A member of the generation of Cuban writers who emerged on the literary scene of the island during the 1960s, Reinaldo Arenas has been almost unanimously hailed as one of the most significant authors contributing to the formation of a "new writing" mode in Spanish America. His passionate and transgressive works are salient examples of the radical changes experienced by Cuban society and culture in the fervor of its first postrevolutionary years. His novels and short stories are notable additions to the ongoing experimentations of the most recent Spanish-American narrative, which found its impetus in the international recognition accorded to previous generations of writers. Within his group of younger authors, which has come to be broadly and imprecisely identified as the post-Boom generation, Arenas voiced staunch opposition to any discourse of power, be it political or cultural, that imposes an official ideology on the imagination, on its rights...