Ramón Díaz-Marzo
HAVANA, February - Practicing journalism in Cuba today is the best school in the world for learning how to write. Among us, there are some old warriors who someday will write their books; but only recently has the right been earned to tell the truth that up to now has remained hidden.
The strongest incentive that we have to learn how to write is the 20 years in jail that we would have to serve if we were to be too truthful in what we write. That's why our chonicles and articles appear to be written from a WWI trench with obligatory military censorship in place.
For ission to our school, the first requirement is to be Cuban and the second is to show that one is experienced in wielding a sword. This skill is important because our training doesn't take place in virtual reality; if at any point since the beginning you get too smart, they'll take you
down.
Objective reality will always be there, if necessary, to chop off your head while they try to convince you to perform harakiri. That's why those of us who have survived the times when the Shogun was powerful and practically did as he pleased, what we learned we learned in difficult conditions.
To survive we had to use the sword that made us samurai. That's why we now practice a William Tell type of journalism, which always offers substantial knowledge of the Cuban problem. And that's why there is an invisible underlayment to our texts of the misterious charm of a journalism that doesn't
need the characteristic artifice of the slave press.
But for the good and the bad, life has its paradoxes guaranteeing wonder; specially if there is personal valor to keep a distance from self interest and one understands that, thanks to pressure and fear, these times are the best of times in which to write well. By the same token, some of the
salaried journalists of the State have also demonstrated their knowledge of swordmanship. So the best pages still remain to be written.
It is possible that when Damocles' sword no longer hang above the heads of the good and the bad, many of us will find it hard to construct a paragraph.
Then we will understand why pressure was more important than we imagined. I know that the most difficult task on the day we become free will be to find a substitute for the lack of liberty sustained by pressure and repression, because no other agony can be compared to this "Revolution."
But I trust I belong to the group of those who -biologically- have come to the world to pound on the keys of a typewriter, whether or not there are reasons to do so.
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