The close connection between Diaspora and other themes of Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia

In Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia, the diaspora is a central theme. By definition, the word diaspora “refers to people who have been dispersed, displaced or dislocated from their homeland”. In Cuba, around the 1960’s many Cubans flew the country and went mostly to the United States. Through this huge movement, the people who immigrated built a new life and a new community in the United States. In other words, the diaspora permits to the immigrated people to create a new culture. This theme and the context of it appears in the novel to help the reader to understand better some of the characters and it is intertwined with others themes such as identity and hybridity. The common feature between these three themes is the creation of a new culture and the trace it lets behind it. In addition, all along the novel, the definition of diaspora constantly changes and tends to demonstrate that not only the fact of moving from a country is an exile.

The diasporic process can be seen with many points of view, which are many characters, particularly Lourdes Puente, her daughter Pilar and Celia del Pino. The beginning of the novel show that Lourdes Puente is assimilated to the American culture; she is building her life in New York with her family (her husband and her daughter) and owns a bakery that marks her independence. Obviously, she is not the only one to have escaped from a political conflict or anything else that brings people to migrate. For example, she lives in Brooklyn where a majority of Jews moved: “Lourdes bought the bakery five years ago from a French-Austrian Jew who had migrated to Brooklyn after the war” (18). The diaspora is set up with the words “Jew” and the “war”. The importance is that the reader sees the diasporic process as a globalization of the immigration. Again, the Jews are mentioned by Pilar: “I felts sorry for the Jews getting thrown out of Egypt and having to drag themselves across the desert to find a new home” (Garcia, 58). The word “home” is something related with many postcolonial novels as Justin D. Edwards mentions it in his book Postcolonial Literature in the chapter “Diaspora”. Actually, he depicts the word “home” with many authors for example “from this perspective […] home is a word that is often burdened with a complicated historical and geographical weight” (151). This sentence reveals that the word “home” has a heavy meaning for the people “victim” of diaspora, they do not have a “real” home because of the constrained of building a new life. The word “home” is a key element for the theme of the diaspora, it emphasizes on the fact that the novelty of the situation, constrains people living in another way, which are the results hybridity; they are mixed with another culture and theirs at the same time.

The complexity of diaspora is that hybridity and identity are closely linked to it and are its consequence. Pilar Puente is surely the most representative of these themes. Pilar is the character that mostly searches her identity and wants responses by returning to Cuba: “Even though I’ve been living in Brooklyn all my life, it doesn’t feel home to home to me. I’m not sure Cuba is but I want to find out” (58). As said before, the word “home” is something very important that Pilar intensifies with her decision of going to Cuba. That is to say, that in hybridity, the people descendant from different cultures and living in another country are continually caught between two stools because of the culture shock they are confronted with. Moreover, Edwards in the chapter concerning the diaspora demonstrates that by mentioning two authors (Braziel and Mannur), both have theorized that: “diasporic communities develop their own particular forms of hybridity and heterogeneity in specific cultural, linguistic, ethnic and national contexts” (156). Again, it reveals that the mixed culture of those communities grows with the environment in which they are living.

“Diaspora identities are those which are constantly producing and reproducing themselves anew, through transformation and difference” (158). This sentence clearly illustrates and define the hidden meaning of “diaspora”. There is a need of change; this change sounds like a revival that obligates people to adapt themselves to the world, bringing some new features. For example, when Pilar and Lourdes are dancing and she is watching at her daughter dancing “Pilar looked so clumsy last night […] She dances like an American” (224). The comparison with the Americans who are known not to being coordinate but “clumsy” intensifies the fact that Pilar has not taken the Cuban rhythm concerning the dancing. Again, the mix of culture is visible due to the diaspora and Lourdes illustrates it. What is difficult in diaspora is to adapt itself; furthermore, it could be compared to an exchange between two cultures that open one to each other. This exchange is made by means of comprehension and integration on each side and not only by the point of view of the people who immigrate.

To conclude, more than a half of the population on earth had once to migrate and History proved that new cultures are the consequences of a diaspora. The diaspora concerns many characters in the novel and we can see that this theme has a connection with others. The diaspora helps to create an identity and diverse cultures. Hybridity and identity tend to be two themes in the novel that are closely attached with diaspora, these questions of identity are recurrent in the novel and Dreaming in Cuban has a well attachment to diaspora, by that we could ask us if the author did not want to explain her own experience.

