Cuban poet Rafael Alcides dies

June 21, 2018

The Cuban writer Rafael Alcides, considered one of the last great living poets of the island, has died in Havana at the age of 85. He had been removed from public life for more than two decades and unpublished in his native country, according to confirmation from the writer's family.

Alcides (Bayamo, 1933) considered himself an "insiliated" person within Cuba and died from cancer that he had suffered from for several years. He belonged to the second generation of the so-called Poetic Generation of the Fifties, along with Fayad Jamís, Pablo Armando Fernández and Antón Arrufat, almost all cultivators of colloquialism.

His first published collections of poems were "Himnos de montaña" (1961), "Gitana" (1962) and "La pata de palo" (1967). At the end of the 1960s, the first decade of the Cuban Revolution in power, Alcides decided for the first time to withdraw from the island's cultural scene. He returned to the Cuban editing system, entirely state-run, about twenty years later with what would be his most recognized work: "Agradecido como un perro" (1983), with which he became the reference poet for Cubans born in the second half of the twentieth century.

The homonymous poem is considered "a work of art of conversational language," which shows "the warmth of a man who expresses himself with his skin open to the world, even though he may receive wounds or caresses," according to Cuban critic and poet Virgilio López Lemus. His last texts published in Cuba were "Noche en el recuerdo" (1989), "Y se mueren, y vuelven, y se mueren" (1989) and "Nadie" (1993).

In the midst of the 1990 economic crisis in Cuba, Alcides withdrew from cultural life and virtually disappeared from the public spotlight on the island, "disappointed" by the Revolution that he loved so much and "for which he would have died," according to what he claimed in 2009, when he traveled to Spain to present his first book in 16 years. At that time he confessed that a poem could be "a machine of intelligence or emotion," and explained that he was never "persecuted" by the Cuban Government, despite writing a column in a newspaper that "is not friendly" to the Government, which he harshly criticized "for being against freedom of expression."

Final Years

After that return, Rafael Alcides published four narrative works in Spain: "Libreta de viaje, 1962-2000," "El anillo de Ciro," "Un cuento de hadas que acaba mal" and "Memorias del porvenir," and the poetry collections "Conversaciones con Dios" and "GMT." In one of his last interviews, in 2011, he clarified that his decision to "stay apart" from Cuban reality was "his way of not collaborating" without having to leave his country, where he wanted to "pay his penance" until the end of his life.

In 2014 he resigned from his membership in the Union of Cuban Writers and Artists (UNEAC), and had previously declined on several occasions the offer of the National Literature Prize, the highest award given to a writer in the Caribbean country.

Alcides received in 2015 the Independent National Literature Prize Gastón Baquero, created by institutions of Cuban exile to distinguish the literary work of exiled and censored creators within the island. "Nadie," the documentary directed by Cuban filmmaker Miguel Coyula and inspired by the poet's life, premiered in 2016 surrounded by controversy, in a small room before a dozen people.

Alcides, whose remains will be cremated by family decision, is survived by three children and his wife, blogger Regina Coyula. So far, the Cuban state media have not reported on the death of the author.

Source: ABC.es