In Before Night Falls, Arenas recounts his journey from a poverty-stricken childhood in rural Cuba to his death in New York four decades later. In between he tells of his odyssey from adolescent rebel fighting for the Revolution, through his suppression as a writer, his disillusionment with Castro, his imprisonment and torture, and his eventual flight from Cuba. Before Night Falls illuminates the importance of Arenas' life as a symbol of the individual against society and of the potential for art to liberate, and confirms the power of the outcast to see and record the truth. In distilled and powerful language, Before Night Falls tells Arenas' own story -- a Kafkaesque life re-created in his highly acclaimed novels.