Bibliography:

Edwards, Justin D., Postcolonial Literature (chapter Diaspora), ed. Palgrave MacMillan, 2008 Garcia, Cristina, Dreaming in Cuban, ed. Ballantine Book, 1993

The irony of language used by the character of Pilar in Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia

Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia is a novel where the reader can approach the characters and make his own opinion about them by their language, their feelings, their thoughts, their background, etc. Furthermore, the narration gives to the reader the impression of being close to the characters. Some of them narrate the story in the first person and others on the third. Obviously, the first person brings the orality to the novel and the third person makes it more “formal” or more poetic. In this work, we will focus on Pilar Puente who is a round character that uses the first person. The passage at page 62 beginning with “I get discouraged […]” until “[…] here to complain” page 63 shows the relationship Pilar has with her mother (Lourdes Puente). The use of irony is recurrent and this has an impact on the text, on the meaning and on the reader. The effects of irony also have an impact on the nature of the relationship of Pilar and her mother.

Based on the feelings of Pilar, she seems being tired of what she is doing; she asks herself “Like what am I? A fugitive from my mother’s Bakery?” (62), the direct speech and the rhetorical questions she uses, express what she feels and reveal her tiredness towards the events happening. These rhetorical questions also reveal her need of identity; all along the passage, her identity is questioned. She went to Miami to ease her escape to Cuba but once arrived, she seems to have forgotten her objective: “I get discouraged. I look in through the rest of the windows without even trying to hide” (62), again her tiredness can be felt by her discourse and it avoids her capacity of staying focused on her purpose. Even though, the personification “the clouds speed through the darkening skies, probably headed to Cuba” (62) divulges that she watches the clouds and thinks about Cuba. There is a kind of paradox between her search of identity and her sudden questioning. Later in the passage, she also thinks her mother cannot change her “She tells me […] is more frustration at what she can’t change. I guess I’m of those things she can’t change” (63). The repetition of “she can’t change” reveal the certitude of Pilar of being a problem for her mother, so it can be interpreted again as the identity Pilar is searching.

Despite her search of identity, similes are a characteristic of Pilar’s language, “she can look like the dogs guarding hell, except she sounds more like a terrier or a Chihuahua” (63). In this sentence, Pilar talks about her mother and imagines her mother’s face when she will discover that her daughter ran away. The first part of the sentence, “she can look like the dogs guarding hell”, in many religious beliefs, the dogs guarding hell are the symbol of ferocity and animosity, it emphasize on the fact that her mother just “look” like them but it does not make her a bad person. Actually, the comparison: “she sounds more like a Terrier or a Chihuahua” reveals that Lourdes is not as mean as the reader can think because these two breeds of dogs are known to be only bad-tempered dogs and no aggressive. The opposition of those dogs is manifest and Pilar uses this simile ironically. By applying the irony, the narrator portrays Lourdes’ personality. Moreover, the metaphor “In her hands, bedroom slippers are lethal weapons” (63) puts the severity of Lourdes forward and the fact that she “can get pretty violent” (63) reveals that Lourdes even though has a certain authority on Pilar, this power is developed later by turning back to the past.

The authority of Lourdes is accentuated with a contrast between the past and the present; Pilar describes how her mother was respected in Cuba and how she is not in the United States: “Back in Cuba, everybody used to treat Mom with respect. Their backs would straighten and they’d put attentive faces like their lives depended on the bolt of fabric she chose” (63). “Back in Cuba”, is the reference to the past and the hyperbole of “like their lives depended on the bolt of fabric she chose” is used to show how much respect people had for Lourdes in Cuba. The sentence intensifies the link between the word “lives” and the second part of the sentence, “the bolt of fabric she chose” and these statements have their own grade of significance. Actually, “lives” is more important than the second part of the sentence and the hyperbole shows the reader the power Lourdes had in Cuba. Quite the opposite in the United States where: “These days, all the neighborhood merchants hate her” (63). We are back to the present by “these days” and then this ironic metaphor made in direct speech: “Where are the knobs, kid?” they ask me when her volume goes up” (63), is linked with her bad temper and the similes of the “Chihuahua” and the “Terrier”. The irony of Pilar’s language is also visible when she makes a joke about her mother and the fact she is always complaining about the items she buys. “One day, she’ll walk into a department store […] Congratulations, Mrs. Puente! This marks the thousandth time you’ve come in here to complain!” (63). The irony of language that Pilar uses, creates humour. In other words, it can be interpreted as she is mocking her mother. Again, the fact this joke is told in the first person brings orality to the text and makes the reader closer to it. Pilar is telling that because she reports the fact her mother is hateful when she wants to complain or even when she tries to straighten out Pilar.

