Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Dreaming in Cuban, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Passion, Romance, and Marriage
Intergenerational Conflict
Religious Diversity
History and Personal Identity
Obsession and Devotion
Summary
Analysis
1979. These days, Jorge speaks with Lourdes less and less, and she can’t hear him as clearly. She grieves her father’s death more deeply than before. Lourdes asks Jorge why he really left Cuba. He says it’s because he couldn’t bear to watch Celia falling in love with the Revolution. He really loved Celia, and he believes she loved him too, in her own way.
Jorge’s conversation with Lourdes reveals that he always knew Celia didn’t love him the way he wanted her to, and that after Gustavo faded in Celia’s life, Castro and the Revolution took his place. Unable to come to terms with this during his life, he seems to be accepting it after death.
Themes
A month later, in winter, Lourdes and Jorge walk together on the Brooklyn Bridge. Jorge says that he can’t return after this, so he needs to tell her a few things. After a long silence, he tells Lourdes that Celia really loved her. He confesses that when he left Celia with his mother and sister, early in their marriage, he knew how much it would damage her. Part of him wanted to punish Celia for loving Gustavo. When he returned from his travels, he saw that he had succeeded.
Jorge admits that Celia’s mental collapse, and the resultant neglect of her children, is really his fault because of his inability to accept Celia’s feelings for Gustavo and himself for what they were. This suggests that the family’s troubles had their root not so much in Celia’s obsession as in Jorge’s jealousy and vindictiveness.
Themes
After Celia spent time in the asylum, they moved to the beach to help her continue to heal. But Jorge kept traveling because he couldn’t bear Celia’s indifference to him. He wanted to take Lourdes all for himself, but Celia loved her. Jorge also tells Lourdes about Felicia’s death. Lourdes must go back to Cuba, he says. When Lourdes says he doesn’t understand, Jorge replies that he knows about the rape. He tells Lourdes that he loves her, and then he’s gone.
Jorge tries to assure Lourdes of what she’s never really believed: that her mother truly did love her. However, this is only one reason that Lourdes must return to Cuba—she must also try to find closure regarding the assault, which she’s never told anyone about. Jorge fades, apparently having told Lourdes everything she needed to hear from him. With her father finally gone, it’s now Lourdes’s turn to try to come to terms with her life.
Themes
Pilar (1980). Pilar chats with Franco, a Spanish-speaking cashier in a record shop, and feels nostalgic for her younger days, even though she’s only 21. Pilar feels uninspired these days. She wanders into a botánica on Park Avenue that she’s never been to before. She looks at the snakeskins, wooden saints, incense, potions, and spices. She watches the elderly proprietor prescribing a love spell to a young woman, and Pilar envies the young woman’s clarity about what she wants. Pilar hasn’t felt that way since she ran away to Miami as a kid. Since then, her destiny has never quite felt like hers.
Pilar still feels that she’s at loose ends. She feels instinctively drawn to the botánica, where Santería religious items are sold, even though she’s never practiced the religion herself. Like Lourdes and Celia, it seems that Pilar is looking for something, though she doesn’t know what. Her discomfort with her identity seems to stem partly from the inaccessibility of Cuba—something that’s out of her control.
Themes
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As Pilar examines the shop’s wares, the proprietor comes over and calls her “a daughter of Changó.” He tells Pilar that she must finish what she began. He gathers herbs, a votive candle, and holy water, and he gives her instructions to bathe for nine nights. After that, the proprietor says, Pilar will know what she should do. He won’t let her pay, saying these things are a gift from the god.
The proprietor senses a special destiny for Pilar. This is a turning point for Pilar, as she finally has the tools to determine what to make of her life, rather than being constrained by politics or family strife.
Themes
Excited, Pilar takes a shortcut through Morningside Park. She remembers one of her childhood nannies telling her about Changó, the temperamental god of fire and lightning. Suddenly, however, three boys surround Pilar, the tallest wielding a knife. They force her under a tree and take turns suckling her breasts, and then they steal some of her magical herbs to smoke. Pilar contains her fear, waits until they’re gone, and runs home.
Pilar’s quest for self-discovery is disrupted by violence. This incident suggests that even self-confident women like Pilar live in a world that does not respect who they are and will try to degrade their confidence at every opportunity. It seems that America is no different than Cuba in this regard.
Themes
When Pilar reaches the university, nothing makes sense to her. She thinks she hears conversations from passing cars in the fluorescent lights. Back in her room, she finally starts her bath. Each night, after her bath with the sacred herbs, she paints. On the ninth night, she calls Lourdes to tell her they’re going to Cuba.
Pilar’s traumatic experience in the park seems to trigger symptoms of mental illness, like what happened to Celia and Felicia at different points in their lives. Yet somehow, Pilar takes these in stride more than either her grandmother or her aunt Felicia ever did. She proceeds with the ritual and learns what she should do.
Themes
