Fantasy and Reality

[Angie]

Forgive me if this has clearly been brought up before, it no doubt has (my "newness to this forum" rears it's ugly head!), but I thought that I would bring a slightly different spin to it if there were possible.

Last night, I was re-reading Guerilla Warfare, and something stood out very clearly: Che's perceptions of the life of guerilla soldiers, as opposed to how the general public perceives him.

The following is a quote from the section that caught my attention:

During the recent war, upon entering the village of El Uvero following a march of sixteen kilometres and a fight of two hours and forty-five minutes in a hot sun (all added to several days passed in very adverse conditions along the sea with intense heat from a boiling sun) our bodies gave off a peculiar and offensive odour that repelled anyone who came near.

My own perception of how the bulk of (at least Western) society views Che is that while he is a freedom fighter, he is somehow immune from imperfection.

Present the above quote to the average teenager who posts his face upon their bedroom wall, and the response would be a curious one - most of them wouldn't have contemplated the fact that during his finest hours, he reeked of body odour, most likely hadn't washed in days, had few clothes - none of which would have been clean or clean-smelling, was caked in blood and the gagging, acidic smell that accompanies it, had a stomach which was probably craving for "normal" food which he hadn't consumed since who knows when ...

His imagery more often than not portrays him as this angelic character, clean and polished, the only real show of "recklessness" to be seen is via the messiness of his hair. I found myself wondering, were Che aware of how he was portrayed these days, if his face would show an expression of despair and even anguish - not unlike that seen in his eyes in the famous Korda image. (Korda's image always made me think that Che had been caught right at that moment when he was thinking, "What on earth are they doing to me?" )

I personally think that despite those images that I love the most, out of those very few images where his eyes are genuinely smiling (because most of the time, they are not, even when his lips are), none of them really portray Che personally as he really was. They were taken because he looked cute in them, and that caught people's attention. I can't help but believe that Che would have hated what that stood for.

I was always under the impression that the most rugged, "Un-Che" photos were the ones which showed him off the best. For instance, the one where he's standing next to the C.I.A agent / Bolivian soldier who killed him. He's practically unrecognisable to people who are so accustomed to seeing him all polished.

But, he looked like a guerilla soldier who had been waging a battle within the Bolivian jungle for a period of time. It was an accurate physical depiction of the man who he craved to be.

Che, to me, was someone who was quiet, reserved, the "observer" as opposed to the "presenter" (a la Fidel). He felt things extremely deeply, especially when witnessing oppression of any form, and he reacted to that in his own way (cases of which include asthmatic attacks or just difficultly breathing in general, the odd bout of publicly viewable tears though most would have been privately shed I suppose, and the "stiffening" of his limbs as he got angry and less fluid in his movements). The thing that remains in my mind the most, that portrays something in his personality that most people don't pick up on, is that I would even describe him as shy. In the odd photo, and especially in the video footage where he's telling an audience a poem written by a desperate man (click here for that, the videos.zip link, then it's video 4 in the collection), when the audience reacts positively to him, he gets all embarressed, starts to mumble a little, and smiles deep into his chest, almost as if attempting to hide for a moment. Also, he pauses briefly in silence, in that "hiding" state, (and constantly returns to it throughout the video), to compose his emotions so that he may begin the poem in seriousness.

I can't, in all honesty, see Che as fulfilling any of the common perceptions held about him, other than he was exceedingly brave and fought for the abolition of oppression towards the lower classes. And that, to me, makes him all the more unique and special - we really don't know him all that well at all, and he was so much more precious than we've ever acknowledged before. $0.02

"My friend, my companion, my model, my light, my star."
-- Quoted by a schoolgirl, at the official funeral, 1997.