In conclusion, the irony Pilar uses, is to bring a certain orality to the text; every word of the first person has a humoristic impact on the reader. He understands quickly that Pilar is very serious about what she thinks. That also makes the meaning and the form connected to each other, and that the novel Dreaming in Cuban is written without any artifices.

In Dreaming in Cuban, the reader is confronted with very different characters, described in various perspectives. Compared to Celia or Pilar’s complex character developments, Lourdes doesn’t appear as a round character at the first sight. This is emphasized as she often states down to earth, black and white judgments – especially facing her daughter, through her own point of view. However, Lourdes’s relationship to her own body gives the reader another comprehension of her character. It helps the character development as much as the narrative during Lourdes’s passages. Her body undergoes extreme experiences through the novel that highlight Lourdes’ willpower, need for control and freedom. Tree main moments helps this understanding: Lourde’s rape, her instable libido and her eating disorder.

Lourdes’s rape by a revolutionary soldier in Cuba (Garcia 71) plays a big role in the narrative process concerning her character. This episode can be seen as the fight between Lourdes and the patriarchal state, which is personified in the soldier. When he notes that “the woman of the house is a fighter” (71), the soldier has to show power over her. He represents the social and cultural power of the revolution. The same way McClintock describes imperialism penetrating a country (Edward 96), this soldier politically overpowers Lourdes by raping her. This act is kept secret by Lourdes and remembered for the first time years later in the narration, when Jorge tells his daughter “[he knows] about the soldier” (Garcia 196). But mentioning it is almost pointless, because remembering the rape might be part of Lourdes’ everyday behavior. This way the memory of it acts upon Lourdes’ way of thinking and reacting. Some of her reactions are predictable along the novel, such as her worries about Pilar’s sexuality. One can read the rape passage as a defining moment helping the narrative and character development of Lourdes.

The relationship between Rufino and Lourdes shows a one-way domination. It is not only underlined by their professional life, but also by a physical domination of Lourdes over her husband. This domination is linked to Lourdes eating disorder: during the first chapters, she is rather acted upon by her desires than mastering them. This is even poetically specified, as “she submitted to them like a somnambulist to a dream” (Garcia 21). This element adds complexity to Lourdes’ relationship to her body because of its ambivalence. Indeed, she is subjecting herself to her libido, which is subjecting Rufino himself – “[begging] his wife for a few nights’ peace” (21). Lourdes therefore reveals a more savage aspect of her character, that she does not control, nor wish to control. This point contrasts strongly with her way to run the family.

Considering the first argument about the rape’s memory, one can also read Lourdes libido as a way to “reconstruct her gendered identity” (Furman 33), alongside the American lifestyle she embraced. Lourdes uses a form of authority she has experienced through her rape, in a playful way with Rufino: she rings a bell to call him to the bedroom (Garcia 21). Furthermore, she exhausts her husband so much it is almost a form of harassment. This behavior might be a way to erase the rape’s memory, as it is suggested in “Lourdes (was) reaching through Rufino for something he could not give her, she wasn’t sure what” (21). This previous quote subtly opens another dimension to Lourdes character and how it is going to be narrated. Later on, she completely stops to have sex with her husband, in a purification ideal related to her extreme diet. Her abstinence also depicts the search for a new identity, and expresses Lourdes’ struggle via her body. What she can not tell to the reader, she shows it through a certain fleshly language.

Moreover, this body language is best illustrated through Lourdes’ compulsive eating disorders. As mentioned, these disorders are linked to her sexual appetite, but not only. Lourdes’ ups and downs develop her emotional state as well as her search for identity. When she decides to stop eating for months, she demonstrates her characteristic willpower: “willpower goes a long way getting toward what you want” (Garcia 172). In opposition with her rape, Lourdes shows she has finally power over her own body. It is no longer acted upon. This way she erases the painful memory and gets free by starving herself. One can regard this as a way for Lourdes to “write the self”, such as observed in Minh-ha’s proposal (Edward 105). Using another language enables Lourdes to get over what enslaves her. It is another way to show authority without using traditional means of power. By subverting the patriarchal and cultural language she is submitted to, Lourdes access to a form of liberation (Edward 105).

