May 26, 2004
Dear Editor,
As the publisher of the book "The Motorcycle Diaries" by Ernesto Che
Guevara, I was somewhat mystified by Larry Rohter's "Che Today?" (May
26, 2004) and references to its "suppression" in Cuba.
The book has in fact been published in Cuba -- one edition published by
the publishing house of the Union of Young Communists. A further edition
is to be published in Cuba next month by the Che Guevara Studies Center,
and our publishing house is assisting in the publication of this new,
expanded edition.
There was no conspiracy in Cuba to hide this book or prevent its
publication. Having been personally involved in this and similar Che
Guevara book projects in Cuba for more than twenty years I can testify
that there is no conspiracy to prohibit the publication in Cuba of this
or any other book by Che Guevara. In fact, the opposite is the case. The
books are published with the support and enthusiasm of those who knew
and collaborated with Che Guevara. These figures include Fidel Castro.
Sincerely,
David Deutschmann
Publisher/President
Ocean Press
Editor of "Che Guevara Reader" (2003)
***
The New York Times - May 26, 2004
LETTER FROM THE AMERICAS
Che Today? More Easy Rider Than Revolutionary
by Larry Rohter
BUENOS AIRES, May 25 - Che Guevara is widely remembered today as a
revolutionary figure; to some a heroic, Christ-like martyr, to others
the embodiment of a failed ideology. To still others, he is just a
commercialized emblem on a T-shirt.
But for Latin Americans just now coming of age, yet another image of
Che is starting to emerge: the romantic and tragic young adventurer
who has as much in common with Jack Kerouac or James Dean as with
Fidel Castro.
The phenomenon began a decade ago with the publication of his
long-suppressed memoir known in English as "The Motorcycle Diaries,"
which has become a cult favorite among Latin American college students
and young intellectuals. But it is being catapulted ahead now by the
release this month of a Latin American-made film version of the book,
enthusiastically received both in the region and last week at Cannes.
Predictably, those on the traditional left in Cuba and elsewhere in
the region, who view themselves as the guardians of Che's legacy, have
not exactly welcomed this development. But others argue that it
reflects not only the malleability of Che's own character and
experience but also the need of each generation to fashion an image of
Che to suit its own needs and circumstances.
Very few young people today would subscribe to Che's belief that power
can be seized through guerrilla warfare. But they are disillusioned
with the wholesale embrace of capitalism that occurred across the
region during the 1990's. They see it as having aggravated economic
and social inequities that he railed against, and they are looking for
alternatives.
Che provides that because he is "a figure who can constantly be
examined and re-examined," as Jon Lee Anderson, author of "Che
Guevara: A Revolutionary Life," puts it.
"To the younger, post-cold-war generation of Latin Americans, Che
stands up as the perennial Icarus, a self-immolating figure who
represents the romantic tragedy of youth," he added. "Their Che is not
just a potent figure of protest, but the idealistic, questioning kid
who exists in every society and every time."
Both the memoir and the movie retell the eight-month, 7,500 mile
odyssey across five South American countries that Guevara, then an
asthmatic 23-year-old medical student, began here in December 1951.
Traveling first on a rickety motorcycle named "La Poderosa," the
powerful one, and then as hitchhikers and stowaways, he and a friend
crossed the pampas, traversed the Andes and navigated the Amazon
before arriving in Caracas, Venezuela, and going their separate ways.
Che was simply Ernesto Guevara then, and his account of the journey is
a classic coming-of-age story: a voyage of adventure and
self-discovery that is both political and personal. "We were just a
pair of vagabonds with knapsacks on our backs, the dust of the road
covering us, mere shadows of our old aristocratic egos," he writes
when the pair reaches Valparaiso, Chile.
His companion on the trip, Alberto Granado Jiménez, is still alive and
living in Cuba. At the age of 82, he traveled recently to Brazil for
the premiere of the film and immediately noticed the change in Che's
image. He said he found himself "surrounded by young people asking
beautiful things, not just about the movie, but about what Ernesto and
I were feeling back then," he said.
"Practically nothing was asked about politics," Mr. Granado recalled,
somewhat wistfully. "They were more interested in the human aspect, in
the story of how two young men, two normal people but dreamers and
idealists, set out on an adventure and with optimism and impetuosity,
achieve their objective."
The Cuban government, which regards itself as the custodian of Che's
image and controls much of his literary estate, has never much liked
"The Motorcycle Diaries." The book remained unpublished until the
early 1990's, and even today, the officially authorized "Complete
Works of Ernesto Che Guevara" includes his famous essays, "On
Guerrilla Warfare" and "Create Two, Three, Many Vietnams," but
pointedly omits the diaries.
"The Cubans have excluded everything about Che that is not heroic,
including that which is most deliciously human about him," said Mario
O'Donnell, an Argentine psychoanalyst and historian who is the author
of a recent biography published here. "The personal doubts, the sexual
escapades, the moments when he and Granado are drunk, none of that
fits with the immortal warrior they want to project."
That demystification is part of a broader process of de-Cubanizing
Che. Though official Cuban accounts usually call him an
"internationalist" (skipping any mention of his Argentine
nationality), he spent only 8 of his 39 years in Cuba. In fact, he had
renounced Cuban citizenship by the time of his death in 1967, when he
was killed after the collapse of a guerrilla campaign in Bolivia.
Having grown up with Che as a brand name advertisement for protests of
any sort, Latin Americans under 40 may have trouble regarding him with
the same reverence as their elders do. So while Che continues to be a
universal point of reference, some recent artistic treatments of him
have also been tinged with irony.
In that vein, a Brazilian film comedy released last year imagines that
Che never died but escaped to the Amazon jungle, where he runs a
business selling T-shirts stamped with his own image. Here in Che's
homeland, a popular singer-songwriter, Kevin Johansen, has a song
called "McGuevara's or CheDonald's."
For an even younger generation, Che is perhaps becoming an even more
remote figure who has already faded into history. "I never had a Che
T-shirt or poster because ever since I was a kid, I saw him, like many
people do, as a distant image," the 25-year-old Mexican actor Gael
García Bernal, who plays Che in the movie, confessed to reporters at
Cannes last week.
"That's what happens with icons," said José Rivera, a Puerto Rican
playwright and screenwriter who wrote the screenplay for the movie.
"They are recycled and made to wear the clothes of a new generation
that is discovering them. We're not in the 60's anymore, so Che will
not have the same power he had back then, and we will have to discover
him in a new way."