[El Che]

Well written, and wellcome to the community. Nice entrance

I agree with you, and I think there are other trades of Che`s personality that are not as well known as they should be. Personaly after reading the bolivian diary, he struck me as inteligent methodic man, reflect on how he maintains the guerrilha together with an inflexible discipline and with a strong sense of justice. His men respect him for that, or at least I would think that is one of the reasons, as I was not among them I can not with all certainty make the claim. But consider that to his men, to the revolutionaries he fought with, to his companheros&companheras e wasn`t some kind of superman hero as some understand him. I think through their eyes we get a clearer picture of the man and not the myth. Determined, methodical, mentaly organised and disciplined. These are the real reasons why Che stands out, he also comes across as generous unselfish man, noble, yet tragicaly a bit naive in his kindness. Amazing what you can[?] tell just by by looking at a person, words really suck as a form of expression. The diary is also punctuated with delightfull humor at times.

I try to look at him for what he was, and I think that is what he would of liked.

(Edited by El Che at 4:28 am on Mar. 16, 2002)

[sabre]

great post angie!

If anything Che's stinkyness and dirty look would have harmed his reputation and appearance, but people still love/loved him

[I Will Deny You]

In an effort to continue Che's legacy, I haven't taken a bath in three months.

Besides being a genius at fighting, he was smart and generous . . . we just don't think of someone like him as dirty. I don't think they would have had a ton of cameras in the jungle where a war was being fought, so the pictures of him that we have are mostly after he'd taken a bath. Unfortuantely, diary entries don't make for posters that will sell. But I don't think he'd mind being remembered as not being very clean, even if it might hurt his reputation overall.

Good first post. Welcome.

[sabre]

today i was at a restraunt and this guy walked by and he smelled bad

[Angie]

Thank you all for the warm welcomes!

Paris
I would presume that once a person has become used to their own smell (their stinkyness as Sabre fantastically worded it!), then they could continue on for a while without feeling the necessity to have a bath. 6 months is a stretch, though! I'm not a clean-freak by any stretch of the imagination, but I think that 3 or 4 days is my current limit of going without washing in some way or another. Perhaps I could test it to see where my "breaking point" would be. :P

El Che

yet tragicaly a bit naive in his kindness.

Isn't that the truth! You'd think that such a wonderful character trait having been embodied in a person such as Che would have been something honoured. And indeed, he was honoured by many people, but the source of his honour also turning into the source of his downfall is horribly sad. Especially when it was cultures similar to my own (I'm Australian) who slapped him down. I feel very ashamed and guilty for that, I really do.

In the current period of history where "freedom" is said to be so important... What excuse could we possibly use with success, that would justify destroying a man who physically embodied the fight for that freedom we claim to hold so dear? (Though I understand that ideals of freedom may differ - socialist freedom is freedom of the people, something that capitalist freedom would place underneath financial issues, these days.)

I was just about to type: "I wonder if we effectively destroyed our own "freedom to the people" ideals, when we destroyed Che?", when I realised that perhaps they're not the ideals of our countries after all...

(Sorry if I don't quite make sense - rambling with my thoughts!)

sabre
I agree, I too think it would have damaged his reputation amongst most people - clearly not all, otherwise we would not be here!

Just out of interest: When you saw that man in the restaurant, what was the first thing you thought of? (Did you think of being further away from him, or did you wonder where he came from / why he would have smelt bad, etc.?)

I Will Deny You
Thank you - You've inspired me! I'm now thinking of making a couple of "altered" pictures of Che, adding some quotes that he made at some stage or another in his life, depicting his life as he saw it. I'd be very curious to see how people related to it. I'll create a new post about it sometime soon.

[Supermodel]

I really love this thread. You all have a great way of communicating thoughts. I come from a part of the world where people don't bathe much, so I can confirm that the habit of not bathing while on a guerilla war in the jungle makes a lot of sense to me.

I agree that the public image of Che is overly affected by a westernized view of who he was and what he did.

For example, in DC where I live now, I mentioned his name to a group at work and none of them knew who I was talking about. In the US, acknowledging that you admire Che is like saying you're a traitor, at least where I work. When you really analyze what he actually did, you can make a lot of paralells with the American revolution and George Washington, and criticisms of him boil down to the one last point of "he was a communist".