This liberation is concluded by the greatest contradiction that makes Lourdes’ body speaks. Finally freed from a memory she is fighting against, Lourdes eats like a glutton at Thanksgiving Day. But her relationship to her body underlines way more than a binary power structure. Rather than considering it as a fight, one can understand it as Lourdes’s own language through the novel. The narration is illustrated by the passive/active role of the body itself. And when this body goes through black and white moment (such as Lourdes’ judgments at some point), it is at first an expression tool. And at very precise moments, Lourdes’s body “[remembers] what her mind has forgotten” (Garcia 224). It is no wonder why she is the best dancer of the family.

Bibliography:

EDWARDS, Justin D. Postcolonial literature. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. p. 96-106.

FURMAN, Rachael. Communicating Control: Performing and Voicing Authorial Power through the Female Body in Dreaming in Cuban. Young Scholars In Writing, 2015, vol. 8, p. 30-39.

GARCIA, Cristina. Dreaming in Cuban. Ballantine books, 2011.

A Question of Power

Close reading of the gender differences within Christina Garcia’s Dreaming in Cuban

In Christina Garcia’s Dreaming in Cuban, the narration is done through three generations of Cuban women. However, a male character named Jorge Del Pino has a strong influence on these women throughout his words and he is, in addition, the man of the family. His voice is a symbolized as a weapon in the image of the men in history books and the Revolutionary movement within Cuba. Although the men are less numerous and present than women in the story, it is outstanding to see that they have a stronger influence in terms of power. Women have the conducting line of the story’s plot but men, by a simple intervention, are able to earn in power when they speak or when they are mentioned in the story. That is why gender issues are felt when it is a question of power in the story. Thereby, the essay will focus on how the patriarchal dominance affects the representation of women in this postcolonial story. An author named Justin Edwards made an article on gender and a few examples from his work will allow to make connexions with some passages of Garcia’s work.

The patriarch over women in Dreaming in Cuban is symbolized by a flat character, Jorge Del Pino, whose intervention is decisive in Lourdes’ life. Even if men are less present than women in Dreaming in Cuban, Jorge has kept an influential discourse to say at a precise moment. He is already deceased when he confides himself in Lourdes who is able to interact with his ghost. Jorge is dead when he tells a shocking truth to his girl. His role of father has already an influential aspect but his approach symbolizes this patriarchal role of the men of the family. By saying “you haven’t begun to understand, Lourdes” (195) he is about to say something that she is not aware. He is about to drop a bomb, metaphorically, to touch her feelings and get her attention. By being “silent for a long time” (195), he takes the control of the situation and it foresees an upcoming shock that Lourdes is about to get. In Edwards’ article about gender it is said that “silence is used as a patriarchal weapon of control” (Edwards 103) and this silence symbolizes Jorge’s control in this situation with his daughter. Silence is associated to the terms of “weapon” and “control” that have a strong connotation of dominance. Jorge has the hold on both the situation and Lourdes. The fact that anyone speaks during this silence is because Lourdes is captivated by the revelation he is about to tell. The control enables Jorge to decide of the turn his declaration should take. That is why his revelation about Celia’s love for Lourdes and his advice of coming back to Cuba is followed by Lourdes. Besides, another declaration deserves to be mentioned. Indeed, Jorge’s desire, talking about Lourdes “to own you for myself. And you always be mine” (196) symbolizes this male ownership over women. The verb “own” and the pronoun “mine” has again a strong connotation of appropriation. Jorge wants his daughter for himself that is partly why he decided to send Celia in an asylum. The other reason is because she was in love with a Spaniard.

