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Rafael Ocasio. A Gay Cuban Activist in Exile: Reinaldo Arenas. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2007. 191pp.
No Latín American gay writer has attracted the critical attention that Reinaldo Arenas has; indeed, no Latin American gay writer has come to enjoy something of a public reputation beyond the realm of Latin American cultural studies. Julian Schnabel's 2000 Before Night Falls, an iffy film version of Arenas's posthumously published autobiography Antes que anochezca, with the double billing of Johnny Depp, is part of this cache, but it has also to do with the touting of Arenas by some as an icon of political persecution in Castro's Cuba and by others as an icon of homophobia at the hands of both revolutionary Cuba and the Miami resistance community. And, too, a certain gypsyish quality of his life, abetted by Javier Bardem's portrayal of him in Schnabel's film, has...