Anyhow, I agree that he was a much more complex character than portrayed, and he admitted his own struggle with living inside the ideals he had painted for the "new man". It comes across that Aleida wanted to provide well for the kids and he resisted with his "vow of poverty", and it caused some friction with them.

I adore the clip you attached. I was watching it on video the other day. We also forget how young he was in those days.

He says he never sought political leadership and admired Castro for being able to be the person to take on that role in the Cuban struggle. How hopelessly lost the Bolivian communist party was with a liar like Monje in charge. If there had been a Bolivian Castro, and an Argentinian Castro, things would have been very different.

Having never been in a life and death situation, I struggle with the thoughts going thru his head in Bolivia. Clearly he had an immense belief in the ability of his band to conquer against all odds, and he missed the "pragmatic" side that Castro brought to the table. As they fought together in Cuba, it seems that Fidel was issuing the "down, boy" command to Che a lot. But what I really don't understand is his apparent death wish at the end. Even a few days before his capture he could have sought a way to live and fight another day, when the odds were clearly hopeless. It seems that he wanted to go out in battle and in no other way.

It still breaks my heart to read the passages about his death. How wretched to keep a man in such squalid conditions and then kill him, he must have welcomed death. I know all of us wished he could still be with us.

[Angie]

This is my second attempt at reply to this - it's a very difficult topic to touch on, granted. I guess how I feel is that at the end of the day, Che was self-sacrificial for a very strong reason - I think he was very much aware that while he was alive, he would continue fighting for as long as he possibly could believing in every moment of it in one way or another, but I feel that he was also very aware of the shallowness of the CIA / Bolivian Army in that they genuinely seemed to believe (and for some screwed up reason the American Government still seems to believe it today) that when Che died, so died everything attached to him. There's something in his spirit that just screams that, I've felt it quite powerfully. Hence the "You're only killing a man" comment that's circulating (whether it's true or not, though I tend to believe he would have said it instead of the other "I'm more important to you alive than dead" line which just sounds so un-Che).

His death was something I believe he knew was going to happen, not just because it was practically inevitable, but because it would turn a new page in the eyes of the CIA (and in the world itself, just for a different reason). The CIA would think that it was some kind of closure, where of course Che would have known as well as you or I know that it was about as far from that as is possible.

He cast the illusion, his legacy provides the smoke-screen, in which future generations could rise up within the screen, preparing to continue his fight. The ultimate magician, who I couldn't honour any more than I already do.

I'm off to find a tissue.

[tebvie]

To me the reason I like him is not because people think he is like a super man hero guy but because he did things helped people that he didn't have to...he fought against things that most people don't think is their buisness....that's what I think is the cool things it's something I respect in even people that I know.

[I Will Deny You]

The notion that he might have had a death wish is a very strange one, but I think I can understand it. (At least a little bit.) It seems to me that he joined the Cuban revolution because it was one of the few movements at the time that looked as if it might be a success. He fought lots of people in Castro's government to move it toward the left, and it didn't work out very well. That was probably one of the reasons why he left in the first place--his dream of a communist revolution did not come true. After his campaign in the Congo was a complete failure, he may have needed to Bolivian campaign to be a success. He was back in Latin America and he was out to prove himself. Once he was captured he probably thought that he had reached the end. A man like Che must have defined himself first and foremost with the struggle that he had dedicated his life to, and once it seemed that his struggle had become a lost cause confusion and second thoughts would have been a natural reaction.

While he was humble and had dedicated his life to fighting for other people's freedom, he was also a very proud man. Just as certain samurai warriors did not feel that they deserved to live after they had lost a battle, Che might have felt that once the score was 2-1, capitalists, he did not deserve his reputation as a skilled commander. If he had survived the attempt to overthrow the Bolivian government and gone home with those same feelings, it's dubious that he would have ended up believing that he deserved to die. But when there were so many people who wanted to kill him right then and there, it's not too hard to realize why he did not fight them as much as possible.