This is a truly brilliant work of art!

I admit it, I did not pay attention to Reynaldo Arenas' work until the release of the film version of "Before Night Falls." I'm happy that so much attention has been paid to such a great writer, but the irony, like that permeating his writing, is that the world is shown this great artist only a decade after his death.

Of course "Before Night Falls" his memoir, is pivotal, but I was interested in "The Doorman" because I wanted to see what Arenas' friend, Lazaro, inspired him to write, or co-write, as was referenced in the film. Also, imagining the handsome actor Olivier Martinez (who played Lazaro, who actually was a doorman) being Juan the doorman in the book, made it special and sexy.

But the book! A wonderful, brief, concise and utterly charming allegory of suffering, immigration, and the absurdities of metropolitan life. I think the animals are meant to represent the various factions of oppressed people under Cuban communism, who cannot agree on how to escape. By limiting his setting to mostly the building where he works, Arenas provides a microcosm of human idiocy and animal desperation.

This is a must-have for all new Reynaldo Arenas fans. Thanks to his friend Lazaro for inspiring this soulful jewel.

Parable, fantasy, allegory,this is the story of a modern saint naive, surrounded by his wards who co-exist in a high rise Manhattan apartment building where he caters to their quotidian and existential needs; each tenant having his/her own bizarre, laughable, but ultimitely tragic life. As many Manhattanites do, this ensemble of characters has a pet and lives in a quirky, unsettling symbiotic relationship with the animals, be they cats, dogs, orangutangs, or bears. Arenas paints a broad mindscape clearly, coherently, imaginatively, wildly. The doorman himself--a displaced Cuban--displays passion, sympathy, perpexity toward this odd array of tenants, but it is they who are ultimately displaced--from their humanity. "Our fault lies in our partialities" Tennessee Williams once wrote, and in their futile attempts at finding coherence and meaning through the most bizarre behaviors, the denizens who inhabit our doorman's building never attain or fulfill their dreams. Rather, they merely embroil their innocent pets in their own morass. And when the pets rebel, the doorman becomes their champion. This is truly a spiritual novel that is wonderful to read. There are reminders of Vonnegut, Orwell, Kafka, "magical realism" in here, but Arenas is truly a unique voice whose work nearly transcends literature, taking (at least myself) into an altered state of consciousness. Arenas, whose life most would not consider "saintly," has written a book that addresses the pressing "life issues" of many of us. This book is vividly and comfortably translated into English by D. Koch, whose contribution to delivering the thoughts of the author should not be overlooked. I think you can tell I loved this book.

This autobiography is an excellent piece of literature and history. This is my second look into Cuban literature (the first piece being "Mascaras" by Leonardo Padura Fuentes). I now wish to read more about Cuban writers, especially those in exile.

Reinaldo Arenas vividly recounts his life in this autobiography. I do not know of the quality of the translations, therefore I do not know if the magic of the author's words are lost in the translation. If you are fluent in Spanish, I recommend you read the text in its original form. I think it is important we all take the time to open our hearts and minds ...

en mi opinion creo que esta obra se acerca mas a lo que en realidad la palabra realidad significa, en contraste con la realidad que nuestros propios sentidos pudieran percibir jamas. Mientras uno va violando una por una la intimidad de estas paginas, se envuelve en esa utopía que incluso actualmente viven los cubanos, ( cuando digo eutopía me refiero, a esa vision del mundo que tienen los cubanos, que viven en un lugar tan personal que solo existe por ellos y para ellos), porque el escribe poniendo por supuesto en primer plano su propia existencia, su propio recorrido y mas que nada sus sentimientos; Pero dejando en foco un segundo plano, que nos da una participación lo suficientemente intima como para pasar desapercibidos en las calles de la habana de aquellos años que Reynaldo Arenas describe y siente con tanta sinceridad.

Queda sobre entendido, la calidad de la obra y sobre todo la calidad del autor.

This book is one of the best books I have ever read! Arenas is a master story teller!

