Jonathan Kozol's Children of the Revolution makes available to the people of the United States an account of a great human development which took place in Cuba almost 20 years ago: the near-elimination of illiteracy, and the continuing successful effort since then to see to it that virtually no Cubans lack a sixth-grade education. (p. 1)

A weakness of Children of the Revolution, and one which often produces a tone of over-wrought sentimentality, is Kozol's tendency to intrude subjective judgments, shaped by his deep distrust of what goes on in U.S. schools, upon uniquely Cuban phenomena. In his defense, however, it is all too natural for a conscientious and even critical North American to be carried away by the warmth, candor and purposeful character of the Cubans.

Probably, then, a book such as this, telling a previously untold story against a general background of U.S. distortion and media...