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Reinaldo Arenas (1943 - 1990)
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Pentagonia  Singing
from the Well by
Reinaldo Arenas
This first novel
in Arenas's "secret history of Cuba"-- a quintet he
called the Pentagonia--is
a powerful story of growing up in a world where nightmare has
become reality, and fantasy provides the only escape.
"One of the most beautiful novels ever written about
childhood, adolescence, and life in Cuba." --Carlos Fuentes
 The
Palace of the White Skunks
by
Reinaldo Arenas, Andrew Hurley (Translator)
The
second novel in the Pentagonia,
this is a phantasmagoric novel of adolescent rebellion and
political revolution.
"A beautiful, heartfelt book by a passionate and epic writer
at the height of his powers." --Oscar Hijuelos
 Farewell
to the Sea : A Novel of Cuba by
Reinaldo Arenas, Andrew Hurley (Translator)
A
young Cuban couple gain permission to spend a week at a beach
resort. They spend most of their time sitting by the ocean, silent
in private thought. We get inside her head for the 7 days and then
into his, receiving different perspectives and views on the
vacation, and on their current lives. Arenas does a fantastic job
of expressing both her and his frustrations at their station in
life, and in the freedom they feel has deserted them. She laments
the burden of motherhood and the loss of her personal sense of
self. He laments his loss of freedom as the Castro government
clamps harder down on writers and artists. Also, driving his
frustration is his own frustration as a closet homosexual in a
straight, macho world. Arenas does not overtly state his themes,
but reveals them like one peeling an onion. There is layer after
layer to discover.. and the underlying themes of the novel come
across through reverie and daydreams.. hallucinations of the young
couple as they stare at the water. It is this non-linear
dual-narrative style of writing that is so effective as through
their private thoughts, we start to understand the true essence of
the lives of this young, but jaded young couple. -- Brett A.
Davis
 Color
of Summer : Or the New Garden of Earthly Delights by Reinaldo Arenas,
Andrew Hurley (Translator)
The final work
from "one of the few truly great writers to come out of Latin
America in this century" (Chicago Tribune)
Critics worldwide have praised Reinaldo Arenas's writing. His
extraordinary memoir, Before Night Falls, was chosen by the
editors of The New York Times Book Review as one of the
fourteen "Best Books of 1993" and was hailed as
"one of the most shattering testimonials ever written"
by Mario Vargas Llosa. His fiction "reveals a profoundly
original writer . . . Reading Arenas is like witnessing a bare
consciousness in the process of assimilating the most universal,
but powerful, human experiences and turning them into
literature" (The New York Times Book Review).
The
Color of Summer, Arenas's finest comic achievement, is the
fourth novel in a quintet he called the Pentagonia.
Although it is the penultimate chapter in his "secret history
of Cuba," it was, in fact, the last book Arenas wrote before
his death in 1990. (The final volume, The
Assault, was written first and published in 1994.) A
Rabelaisian tale of survival by wits and wit, The
Color of Summer is ultimately a powerful and passionate
story about the triumph of the human spirit over the forces of
political and sexual repression.
 The
Assault by
Reinaldo Arenas, Andrew Hurley (Translator)
A
passionate, epic writer, the author of Before Night
Falls,
concludes his five-novel sequence--a "secret history of
Cuba" and a writer's autobiography--with this allegorical
satire. Arenas paints a harrowing yet boldly entertaining Kafka-esque
picture of a dehumanized people and the despair of an
observer/narrator clinging to sanity.
 Before
Night Falls by
Reinaldo Arenas, Dolores M. Koch (Translator)
This
shocking personal and political memoir from one of the most
visionary writers to emerge from Castro's Cuba recounts Arenas'
stunning odyssey--from his poverty-stricken childhood through his
suppression as a writer and imprisonment as a homosexual to his
flight to America and subsequent life and death in New York. A New
York Times Best Book of 1993. "We
went to see the movie, not knowing anything about Arenas at the
time. The movie was amazing, which inspired me to buy the
book. The book is even more amazing, with much more details,
especially about the construction of sex, sexuality, homosexuality
and gender in Cuban society. Completely fascinating and
wonderfully written." -- Anonymous Review
About the Author
Reinaldo Arenas was born in Cuba in 1943. In 1980, he was one of
120,000 Cubans who arrived in the United States on the Mariel
boatlift. Arenas settled in New York where he lived until his
death from AIDS ten years later.
