Havana Dreams

May 4, 1998
The centerpiece of this highly personal, disjointed history of modern Cuba is a brief affair between a married Havana socialite named Naty Revuelta and Fidel Castro, carried out mostly in love letters written in 1953-54 while the future dictator was in jail. The affair fizzled, but not before Castro supposedly left his paramour with a daughter, Alina, who created a minor sensation in 1993 when she immigrated to the U.S. and joined protesters demonstrating against the Cuban leader's 1995 U.N. appearance in New York City. Castro never publicly acknowledged the legitimacy of the daughter, and though references are made to photographs of the Cuban leader and Alina together, none are included here. Gimbel (Edith Wharton) interviewed four generations of Revuelta women to reconstruct the family's story through their sad experiences as deposed Cuban elites, scorned lovers and defectors. The result is a virulently anti-Castro document with a confusing mix of characters either relieving the glorious pre-revolutionary past or denying that such a past ever existed. The book is often sentimental--"Fidel Castro knew how to make love to a woman without ever touching her." But the love letters, like much of the book, provide little insight into Castro's development and suggest only that even a hardened revolutionary can churn out banal but tender sentiment when smitten with a woman.

Certainly no revolution in our century has kept its promise, and Castro's Cuba is no exception. Returning in 1991 to the Cuba she left as a girl, Wendy Gimbel discovers Naty Revuelta, whose life and family mirror the struggles of Cuba and its revolution. Anna Fields's warm voice and vigorous delivery are a good match for Gimbel's perceptive account of Naty's betrayal. Falling in love with Fidel in 1953, she bore him a girl, was quickly abandoned in his heady ascent to power, and left finally without marriage, happiness, or family--sacrificed (like Cuba) on the altar of Fidel's ambitions. A caustic edge to Fields's voice drives the anger in Gimbel's account and leaves us with no affection for Castro, but a better understanding of Cuba's history and people. P.E.F. (c) AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine