This collected proceedings of the First International Colloquium on the Significance of the Beatles' Work in Cuba (October 15-17, 1996) consists of 22 short, mostly Cuban-authored presentations that may be classified in two groups.
The first fifteen papers (17-108) briefly examine, from a universal vantage point, a wide range of topics that have already been more extensively analyzed elsewhere (e.g., the Beatles' musical heritage, their sense of humor, and an interpretation of the Revolver album). In addition to being inessential for Beatles fans, many of these articles are unsatisfactory for scholars of twentieth-century Cuban popular culture because they generally diverge from the stated objective of the conference: to discuss the social and cultural impact of the English band and their songs on Cubans from the 1960s up to the present day. Papers from the first half of the book are not examined in this review.
The seven authors of papers included in the second half of the book (111-49) undertake a fascinating search for answers to the complex and controversial questions of whether the Cuban government, in fact, officially prohibited the dissemination of the Beatles' music during the period 1964-1966, and, if so, why these songs were treated like forbidden fruit. This frank, animated, and sometimes polemic discussion among Cubans of the alleged proscription, and what it would imply about the revolutionary regime's interference in other aspects of the people's social and cultural lives during the mid-1960s, make this book valuable for scholars of twentieth-century Cuban popular culture as well as for Beatles' fans. This review examines some essential aspects of the opposing arguments forwarded at the colloquium.
