Since Fidel Castro came to power, the government has viewed cultural production as a powerful mechanism to present a reconciling image of the country. The political elite made a distinction between creative work that made the revolution progress and creative work that aimed to destabilise the system. This distinction re-created an important diatribe among the Cuban intelligentsia: who were the true revolutionaries: those who followed the norm or those who challenged it? For the latter, cultural production was necessarily embedded in the defence of the freedom of expression and experimentation, an arena through which Cubans could make real change happen.
1 Jorge de la Fuente, ‘Sobre la joven intelectualidad artística’, Temas, 19 (1990), 59–71, p. 68. This has been a difficult task in Cuba.
For many Cuban writers born after Fidel Castro came to power, being writers has put them in a difficult situation with the government. In this way, Portela attributes the fact that
Cien botellas has gone unnoticed in Cuban literary contests to ‘pure and hard politics, sexism, homophobia, personal aversion’.
2 Spanish original: ‘política pura y dura, sexismo, homofobia, inquinas personales’; Jorge Camacho, ‘¿Quién le teme a Ena Lucía Portela?’, La Habana Elegante (Spring–Summer 2006), 33–34. Luisa Campuzano observes that Portela and other Cuban women writers of the late 20th and early 21st centuries tend not to make explicit reference to specific people or occurrences of the Special Period: ‘but they treat them biased, from a humorous and ironic perspective, they touch or allude to them laterally in texts that at first glance do not seem to be related to these referents’.
3 Spanish original: ‘Sino que los tratan sesgadamente, desde el humor y la ironía, los rozan o los aluden lateralmente en textos que a simple vista no parecen tener relación con estos referentes’; Luisa Campuzano, ‘Literatura de mujeres y cambio social: narradoras Cubanas de hoy’, Temas, 32 (January–March 2003), 38–47, p. 41. In
Cien botellas, there is not a sole mention of Fidel Castro by name, and allusions to historical events are vague and collateral to the main plot. In Nicola Miller’s words, cultural repression in revolutionary Cuba is constitutive of contempt for individuals.
4 Nicola Miller, ‘A Revolutionary Modernity: The Cultural Policy of the Cuban Revolution’, Journal of Latin American Studies, 40 (2008), 675–96. Perhaps by not making a direct criticism of the system, Portela is trying to protect herself from governmental contempt.
Portela has declared her disengagement from Cuban politics on many occasions. For example, in an interview with López she said: ‘I am not a very sociable person, neither here nor abroad. I am not interested in patriotism, nor the nostalgic wave of “remembering the old days”’.
5 Spanish original: ‘No soy una persona muy sociable, ni aquí ni en el extranjero. No le descargo al patriotismo, ni a la onda nostálgica esa de “recordar los viejos tiempos”’; Iraida H. López and Ena Lucía Portela, ‘Entrevista. Ena Lucía Portela’, Hispamérica, 38.112 (2009), 49–59, p. 50. Portela argues that she needs her energy for her work and cannot spend her time ‘thinking that they are going to do this or that to me. No way. Let them do what they want, or what they can, which will be seen later’.
6 Spanish original: ‘Así que no puedo despilfarrarla metiéndome miedo yo misma, […] pensando que me van a hacer esto o aquello. Nanay. Que hagan lo que quieran, o lo que puedan, que luego ya se verá’; Pardo Lazo, ‘Ena o UNEAC’. By pretending that she does not care, Portela can manage the situation effectively.
Yet, a close look at her narrative, particularly Cien botellas, reveals Portela’s sharp views against censorship and ideological control in Cuba. Her combative attitude against censorship manifests in her sympathy with those authors who, with honesty and courage, have defended their rights in totalitarian systems. Portela’s views on, for example, the writer Reinaldo Arenas show evidence that resistance against ideological directionism and the defence of freedom of expression is very present in her writing:
It is clear that he was not a saint. Just an indomitable, rebellious writer, with an extraordinary vocation for frankness. One who defended through thick and thin, in particularly difficult circumstances, his right to express himself freely. One who did not bow, in this same scenario where many others, still today, crawl.
7 Spanish original: ‘Está claro que no fue un santo. Solo un escritor indómito, rebelde, con una extraordinaria vocación de franqueza. Uno que defendió contra viento y marea, en circunstancias particularmente difíciles, su derecho a expresarse con entera libertad. Uno que no se doblegó, en este mismo escenario donde otros muchos, todavía hoy, se arrastran’; see Mario Luis Reyes, ‘La libertad de Ena Lucía Portela’, E Estornudo: Alergias Crónicas, 6 November 2018; https://revistaelestornudo.medium.com/la-libertad-de-ena-luc%C3%ADa-portela-b8353ee5dcee [accessed 9 November 2020]. In this line, it is possible to draw similarities between the works of Arenas and Portela for their thematic and literary style and use of humour. Both authors give visibility to less visible dynamics of resistance to repressive mechanisms against sexual minorities and intellectuals. Both have the ability to create rebellious characters with an ‘extraordinary vocation for frankness’
8 Mario Luis Reyes, ‘La libertad de Ena Lucía Portela’. and plots through which both the characters and the authors exercise their right to express themselves free from moral prejudices. In an interview with Nara Araújo, Portela argued that her writing has a similar aim: to ‘bristle and amuse’.
9 Spanish original: ‘erizar y divertir’; Nara Araújo, ‘Erizar y divertir: la poética de Ena Lucía Portela’, Cuban Studies, 32 (2001), 55–73.In Cien botellas, Zeta shows a lack of interest in the revolution and apparent disengagement from the critical political situation in Cuba. Yet, knowing Portela’s views on the government’s treatment of intellectuals leads us to argue that these are in reality weapons of protection and resistance for the protagonist. Zeta is known by the last letter of the alphabet, indicating that she occupies the lowest rank in Cuban society. What does Portela tell us by making Zeta the protagonist of Cien botellas? Let us address this issue next.