Lourdes’ rape symbolizes the inferiority of women over the power of men. The verbal attack she made when the military attacked her husband Rufino has had repercussions on her. Indeed, by feeling humiliated by this women, the militaries took their revenge because they are representatives of power within the country. People have to show them respect and they wanted to show their superiority by attacking Rufino. They wouldn’t be victims of a women so one of the two soldiers “placed the knife flat across her belly and raped her” (71). Speaking of Lourdes, this rape is a form of loss because she undergoes the consequences of her behaviour with the soldiers. The knife that the soldier uses to carve an inexplicable message in Lourdes’ belly is an obvious symbol of male power. This victimization of the female by this masculine power characterize Castro’s revolutionary movement. Therefore, that is true to say that in this case “women are usually the creatures of a male power fantasy” (Edwards 98). The transformation of women into “creatures” symbolizes the superiority of men in this example. Besides, this aspect of “fantasy” let the reader thinks that this is a kind of a game for the men. The soldiers’ grade speaks for them and let them do things they wouldn’t do if they were simple citizens.

According to Pilar, the historical events reflect inequality between race and they put women at a more inferior stage than men. History only remembers great masculine leaders whereas it should also remember other actors like women, for their suffering in the shadow of these men. She says she would remember other things in history, like “the time there was a freak hailstorm in the Congo and the women took it for a sign they should rule” (28) or “the life of prostitutes in Bombay” (28). She indirectly mentions black women to denounce that there are already not enough mentions of women in history books. Therefore, it creates a gap with what is known from history books. She says that “we only know about Charlemagne and Napoleon because they fought their way into posterity” (28). Their presence in books is due as a reward for the fights they made. People know them because they deserved it. The fact that men have power is a thing but but no mention of women shows that there is an opposition between both gender and race. Pilar shares her point of view and her voice joins a declaration made in Justin Edwards’ article. In this article it is said that “silence is used as a patriarchal weapon of control, voicing is self-defining, liberational, and cathartic in light of the fact that women are treated as second-class citizens” ( Edwards 103). If Pilar decided to stay silent, her voice would have never been heard. However, by giving her opinion it is “liberational” because it is better to say things than keep it for herself and it is also revealing of her personality. She speaks for the women’s cause because history do not show enough gratitude to them this is why Pilar makes the reader understand that women are unfairly considered as inferior to men.

Through the story of Dreaming in Cuban, women are the narrative voices who say the bottom of their thoughts and describe the characters’ life. However, amongst the density of information in the story, this is some short passages which make the difference and provide details on a bigger issue that touch the women in the story. This matter is the patriarchal influence that the reader discovers by giving a particular attention to the gender differences within the book.

Years after the Cuban Revolution, the teenage girl Pilar Puente wants to escape the United States to go back to the place where she was born and where her grandmother lives; Cuba. On her way to Miami, where she hopes to find a boat going to the island, she delivers her thoughts about the world in which she grew up and how it is ruled by a minority of people. By having a close reading of the passage going from the second paragraph to the end of the third one on page sixty of Cristina Garcia’s Dreaming in Cuban, the reader is confronted to the reality that the dictatorship of only a few people over everybody’s life in the 1970’s was. Full of figures of speech, this passage emphasizes how reduced is our liberty of behaving. By making use of similes, metonymies, rhetorical questions, hyperboles and irony, the young protagonist is endowed with the voice of a feminist blaming the whole American system.

In the second sentence of the second paragraph, Pilar does a simile by comparing the mannequins of the Miracle Mile shops to “astronauts’ wives” (60). This figure of speech does not only intend to describe how the mannequins are looking but the young adolescent is mocking the hairstyle they are wearing. For her, the beehive looks like an astronaut’s helmet and is totally ridiculous. By linking this second sentence with the first one of the paragraph, one can understand that, for Pilar, what is considered as being fashionable seems very old and not innovative at all. However, what seems to shock the young girl is the fact that women would still consider this as being the new trend and are ready to spend money for it, as well as being fit enough to suit these clothing. This point of view is therefore reinforced by the third sentence, in which Pilar uses the ambiguous metonymy of the beehive to describe how shameful was the hairstyle in vogue at that time. By questioning who would find a beehive attractive, one can understand it by being the actual hairstyle, or taking it literally so Pilar would really ask how is it possible that somebody finds a real beehive attractive and wants her head to look like it. This metonymy reinforces Pilar’s point of view by pointing out what she really thinks of this haircut.