Andrew Hurley is a professor of English at the University of
Puerto Rico in San Juan. He has translated all of the novels in
Arenas' Pentagonia and is also the translator of Jorge Luis
Borges's Collected Fictions.
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Raised in extreme poverty in Cuba, as a young
man Arenas committed himself to Fidel Castro's revolution but grew
to despise the repressive politics that resulted, especially as
they pertained to the persecutions of lesbians and gay men. After
the publication of a novel in 1967 he was blacklisted by the
government and smuggled his manuscripts abroad.
Upon leaving Cuba in 1980 he celebrated his
freedom through publishing and public appearances but later became
critical of Cuba's emigrant community and of American gay men.
After being diagnosed with AIDS in 1987, Arenas exerted a
tremendous effort to finish several of his works he considered to
be important statements he had to make as a writer.
Arenas's work includes: Arturo, la Estrella Mas
Brillante (The Brightest Star), Singing From the Well,
Hallucinations, El Central and Antes que Anochezca (Before
Night Falls) an autobiographical account of the harrowing
conditions of life in Cuba as well as rundown of dozen's of his
estimated 10,000 sexual encounters completed in 1990, shortly
before he committed suicide.
Arenas's Major
Published Works:
Celestino antes del alba
(La Habana: Ediciones Unión, 1967), republished as Cantando en
el pozo (Barcelona: Seix Barral, 1982), English translation by
Andrew Hurley published as Singing from the Well (New York:
Viking, 1987); El mundo alucinante, una novela de aventuras (Mexico:
Editorial Diógenes, 1966), originally published in France as Le
monde hallucinant (Paris: Editions Du Seuil, 1968), English
translation by Gordon Brotherston published as Hallucinations:
Being an Account of the Life and Adventures of Friar Servando
Teresa de Mier (New York: Harper & Row, 1971); El
palacio de las blanquísimas mofetas (Barcelona: Editorial
Argos Vergara, 1983), first published in France as Le palais
des trés blanches mouffettes (Paris: Editions Du Seuil,
1975), English translation by Andrew Hurley published as The
Palace of the White Skunks (New York: Viking, 1990); El
Central (Barcelona: Seix Barral, 1981); Termina el desfile
(Barcelona: Seix Barral, 1981); Otra vez el mar (Barcelona:
Editorial Argos Vergara, 1982), English translation by Andrew
Hurley published as Farewell to the Sea, a Novel of Cuba
(New York: Viking, 1986); Arturo, la estrella más brillante
(Barcelona: Montesinos Editor, 1984), English translation by
Andrew Hurley published as "The Brigthest Star" in Old
Rosa: A Novel in Two Stories (New York: Grove Press, 1989); Necesidad
de libertad (Mexico: Kosmos - Editorial, 1986); Persecución
(cinco pieza de teatro experimental) (Miami, Ediciones
Universal, 1986); La loma del angel (Barcelona: DADOR /
ediciones, 1987), English translation by Alfred MacAdam published
as Graveyard of the Angels (New York: Avon Books, 1987); Voluntad
de vivir manifestándose (Madrid: Editorial Betania, 1989); El
asalto (Miami: Ediciones Universal, 1990); Leprosorio (Trilogía
poética) (Madrid: Editorial Betania, 1990); El portero
(Miami: Ediciones Universal, 1990), English translation by Dolores
M. Koch published as The Doorman (New York: Grove Press,
1991); Viaje a La Habana (Miami: Ediciones Universal,
1990); El color del verano o nuevo jardín de las delicias
(Miami: Ediciones Universal, 1991); Final de un cuento (Diputación
Provincial de Huelva: El Fantasma de la Glorieta, 1991); Antes
que anochezca (Barcelona: Tusquets Editores, 1992).
Related Resources:
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A Finding Aid Prepared by Rodolfo G. Aiello
Manuscripts Division
Department of Rare Books and Special Collections
Princeton University
This aid consists of typescripts and manuscripts
of novels and novellas, short stories, plays and screenplays,
poetry, nonfiction, correspondence, and miscellaneous and printed
material.
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Names Index:
A B
C D
E F
G H
I J
K L
M N
O P
Q R
S T
U V
W X
Y Z
| Authors
Index | Scholars
Index |
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