I love it when I read a book and the author is able - through words - to transport me to that time and place. I could feel his happiness, his pain, I could smell what he was smelling, see what he was seeing . . . I was by his side through his tribulations in Cuba.

I have to admit that I was saddened when I reached the end page.

His use of the Spanish language is masterful and colorful - - you almost can taste every word he uses.

This novel is a dialogue between fiction and history, but it also forces the readers to build a story in their minds. Many chapters are written from several perspectives, in other words, the same events are told in different ways; therefore, if five readers were to get together to discuss this book, the basic ideas would be the same, but the storyline would vary from reader to reader as each of them selected which chapter becomes "real" for them. One should also keep in mind the irony of Arenas writing this book about a persecuted man, Servando Teresa de Mier, and the author's life reflecting his art. Perhaps that's why Arenas was compelled to write about this historical figure in the first place. This is a difficult read but worth the effort.

I met the Reinaldo Arena's work in 1997, by the reading of this book. I felt in love with his writting and I became his fan. Now, he is famous because of the movie "Before Night Falls", but I already admired him. This is an fascinating novel where the History argues with one amazing story: it is like a mix between reality and fiction. Strange (very strange) things happen there. It is the story/history about Fray Servando, a latin-american hero, who lives in the mexican independence time. He fights against the spanish Inquisition and strange enemies with amazing powers chasing him: but he always runs away by "magic".

In "Farwell to the Sea," Arenas continues his Pentagonia series by departing from the hallucinatory violence presented in the first two books ("Singing from the Well" and "Palace of the White Skunks") and entering the minds of a young married couple spending a week by the sea. Divided in two parts, the first part is the stream-of-consciousness narrative by the unnamed woman who resents her baby, fears losing her husband, and who feels helpless to cope with the communist society in Cuba. She aches for her husband's love, yet is suspicious of his infidelity, particularly when a handsome and taciturn teen-aged boy arrives with his loquacious mother and moves into the cottage next to theirs. Her dreams are mixed into her daily conscious narrative and reveal her anxiety, torment and fears. In one dream with sexual connotations, she sees visions of Greek warriors slaughtering each other in a violent orgy-like battle. And in another vivid rendition of the ubiquitous cue of the communist life, Cubans stand morosely in line while soldiers standy nearby, gunning down anyone that dares defies them or attempts to alter the cue.

The second part is from the husband's, Hector, perspective, but it's primarily told in poetic form and involves often allegorical portrayals of how he sees Cuban life and his own. His resentment underscores much of his tale, even his attraction to the boy next door, which becomes a central conflict during his stay. He longs for the boy and to freely express his homosexuality, yet feels the omnipresent oppression of the communist system as it systematically stifles all that is human. Perhaps one of the most poignant passages is the following poem in which Hector expresses what the communist system has done to his and everyone else's humanity: "You are no longer a man who calls things by their name -- you blaspheme. You are no longer a man who laughs -- you jeer. You are no longer a man who hopes -- you mistrust. You are no longer a man who loves -- you accept. You are no longer a man who dreams aloud -- you are silent. You no longer sleep and dream -- you are sleepless. You are no longer one who is wont to believe -- you consent. You are no longer a seeker -- you hide." And then he adds the line (not 30 yet) to signify how communism has jaded him and turned him into a hopeless cynic while still a young man.

Beautifully written, and a tale that will bear repeated readings.

A young Cuban couple gain permission to spend a week at a beach resort. They spend most of their time sitting by the ocean, silent in private thought. We get inside her head for the 7 days and then into his, receiving different perspectives and views on the vacation, and on their current lives. Arenas does a fantastic job of expressing both her and his frustrations at their station in life, and in the freedom they feel has deserted them. She laments the burden of motherhood and the loss of her personal sense of self. He laments his loss of freedom as the Castro government clamps harder down on writers and artists. Also, driving his frustration is his own frustration as a closet homosexual in a straight, macho world. Arenas does not overtly state his themes, but reveals them like one peeling an onion. There is layer after layer to discover.. and the underlying themes of the novel come across through reverie and daydreams.. hallucinations of the young couple as they stare at the water. It is this non-linear dual-narrative style of writing that is so effective as through their private thoughts, we start to understand the true essence of the lives of this young, but jaded young couple.

