Cuba has had only ten years of revolution. It is a country still struggling to overcome a history of economic imperialism, social oppression, and hurricanes. Before 1959, Cuba was the world's leading supplier of dope and whores, and in Havana alone were the three most famous pornographic theatres in the world. By most standards, however, a Cuban culture, Cuban art, did not exist. (The one exception was the folk culture of the Afro-Cubans which is now flourishing and statesupported.) “Cuban theatre” consisted of a few professional groups in Havana who, by and large, did European imitations aimed at the tiny Cuban bourgeoisie.

Since 1959, the Cubans have developed an excellent professional theatre which is open to stylistic experiment; a large public which is much more honest than polite; and amateur theatre on all levels of society—in schools, factories, small towns, hospitals, cane-cutting brigades, youth brigades, the armed forces, etc.