The Diary of a Fellow Traveler

Laurette Séjourné and the Cuban Revolution in 1970

Abstract

Starting in 1970, a significant segment of the new intellectual left began to challenge the alignment of the Cuban regime with the URSS and the constraints placed on freedom of expression, leading them to distance themselves from the Cuban cause. The defection of intellectuals from various countries coincided with the official invitation extended by the government to the Franco-Italian archaeologist Laurette Séjourné for a visit in the mid-1970s. Rapidly, Séjourné became a “fellow traveler” and initiated a close collaboration with Casa de las Americas and the Federation de Mujeres Cubanas. This article is based on Séjourné’s diary of her trip to Cuba. The diary reveals that the process of radicalization she underwent had a personal transformative aspect, with an underlying spiritualist –almost esoteric– dimension that was also present in her work as an archaeologist in Mexico. The spiritual component played a determining role in Séjourné’s adherence to the Cuban cause, to the extent that it intertwined and was compatible with the redemptive rhetoric used by the regime.