Gibara (Cuba), 1929 – London (England), 2005

By Flávio Aguiar

The mastery and boldness with which he handles language, crafting text through a fusion of meanings and significants, rhythms and sounds, make this Cuban a challenger of traditional rhetoric. From his first work, a collection of stories published in 1960, Así en la paz como en la guerra, Cabrera signals his path along this literary avenue, affirmed in Tres tristes tigres (1964), which won the Biblioteca Breve Prize. This work is labeled merely as narrative, not a novel, as it innovates punctuation, continuity, and textual linearity, recreating the traditional genre through what he understands as discursive naturalization, evident in his use of various Cuban dialects.

Oral language, the city of Havana, and the Cuban world form the core of his literary production, which encompasses short stories, novels, essays, film critiques, and political writings. Before leaving Cuba, from which he never returned, heading to Europe, he founded the Cinemateca de Cuba. Initially, he was sympathetic to the Cuban Revolution and served as editor of the literary supplement Lunes de Revolución for the official newspaper Granma. In 1961, following a controversy surrounding the short film P. M., directed by his brother, the supplement was suspended, marking his estrangement from the regime.

After a stint in diplomatic service abroad, he definitively broke with the Cuban regime in 1965, going into exile. He settled in England because Francoist Spain refused to accept him due to his revolutionary sympathies in Cuba. He read various Latin American writers, including Brazilian authors Machado de Assis and João Guimarães Rosa, from whom he claims to have drawn influence. Exile was a significant experience in his production, much like for his compatriot Severo Sarduy: the heart in Cuba and the home in London. Other works include Mea Cuba (1993), Vista del amanecer en el trópico (1974), and Ella cantaba boleros (1996).