In the fourth sentence of the paragraph, Pilar expresses how angry and disgusted she is by thinking of who decides what is trendy and what is not. One can link this idea to what the young girl says earlier in the novel, when she questions “who chooses what we should know or what’s really important?” (28). She is revolted by the idea that only a few people, especially men, can decide “what’s really important” (28) or what women have to wear to be seductive. The hyperbole of “torture” (60) emphasizes the teenager’s vision of the fashion industry. It helps the reader grasp her feelings about the people who lead and dictate other’s behavior, and, in this case, women’s. One can figure out that, according to Pilar, things would have been a lot different if women were sitting in these “fashion control centers” (60). Women would not have to make all these efforts and to suffer this “torture” that the appearance is for modern society. Throughout the passage can be found other terms referring to suffering, such as “wince” (60) and “bruise” (60), which support the young girl’s voice. Pilar also repeats “new ways” (60) two times, what emphasizes the impact of her words on the reader. These “new ways to torture women” (60) are the evolution of the trend that women have to follow in order to keep up with society. After giving an anecdote about one of her friend’s mother, the young protagonist makes use of a rhetorical question in order to hit the reader’s mind directly and make him think about who is dictating the way women have to dress and what they need to like.

The third paragraph of the page sixty is very poetic. It begins with the simile “the sky looks like a big bruise of purples and oranges” (60). The sky often has the connotation of divine forces that should guide human’s behavior, especially in poetry. In this image, one could understand that, despite being beautifully colored, the sky is suffering. To emphasize this point of view, the sky is personified as suggested in the third sentence. Pilar explains how, in a land where there are not too many people, the sky would have a great impact on them, as she explains that it “announc[es] itself in a way you can’t ignore” (60). By saying that the sky can announce itself, she gives it a human, or even a divine feature. She ends the paragraph by explaining how less important is the sky, so the divine, in big cities like New York. The world leaders living there are getting more important than the sky and have a bigger impact on citizens’ mind. They are so powerful that they can compete with the sky itself.

In this passage, Garcia gives the reader the chance to question himself about who takes the decisions, about who dictate our world. Through Pilar’s mind, she denounces the injustice of the whole system, ruled by a minority of people. By using several figures of speech, she reinforces the young protagonist’s point of view and increases her impact on the reader. Her words remind us that we are not totally free in our ways of thinking and behaving and that everything is decided by only a few leaders, who can even compete with the sky.

In Cristina Garcia’s novel Dreaming in Cuban as in a lot of other postcolonial works can be found supernatural events like ghosts or visions. These supernatural events happening in a realistic context are also called magical realism. In this novel, all of the three generations of the family Del Pino women encounter such events and are able to communicate with their relatives, even though they are not living in the same country. In this story, magical realism helps protagonists to overcome physical boundaries and to see or hear each other. It keeps all three women closer, even if there have been altercations between them in the past. Magical realism reveals to the protagonists what had been kept secret and what they have not been able to hear and see.

Although it is not the first time that a character is confronted with a supernatural event, the moment when Celia “closes her eyes and speaks to her granddaughter, imagines her words as slivers of light piercing the murky night” (Garcia 7) marks the first time that a character is able to interact with another one by telepathy. As Maria Rice Bellamy suggests in her book titled Bridges to Memory: Postmemory in Contemporary Ethnic American Women’s Fiction, “Pilar remains closely connected to Celia and Cuba through telepathic conversations that overcome the physical distance between New York and Cuba” (Bellamy 79). It is therefore by means of magical realism that these two protagonists are able to communicate together even though thousands of kilometres separate them and they have not seen each other physically since Pilar and her family left Cuba. Telepathy helps them to keep in touch and to stay close with each other. As a proof that telepathy really exists between Celia and her granddaughter, the young girl says that she “hear[s] her speaking to [her] at night, just before [she] fall[s] asleep” (Garcia 29). This communication, as said before, brings the two women closer to each other as Celia tell her granddaughter that “she wants to see [Pilar] again” and that she “tells [her] she loves [her]” (Garcia 29). These conversations are so strong that it is part of what motives Pilar to take the trip back to Cuba.