Los mejores cuentos de Reinaldo Arenas. Empieza con un monologo que describe en modo eficaz la represion y enajenacion del sistema (de La Habana...) y termina con otro monologo sobre la imposibilidad de "ser" fuera de donde fuimos (...a Nueva York).

Hopefully the successful audience response to the film of Arenas' "Before Night Falls" will encourage readers to explore the unique and vastly enriching glimpses of Castro's (or any dictator's for that matter) Cuba. The author's style is indelibly his own, reporting and commenting on the conditions of political supression, whether he elects to satirize in the first person/s as in "Color of Summer" with its over the edge surreal view of contemporary Cuba, or placing the narrator from within as in "The Assault". Truth, as he viewed it, is so ludicrous that it becomes black comedy, not unlike Goya's "Goyescas". But for all the unsettling details of this tale of destruction of all that matters in our past, this book, once read burns a spot in our minds that makes it almost necessary to revisit it lest we forget the joy of freedom. Tough reading, but highly recommended.

Since I read the first chapter of the book I was not able to stop until I finished.The imagination of Reinaldo Arenas is outstanding.In his own peculiar way of writting he create a world that he called Cuba.His description of the cuban regime mainly Fidel Castro (FIFO),is unique part fantasy,part reality, but actually the fantasy is also reality.It is not an easy book to read if you do not dominate the cuban language,and I do not think that there is anyone able to trasnlate the book without the book loosing all the meanings that Arenas place in it,his three diferent personalities,the members of the political aparatus in Cuba and the way that Reinaldo being a homosexual and prosecuted by the goverment was able to write this magnifecent book,one of the best in the new era of Cubans artist,writers poets and painters totally uknown to the outside world.

I read this book many years a go and had been looking for it.I'm so glad to have found it again.Here americans can learn about authors that are not well know in the U.S. and what they saw and felt in their countries ie.oppression,hate,love,fear and joy.One of my favorite writers besides Reinaldo Arenas is De Andrade a brazilian author(gay) with a magnificent way of expressing the love for his fellow men and for a counrty in turmoil.One of his quotes is inscribed in a friends tombstone and it goes something like this"And the late night revelers and the drunken people passed us by say nothing".I recommend this book for not only gay people but for all americans to learn more about Latin Americans but to learn tolerence and understanding of what it is to be different yet the same.

If the famous altarpiece of Hieronymous Bosch , similarly titled the Garden of Earthly Delights, could become words, those words would probably read much like Reinaldo Arenas' last volume. As with any fine writer (and make no bones about it, Arenas is one of the best of the Latin writers), the act of drawing an audience into a book is part enjoyment but also part labor. Plan on working to catch all the subtle metaphors and references as well as the obvious in-your-face slapstick that flows continously from these pages.

Arenas' bifurcated feelings about his native Cuba are well know to the readers of his other novels: Cuba he adores - Castro he loathes. And as the author was dying from AIDS in the US he was able to concentrate all of his ambiguous responses to his native homeland into a grand guignol carnival Farewell Party. The precis for the story is the preparation for the celebration of Fifo's (thinly disguised name for Fidel Castro) "50th" anniversary of dictatorship. Arenas very cleverly separates his personality into three faces - Gabriel, Reinaldo, and Skunk in a Funk - in order to give us the many facets of view of living in Cuba now and before Castro. His characters are hilariously drawn campy creatures in an endless pursuit of earthly delights (aka gay sex) and if the interchange of gender pronouns (him/her) at times gets a bit overused, the premise is sound and keeps the stew bubbling. Even the atrocities attributed to "Fifo" are handled in sure polished slapstick that we are drawn more to laughter than to loathing. Cuba is finally liberated by being separated from its mooring to the sea floor to float out blissfully toward Europe..or....

