], 1992
* ''Reinaldo Arenas : narrativa de transgresión'' / Perla Rozencvaig, 1986
* ''La alucinación y los recursos literarios en las novelas de Reinaldo Arenas'' / Félix Lugo Nazario, 1995
* ''El círculo del exilio y la enajenación en la obra de Reinaldo Arenas'' / María Luisa Negrín, 2000
* ''La textualidad de Reinaldo Arenas : juegos de la escritura posmoderna'' / Eduardo C Bejar, 1987
* ''Reinaldo Arenas : alucinaciones, fantasía y realidad'' / Julio E Hernández-Miyares, 1990
* ''El desamparado humor de Reinaldo Arenas'' / [[Roberto Valero]], 1991
* ''Ideología y subversión : otra vez Arenas'' / Reinaldo Sánchez, 1999

== External links ==
*[https://www.loc.gov/item/93842377/ Reinaldo Arenas] recorded at the Library of Congress for the Hispanic Division's audio literary archive on December 7, 1980
*[http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/pacscl/PRIN_MUDD_C1562 Aurelio Cortés collection of Reinaldo Arenas] at [https://library.princeton.edu/special-collections/welcome Princeton University Library Special Collections]
*[http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/pacscl/PRIN_MUDD_C0984 Dolores Koch collection of Reinaldo Arenas] at [https://library.princeton.edu/special-collections/welcome Princeton University Library Special Collections]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Arenas, Reinaldo}}
[[Category:1943 births]]
[[Category:1990 deaths]]
[[Category:1990 suicides]]
[[Category:20th-century American novelists]]
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[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
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