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This dissertation examines postmodernism in Cuban literature, specifically in the narrative and essay genres. My thesis is that with the triumph of the Cuban revolution in 1959, the gestation of postmodernist thought began in earnest. Leaning on theoretical ideas from both Europe and the United States as well as from Latin America and Cuba, I synthesize diverse streams of thought from Francois Lyotard, Frederic Jameson, Roberto Fernández Retamar and Margarita Mateo in order to describe the insertion of postmodernism in Cuba in spite of its initial official rejection. Drawing on diverse literary works, I analyze this process which began in earnest at the end of the 1980's and has continued inside and outside of Cuba to the present time.
In the first two chapters, after discussing postmodern hermeneutics in Cuba and spotlighting the battle between creative artists and the functionaries who support a "socialist" modernity, I examine two exemplary texts still not published in Cuba: Vista del amanecer en el trópico (1974) by Guillermo Cabrera Infante and Muerte de nadie (2003) by Arturo Arango. In the third and fourth chapters, I analyze the use of José Martí, advocate of Cuban independence and the most revered patriot in the nationalist narrative of the island. Poet and renowned modern literary figure, Martí has been converted into the warhorse of Cuban postmodernism, both as a symbol of devotion as well as rejection. With respect to this symbol, I analyze a series of literary works where he appears as a protagonist as well as of a part of the abundant oeuvre of essays that make him an object of study both in order to praise him as well as to condemn him. I consider Martí to be the most effective symbol of the Cuban struggle between failed modernism, more or less paralyzed, and postmodernism which now in Cuba represents the revolutionary character that modernism had at its inception.