Arenas was a brilliant writer who died too young, but as this final translation of his output proves, his was a significant voice not only as a gay writer, but as a revolutionary thinker under the duress of loss of freedom that still plagues Cuba. Highly recommended book....just plan to work some and to take your time.......

Wow! I just finished reading "The Color Of Summer" by the late Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas--and what a challenge it is for me to describe or assess this extraordinary work of fiction. It seems to be a hybrid of memoir, satire, and wild, hallucinatory magical realism. Maybe I should de-emphasize the term "realism." Historical events are exaggerated or transmogrified by the author--often with hilarious and irreverent results. The relentless pursuit of pleasure is constantly at odds with the pursuit of power. In one chapter entitled "The Garden Of Computers" Arenas brilliantly satirizes the bureaucracy of informants. "...denunciations, backstabbings, and betrayals of friendship were the nourishment the machines lived on." This is as brilliant as anything Dickens ever wrote about corrupt institutions. Other authors that came to mind as I read "The Color Of Summer" were Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, William Burroughs and, especially, Salman Rushdie. The amazing word-play in this book(in which 30 tongue twisters are interspersed)is delightful. Credit for this must surely be shared by the English translator Andrew Hurley. Sex(especially gay sex)is an obsession with most of the characters in this book-including the central tyrant Fifo(Castro). This is not a book for the timid or prudish. However, underneath it all there is a powerful affimation of the human spirit. Arenas expresses profound sadness, frustration, and anger--which cuts right through all the raucous humor. But, more than that, he imparts a sense of real joy through his characters' acts of defiance and creativity. I thoroughly recommend this book. A masterpiece.

The translation of this work is amazing - no way would you know that this delightful queen, Arenas, didn't originally write this in wickedly idiomatic English. He had to write this story, what?, seven times? It was confiscated, stolen, and lost over and over. And he re-wrote it over and over, until he could escape to freedom and finally see it in print. The story is a scream of queer humor atop the most tragic background of brutal state repression. Yet, in a way that only imprisoned Cubans seem to know how to do, his pride and dignity survive.

The first novel of Arenas's "Pentagonia" ... beautiful, poignant, and at times downright frustrating. Reality and fantasy seamlessly interweave in this depiction of a boy's childhood in pre-Castro Cuba. I am having a difficult time putting into words my experience with this novel. Arenas's prose is gorgeous, poetic in its lyricism, crossing into a style that reads like a fusion between Walt Whitman and James Joyce, reminiscent of the latter particularly in the novel's final section, a mad and hallucinatory set piece that takes place during Christmas and is written completely as dialogue. There is much abuse - both physical and psychological - to be endured in these pages, yet through it all Arenas maintains a strangely uplifting tone. His descriptions of nature are stunning in their simplicity and detail, as is the relationship between the young narrator and his mother that provides the through-line around which the action of the novel centers.

By its end, the reader is left moved and exhilarated, yet painfully aware that life for this boy and his mother really isn't going to get much better ... and, if we are to read the narrator as Reinaldo Arenas himself, in fact, will get much much worse.

I was frequently reminded of Julian Schnabel's film of Arenas's memoir "Before Night Falls", particularly of the early childhood scenes at the beginning of the film. If you haven't seen it, it serves as an excellent introduction to the life of this amazing artist. If you have seen it, the film stands to be viewed again.

I could not put this book down ...even though sometimes I thought I would throw up..incredibly honest and very descriptive, I actually fell in love with Reinaldo, if he were alive today I would give anything to meet him..even though I am female , I think he would like me , and our love of the ocean would bind us together!!!oops this review is meant for before night falls

As a student of literature I have read my fair share of books. So far, this is my favorite. It is incredibly emotional and I found myself completely attached to the narrator. I have not read the rest of the books in Arena's collection, what he calls the Pentagonia, but now I plan to do so. Read this book! It is worth your time.