Radio Netherlands report on Cuba's independent libraries

[Steve Marquardt]

Radio Netherlands on May 16 broadcast a program on Cuba's independent
libraries, emphasizing the work of the Pax Christi Nederland "Boeken
voor Cuba" program that sends books to the island.

Pax Christi Nederland has also arranged for writers, politicians, NGO
activists and union leaders to adopt individual prisoners of
conscience in Cuba, including several independent library prisoners.
More about that project, which could be replicated in the US library
and literary community, will be sent later.

Here the article and the URL for article that contains a link to the
audio (in English) of the Radio Netherlands program:

Bibliotecas Independientes
By Marijke van der Meer
May 16, 2008
http://www.radionetherlands.nl/currentaffairs/region/southamerica/tswi-080517-biblioteca

One of the showpieces of Cuba's socialist revolution is the nearly 100
percent literacy rate of its people.

Fidel Castro proclaimed at the 1998 Havana International Book Fair,
"There are no banned books in Cuba, only the lack of funds to purchase
them." This prompted two young political activists to open their home
library to the public.

Ten years later, there are now over a hundred of these informal
libraries-- bibliotecas independientes-- in Cuba. The books are
supplied by visiting foreign tourists.

The Dutch peace organization Pax Christi, for example, has set up a
project called 'Open the Door for Cuba'. Marianne Moor, head of the
organization's Latin America department explains:

"What we do is send volunteers to see what is needed and then we ask
Dutch tourists who go to Cuba to take the books with them in their
backpack and personally deliver them to one of the independent
libraries. One tourist we spoke with dropped off books in a library
they found in a very small house in a poor neighborhood in Santa
Clara, and she said the experience was both "very special" and also "a
little bit freaky":

"A man opened the door. He looked very nervous but he was happy to see
us and to hear that we were bringing books. He then very proudly
showed us his library, a small room with two bookshelves and a small
table. He also showed us very proudly a box with cards in it, with the
names of the people who come to borrow books, and he told us it was
not safe to have this box in his house. So every night he brought it
somewhere else so that when the police came it was not clear who was
borrowing books."

Critics respond

Pro-Cuban critics of American foreign policy say the bibliotecas
independientes are a front for political dissidents and are CIA-
funded. Moor does not believe this is true. "Some librarians are
politically active, which is their right, and people who fight for
democracy also tend to be more active in culture."

Moor explains that Cuban readers are very interested in what is being
written about Cuba, and in books and magazines that describe Europe,
such as the transition of the former communist countries to EU
membership.

Books for everyone

There is also a strong need for children's books. "Some libraries have
a more political focus, but when I say political I refer to history,
civil rights, also academic work not available in Cuba's official
communist libraries. So in our view they aren't even political books."
At the same time, there is no official black list of forbidden books
in Cuba. "What happens is that in fact no one knows which books are
forbidden and which aren't. Sometimes people are harrassed only for
having academic work in their house...You never know how far you can
go."