Women's presence in Cuban theatre

The play begins. Two women on stage, one black and one white, discuss and reflect on the prejudices and issues regarding the female gender, such as violence, abuse and discrimination; and women's struggle to obtain their rightful place in society. It is a dispute between the role that has been attributed to women over the centuries and their continuous struggle to achieve gender equality.
This play, Iniciación en blanco y negro para mujeres sin color (Initiation in Black and White for Women without Color), by playwright Fátima Patterson, is one of many that have been presented in recent years on the subject of women and their constant subjugation as an object within society. This dramatic text, written by a woman, shows that although times have changed, there still exist those who are prisoners of the past who try to stop the development of the female gender as a social being capable of doing, saying and feeling, equal to or more than any man.
The theater, given its great social influence, can be an instrument for denouncing these evils that still affect Cuban society and the entire world. Within this context, women have broken through to reflect in plays the existing contradictions, or to simply participate and develop as a great intellectual individual.
Since the nineteenth century, when a theatrical movement with its own identity began to develop in Cuba, women, despite the prejudices of the time, managed to assert themselves and challenge the limits of censorship. They became an active part of Cuban theater and directly influenced the construction of nationality.
Great drama figures such as Adela Robreño, Luisa Martínez Casado and Eloísa Agüero de Osorio stand out in this period. Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda, who wrote about women and their discrimination within society, has to be mentioned. Some consider her the best playwright in the Spanish language.
The plays of La Peregrina, Avellaneda's pseudonym under which she wrote, have been staged in different moments, not only as a way to rescue the classics, but also because of the importance and validity of her theatrical texts. And because of her continuous struggle to achieve women's rightful place within their historical context.
After the establishment of a neocolonial republic in Cuba, Cuban theater seemed like it was going to disappear. A period of crisis began that threatened dramatic expression and its development. The number of places and performers decreased. Only the Alhambra remained open during this difficult time promoting what was known as "popular" theater and offering twenty-three shows weekly. But despite its heyday, it did not survive and disappeared in 1935.

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Literary Culture in Cuba – interview with Dr Par Kumaraswami

Pre- 1959 Cuba was not a cultural desert. Jose Martí, the national hero, was after all a poet and writer, who wrote famously "Ser culto es ser libre" (to be cultured is to be free). However publishing was very small scale, there were few bookshops and even the National library relied on authors' donations. In the 1950s less than a million books were produced each year, mostly text books destined for private schools. Many aspiring writers went abroad to get published including Alejo Carpentier. Small literary groups produced magazines but relied on private patrons. Cuba had a high level of literacy by regional standards (around 75%) but for the majority poor and rural society, literacy and access to books was very much lower. The revolution changed all of this, putting culture at its centre – with the emphasis on active and creative participation by and for the benefit of all and to help build a shared vision and ideals.
As public libraries and bookshops here in the UK close, academics at Nottingham university have spent the last few years looking at Cuba's approach to reading, writing and books and the network of activities that binds these together.

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