These visions can also lead to communication in another way than by having a spoken conversation. Sometimes, the protagonists are only able to see the others but not to hear them. It is the case for Celia, at the beginning of the novel, when Jorge, her deceased husband, “emerges from the light and comes toward her, taller than the palms, walking on water” (Garcia 5). Here, three points can be seen which immediately set the story into the magical realism category. Jorge is seen as a gigantic person, walking on water and, above all, he is supposed to be dead. Communication is difficult, as Celia can only see her husband’s mouth move but she “cannot read his immense lips” (Garcia 5). Here, the communication is broken, as Celia is not able to understand Jorge. However, as Bellamy specifies, “Garcia uses alternative forms of connection, specifically total recall and dreams, to create relational bridges between characters even when they do not consciously seek them” (Bellamy 80). As she explains, the protagonists are communicating even if they think that they cannot understand each other. It is unconscious. Another example is found when Pilar has an “image of Abuela Celia underwater, standing on a reef” who “calls to [Pilar] but [she] can’t hear her” (Garcia 220). In her work titled Rediscovering Magical Realism in the Americas, Shannin Shroeder links this vision to “Celia’s walk into the ocean at the end of the novel” (Shroeder 70). Again, this vision helps the two characters to communicate, even if no pronounced word is understood.

Lourdes also encounters such unnatural events, especially when her deceased father “greets [her] forty days after she buried him” (Garcia 64). Although she fears this first meeting with her father and comes back home with a “presentiment of disaster” (Garcia 65), the other times she sees him will benefit her. According to Bellamy, the use of magical realism “facilitate the interaction of people distanced by ideology, geography and even death” (Bellamy 79). It works for Lourdes on every point Bellamy makes. As her father finally reveals her that her mother loved her and that her sister Felicia died, he finally persuades Lourdes to “go to them” (Garcia 196). This communication between Lourdes and Jorge therefore helps her to get closer to her Cuban family, distant to her geographically. In addition, she meets there her mother Celia, who is also distant to her ideologically. Celia is militating in favour of Fidel Castro’s regime but her daughter is completely against it. She even called Lourdes a “traitor to the revolution” (Garcia 26) when the latter decided to leave Cuba to go to the United States. This marks how much they have distant ideology. Finally, the fact that she has conversations with her deceased father makes her interact with somebody distant to her because of death. In his book titled Postcolonial Literature, Justin D. Edwards writes that writer Toni Morrison “asserts that the literary use of haunting offers the possibility of representing ‘unspeakable things unspoken’” (Edwards 119). In Dreaming in Cuban, the moment when Jorge reveals to Lourdes what really happened between him and Celia marks a haunting scene of a ghost revealing what had not been spoken during Jorge’s life.

Throughout the novel, multiples supernatural events happen and help the protagonists to interact together. Magical realism allows them to overcome every boundary of any nature. Even if the characters are very distant in a geographical way, political beliefs and even if they are separated by death, these supernatural events build bridges allowing them to communicate together. It gives them the power to speak about what is unspeakable in their life and tighten the links between them.

Works Cited:

Bellamy, Maria Rice. Bridges to Memory: Postmemory in Contemporary Ethnic American Women’s Fiction. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2015: 76-102

Edwards, Justin D. Postcolonial Literature. New York: PALGRAVE MACMILLAN, 2008: 118-128

Garcia, Cristina. Dreaming in Cuban. New York: Ballantine Books, 1993

Schroeder, Shannin. Rediscovering Magical Realism in the Americas. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004: 69-82

Cristina García’s Dreaming in Cuban reflects different points of view of the history of Cuba. For instance, Lourdes has an adverse opinion of Cuba after the Revolution. At the beginning of the novel, she is an enigmatic character, but the reader understands her perspective when s/he finds out what happened to her in the past. Justin D. Edwards, in his chapter on memory in Postcolonial Literature, states that the “postcolonial writing often deals with the recollection of traumatic events” (132). Indeed, Cristina García illustrates this situation in Dreaming in Cuban through Lourdes’ callback of her unborn baby’s death and her rape. Hence, the author shows the repercussions of a traumatic event by calling back Lourdes’ memory, thus reflecting one of the perceptions on the introduction of a revolutionary government in Cuba and its consequences.

