On Hearing Huber Matos Speak

He is a small man, neatly turned out, compact, looking maybe like the chap who runs your stationary store, reminding me improbably of William Faulkner, quiet, dignified, never raising his voice. He speaks before some two dozen people at a gathering called by the League for Industrial Democracy. I sit there, a little stunned, trying to digest the thought that this man is a hero of our time, unsung, uncelebrated.

Huber Matos was a comrade-in-arms of Fidel Castro, fighting in the campaign to overthrow the Batista dictatorship; when it became clear that Fidel was intent upon establishing another, more efficient dictatorship, Matos sent him a letter asking simply to be allowed to withdraw from politics, pull out of “the movement,...