Erikson, who conducted exten-
sive interviews for the book (mostly
the future, this younger generation,
given a chance, will vote with its feet
and leave the country.
Those who do leave Cuba join a
diaspora that stretches from Miami
to Moscow. This is the subject of
The Portable Island, a book edited by
University of Michigan anthropology
professor Ruth Behar and Amherst
College associate Spanish professor
Lucía M. Suárez, which encourages
the reader to reflect on how history
has shaped Cuban identity. Cuba is a
“portable island” not only for those
who have left, but “even for [the Cu-
bans] who live [there], for they are
witnesses to the endless departures
and returns, and they know what fits
and doesn’t fit in a suitcase.” This ex-
traordinarily rich book shines a light
on what it means to be a member of
the Cuban “tribe.” Contributors reside
in and out of Cuba and some are even
“between” Cuba and some indetermi-
nate place, with each offering a win-
dow into the Cuban experience.
There is much to choose from in
this book—essays, reflections, poetry,
Apathetic and pessimistic about
stories in the Cuban-American stand-
off. He looks at the Wasp Network—
a group of five Cuban intelligence
officers who were convicted by a
Miami jury in 2001—and the case of
accused spy and former U. S. Defense
Intelligence Agency senior analyst
Ana Belén Montes. Both cases—and
the more recent arrest (June 2009)
of former U.S. State Department employee Kendall Myers and his wife
on similar charges—underscore the
effectiveness of Cuban intelligence.
Erikson also looks at the internecine
battles of the Cuban-American community, the judicial embarrassment
surrounding the case of anti-Castro
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles and Fidel Castro’s artful use of six-year-old
Elián González. More topically, he
covers the brutal crackdown on dissidents in 2003 and the emergence of
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez
as the revolution’s new sugar daddy,
providing more than 115,000 barrels
of oil per day at subsidized prices.
outside Cuba), lets his subjects speak
for themselves. And, occasionally,
their words speak volumes. We hear
the echoes of the ongoing debate
within the Cuban government: economist Pedro Monreal, who later left
Cuba to work in Jamaica, says lifting the embargo “would have a huge,
rapid impact…[for which] Cuba would
not be prepared,” but then observes
that “many of my friends tell me that
Cuba has the manpower to control
the effects of lifting the embargo.”
FRESH LOOK
The last chapter focuses on the
country’s so-called “bridge generation,” born in the late 1960s and early
1970s and educated under the Revolution. There, Erikson correctly argues
that Raúl Castro’s greatest challenge
is in dealing with “the growing impatience of the island’s restless youth,”
who are resentful of the bureaucratic
hurdles to secure exit visas, the dual
currency system that discriminates
between those with and without access to dollars, and the limitations
on travel within and off the island.
