Dreaming in Cuban - Themes

Themes

• Family Relationships

Family relationships are at the heart of Dreaming in Cuban, which explores how they are twisted by physical separation, politics, and lack of communication. Many of the relationships are ruptured in the novel. Mothers and daughters seem largely unable to connect, as nothing is able to close the distance between Lourdes and Celia, and Lourdes and Pilar are also divided by a lack of understanding. Similarly, Felicia is ultimately distanced from her entire family. Only the bond across generations seems to last: Celia is close to her grandchildren, Pilar in particular. The friendship that springs up between Ivanito and Pilar suggests that there may be hope for connection within the third generation of the family as well. Fathers and daughters, and mothers and sons also share closer relationships in the novel. The relationships between husbands and wives, on the other hand, seem to break often: Jorge and Celia spend the last years of his life apart, Felicia tries to kill two of her three husbands, and Lourdes and Rufino drift further and further apart until they no longer talk.

• Exile

This novel explores the impact that exile has on those in exile and those left behind. The exile in the novel reflects the real exile experienced by thousands of Cubans, as the Puente family flees Cuba in the wake of the revolution just as many did in 1961. Celia acutely feels the absence of her granddaughter in Cuba, and she is saddened by the nomadic existence of her children, but she is powerless to change these things. Lourdes uses the exile as an attempt to ignore her past in Cuba and bury the memory of her rape. Her vision of Cuba is frozen at that point in the past. Only in her return to Cuba is Lourdes able to revisit the memory of her rape and her lost child. Pilar grows up with a longing to return to her grandmother a Cuba without knowing the reality of life in Cuba beyond her memories. She too is powerless for a long time to reach Cuba—even her attempt at running away fails. She is distanced further from her family roots and her cultural heritage due to her mother’s unwillingness to speak of them. This distance is exemplified by Pilar’s distance from the Spanish language, as she only is able to dream in Spanish after she makes a return visit to Cuba.

• The Divisiveness of Politics

The rift created by politics is also an important theme of the novel. Politics pervade the novel—it is political conflict due to the revolution that leads to the Puente family’s exile. Politics also polarize the del Pino family’s relationships. Celia is steadfast in her support of the revolution, even to the point of suppressing creative works in her role as a judge. Her socialism links her more closely to her son Javier, but distances her from Lourdes and even Felicia, with whom she was once close. At the same time, Lourdes’ zealous pro-U.S. patriotism distances her from her own daughter Pilar. Ultimately, political inflexibility leads to increasing isolation—Celia is left alone in Cuba, while Lourdes returns home without any greater closeness with her daughter or husband.