The articulation of Lourdes’ memories in the narration suggests a logical connection between the events of the past, which helps to understand the character’s motives and reactions. The plot is a disrupted narrative structured like memory. Each event is a piece of memory articulated with another one in a non-linear way. However, it seems like events of Lourdes’ memory are linked together in a logical way. In chapter 5, the reader finds out about a traumatic event that Lourdes lived through: soldiers of the revolutionary government catalyzed her miscarriage and she has been raped by one of them (García, 70-71). The reminiscence of this episode of violence appears just after the mention of the day Lourdes left Cuba (García, 69). This succession in the narration connects the two memories; as Lourdes’ aggression happened before her exile, it suggests that this traumatic event has been a motive of her exile. Moreover, just after the mention of Lourdes’ trauma, the narrator asserts that immigration is a good point in her life because it “has redefined her” (García, 73). S/he further reveals that “[s]he wants no part of Cuba, no part of its wretched carnival floats creaking with lies, no part of Cuba at all” (García, 73). The repetition of “no part” highlights Lourdes’ rejection of Cuba. This association of memories in the narration reveals that Lourdes’ rejection of her homeland is one possible consequence of her trauma.

A further consequence of Lourdes’ trauma is her impossibility to talk about this violent incident. Judith Lewis Herman argues that “a trauma is outside of language and, as a result, is unspeakable and unrepresentable” (Herman 1992 cited in: Edwards 2008: 136). Lourdes’ reaction when Jorge asks her to go to Cuba illustrates this point. She refuses her father’s proposition but she does not say why; her body reminds her of her trauma and speaks for her: “I can’t go back. It’s impossible. […] You don’t understand, Lourdes cries and searches the breeze above her. She smells the brilliantined hair, feels the scraping blade, the web of scars it left on her stomach” (García, 196). Indeed, her trauma is expressed through feelings; she “cries” which shows her pain. She also has difficulty to breathe because she “searches the breeze above her”, which means that she feels oppressed only by thinking to go back to the place of her trauma. Furthermore, Lourdes’ aggression left her with physical sequelae. She “feels” sensations related to suffering (“scraping blade”, “web of scars”), which demonstrates that, unconsciously, she associates the place of her aggression with pain. It is besides what Judith Lewis Herman claims: “a trauma is often that which is suppressed within individual’s consciousness, so traumatic material is often difficult, if not impossible to depict” (Herman 1992 cited in Edwards 2008: 136). Thus, García devised a master stroke by letting Lourdes’ body express itself against the idea of going back to Cuba.

The repercussion of Lourdes’ impossibility to talk of her trauma is that she fears that her suffering becomes forgotten. However, instead of staying passive, she reacts on a political level. When she is finally in Cuba, she goes back to the place of her aggression: “She lost her second child in this place. […] What she fears most is this: that her rape, her baby’s death were absorbed quietly by the earth” (227). Through the metaphor “absorbed quietly by the earth”, the reader finds out that Lourdes is afraid that her suffering is forgotten and meaningless. It leads the reader to believe that Lourdes has engaged in politics to give a sense to her aggression. Indeed, she has become an anti-communist: “[s]he is convinced that she can fight Communism from behind her bakery counter” (García, 136). After all, it is because of the introduction of a communist government that Lourdes’ aggression occurred. It confirms that, as Kali Tal suggests, “the memories of traumatic events often involve cultural-political movements” (Tal 1996 cited in Edwards 2008: 133). Tal further argues that the “traumatic experience becomes a weapon in another battle, the struggle for political power” (Tal 1996 cited in Edwards 2008: 133). It is interesting to note the word field of war in both Tal’s second statement (“weapon”, “battle”, “power”) and Lourdes’ conviction towards Communism (“fight”). It means that Lourdes’ political fight can be interpreted as a revenge on her past: she lost a battle but not the war.

Therefore, through the narrative structure that helps making links between the events of the past, the expression of Lourdes’ unconscious feelings through her body, and her reaction after the traumatic event, the reader finds out Lourdes’ version of history. Her recollection of traumatic events enables the reader to understand the different positions that follow episodes of history such as the introduction of a revolutionary government in Cuba. Justin D. Edwards claims that “the postcolonial writer who captures memories often does so as a way of bearing witness to the traumatic histories of the past” (138). Indeed, García, by recalling not only individual memories –for instance through Lourdes’ story– but also a collective memory –through the history of black people– gives a voice to the people who suffered and thus the historical truth is revealed.

Bibliography

Primary Text:

García, Cristina. Dreaming in Cuban. New York: Ballantine Books, 1992.

Secondary Text:

Edwards, Justin D. “Chapter Twelve: Memory.” Postcolonial Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.

Works Cited:

Herman, Judith. Trauma and Recovery. New York: Basic Books, 1992.

Tal, Kali. Worlds of Hurt: Reading the Literatures of Trauma. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.