A Cuban Parable: Samuel Becket's "Endgame"

We are in the middle of a theater festival and this helps us escape the boring programming on television and the limited recreational choices, almost all in convertible pesos, of the Havana night. Guided by the drama and comedy, we try to dispel our everyday problems, the frustrations and doubts created by this script of the absurd in which we live. But in these darkened rooms we don't always manage the evasion, rather we may find keys to revisit and reinterpret our reality.

On Saturday, a small local theater, Agros, on the corner of Ayestaran and May 20th Streets, put on Samuel Beckett's play, "Endgame." We went early to find space on the rustic wooden benches. Believe me, nearly two hours without a backrest on a hard bench can only be tolerated if the staging is excellent. Well, the night before last was the kind to make you forget your cramps and aching neck. And not through amusement or laughter, but by creating that torment that keeps us in suspense, that human anxiety that draws our attention to everything we lack.

An elderly man, blind and dying, maintains an abusive relationship with his servant, keeping him submissive, controlling him through habit and blackmail. In a wheelchair, the capricious patient wants to direct everything that happens and uses the eyes of his subject to do so. A sickly gratitude and the inability to imagine other life circumstances tie Clov to his master Hamm and postpone the day when he will achieve independence. Through a dirty window he sees the sea, a symbol of everything outside that is prohibited, of everything we are forbidden to experience.

Later we walked home, utterly overcome by the apprehension engendered by the drama. The black-painted walls were too strong, the shouts of the despot demanding attention and calling out to us--with so much coarseness and familiarity, "the unspeakable nature of the relations of power, its mystery and its rituals of blame, blackmail, impositions, pardons, manipulations..."*

* Remarks by Carlos Celdran, director of Argos Theater, in the program notes for "Endgame," performed by Pancho García, Waldo Franco, Jose Luis Hidalgo, Veronica Diaz.

Yoani's blog, Generation Y, can be read here in English translation.

Follow Yoani Sanchez on Twitter: www.twitter.com/yoanisanchez

Comments

[FloresdelaHoz]

Patience, everything will change over the next five years in Cuba. For now we must continue taking baby steps towards helping the desperate Cuban people survive living a real life 1984.

But let's not lose sight of the fact that Castro has an IQ in the 160s. He will go down in history as the most important figure in the history of the Western Hemisphere. If he succeeds in the Left winning Mexico in 2012 he may well go down as the most significant a figure in Western history since Napoleon.

We are dealing with an extrenely confident and fearless genius. We cannot afford to do anything impulsive. Obama should continue taking well thought out baby steps with Castro. Time is finally on our side. Patrience is the key.

[SigmundF]

castro had the opportunity to become the greatest man in modern times by creating a new order in international relationship and driving Cuba to a prominent place in the world transforming the country in an example of democracy, welfare and economic prosperity but he put all this aside to become a successful dictator with the absolute world record in keeping the power and getting rich. As an extraordinary intelligent man he realized that the first would be a very difficult and uncertain task, while the second would be relatively easy to achieve. Thus he lost the opportunity to be a great man but got the title of great tyrant.

[DeSwiss]

Here's to the day when the blind and sickly are made to see. Or, failing that, to no longer suffer their sickness, nor others suffer from it. So that those who must care for them can finally find the relief they seek.

And here's to hoping that it's soon.