Today is the birthday of man who need no introduction.
Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
His iconic photo wearing his black beret taken by Alberto Korda was declared "the most famous photograph in the world."
He remains both a revered and reviled historical figure, polarized in the collective imagination in a multitude of biographies, memoirs, essays, documentaries, songs, and films.
As a result of his perceived martyrdom, poetic invocations for class struggle, and desire to create the consciousness of a "new man" driven by moral rather than material incentives; he has evolved into a quintessential icon of various leftist-inspired movements.
Despite his polarized status, a high-contrast monochrome graphic of his face, created in 1968 by Irish artist Jim Fizpatrick, has become one of the world's most universally merchandized and objectified images, found on an endless array of items, including t-shirts, hats, posters, tattoos, and bikinis, ironically contributing to the consumer culture Guevara despised. Yet, he still remains a transcendent figure both in specifically political contexts and as a wide-ranging popular icon of youthful rebellion.
Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
His iconic photo wearing his black beret taken by Alberto Korda was declared "the most famous photograph in the world."
He remains both a revered and reviled historical figure, polarized in the collective imagination in a multitude of biographies, memoirs, essays, documentaries, songs, and films.
As a result of his perceived martyrdom, poetic invocations for class struggle, and desire to create the consciousness of a "new man" driven by moral rather than material incentives; he has evolved into a quintessential icon of various leftist-inspired movements.
Despite his polarized status, a high-contrast monochrome graphic of his face, created in 1968 by Irish artist Jim Fizpatrick, has become one of the world's most universally merchandized and objectified images, found on an endless array of items, including t-shirts, hats, posters, tattoos, and bikinis, ironically contributing to the consumer culture Guevara despised. Yet, he still remains a transcendent figure both in specifically political contexts and as a wide-ranging popular icon of youthful rebellion.
Ernesto Guevara was born to Celia de la Serna y Llosa and Ernesto Guevara Lynch on June 14, 1928 in Rosario, Argentina.
Though he was suffering from asthma that were to afflict him throughout his life, he excelled as an athlete, enjoying swimming, football, golf, and shooting.
The Guevara home contained more than 3,000 books, which allowed Guevara to be an enthusiastic and eclectic reader.He read books on wide range of subjects and authors.He was passionate about poetry.
In 1948, Guevara entered the University of Buenos Aires to study medicine.
His "hunger to explore the world" led him to intersperse his collegiate pursuits with two long introspective journeys that would fundamentally change the way he viewed himself and the contemporary economic conditions in Latin America.
Though he was suffering from asthma that were to afflict him throughout his life, he excelled as an athlete, enjoying swimming, football, golf, and shooting.
The Guevara home contained more than 3,000 books, which allowed Guevara to be an enthusiastic and eclectic reader.He read books on wide range of subjects and authors.He was passionate about poetry.
In 1948, Guevara entered the University of Buenos Aires to study medicine.
His "hunger to explore the world" led him to intersperse his collegiate pursuits with two long introspective journeys that would fundamentally change the way he viewed himself and the contemporary economic conditions in Latin America.
The first expedition in 1950 was a 4,500 kilometer (2,800 mi) solo trip through the rural provinces of northern Argentina on a bicycle on which he installed a small motor.This was followed in 1951 by a nine month 8,000 kilometer (5,000 mi) continental motorcycle trek through most of South America.
For the latter, he took a year off from studies to embark with his friend Alberto Granado, with the final goal of spending a few weeks volunteering at the San Pablo Leper colony in Peru, on the banks of the Amazon River.
Guevara used notes taken during this trip to write an account entitled The Motorcycle Diaries, which later became a New York Times best-seller, and was adapted into a 2004 award-winning Spanish film of the same name directed by Walter Salles. I saw this movie in UTV world movies.
Guevara later remarked that through his travels of Latin America, he came in "close contact with poverty, hunger and disease" along with the "inability to treat a child because of lack of money" and "stupefaction provoked by the continual hunger and punishment" that leads a father to "accept the loss of a son as an unimportant accident." It was these experiences which Guevara cites as convincing him that in order to "help these people", he needed to leave the realm of medicine, and consider the political arena of armed struggle
On July 7, 1953, Guevara set out again, this time to Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador.
In Guatemala City, Guevara sought out Hilda Gadea Acosta, a Peruvian economist who was well-connected politically as a member of the left-leaning Alianza Popular Revolucionaria Americana.
Guevara then established contact with a group of Cuban exiles linked to Fidel Castro through the July 26, 1953 attack on the Moncada Barracks in Santiago de Cuba.
Guevara arrived in Mexico City in early September 1954.
During this time he renewed his friendship with Nico Lopez and the other Cuban exiles whom he had met in Guatemala. In June 1955, Lopez introduced him to Raul Castro who subsequently introduced him to his older brother, Fidel Castro, the revolutionary leader who had formed the 26th of July Movement and was now plotting to overthrow the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.
Despite their "contrasting personalities", from this point on Che and Fidel began to foster what dual biographer Simon Reid-Henry deems a "revolutionary friendship that would change the world", as a result of their coinciding commitment to anti-imperialism.
The whole world know what these two revolutionaries did. so let us go to the last days of Che's life.
In Algiers, Algeria on February 24, 1965, Guevara made what turned out to be his last public appearance on the international stage when he delivered a speech at an economic seminar on Afro-Asian solidarity.
Two weeks after his Algiers speech, Guevara dropped out of public life and then vanished altogether.
His whereabouts were a great mystery in Cuba, as he was generally regarded as second in power to Castro himself.
Pressed by international speculation regarding Guevara's fate, Castro stated on June 16, 1965 that the people would be informed when Guevara himself wished to let them know. Still, rumors spread both inside and outside Cuba. On October 3, Castro revealed an undated letter purportedly written to him by Guevara some months earlier: in it, Guevara reaffirmed his enduring solidarity with the Cuban Revolution, but declared his intention to leave Cuba to fight for the revolutionary cause abroad. Additionally, he resigned from all his positions in the government and party, and renounced his honorary Cuban citizenship.
In early 1965, Guevara went to Africa to offer his knowledge and experience as a guerrilla to the ongoing conflict in the Congo.
Guevara was reluctant to return to Cuba, because Castro had made public Guevara's "farewell letter"—a letter intended to only be revealed in the case of his death—wherein he severed all ties in order to devote himself to revolution throughout the world. As a result, Guevara spent the next six months living clandestinely in Dar es Salaam and Prague.] During this time he compiled his memoirs of the Congo experience, and wrote drafts of two more books, one on philosophy and the other on economics.
He then visited several Western European countries to test his new false identity papers, created by Cuban Intelligence for his later travels to South America. As Guevara prepared for Bolivia, he secretly traveled back to Cuba to visit Castro, as well as to see his wife and to write a last letter to his five children to be read upon his death, which ended with him instructing them:
"Above all, always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world. This is the most beautiful quality in a revolutionary".
Before he departed for Bolivia, Guevara altered his appearance by shaving off his beard and part of the top of his head as well as dyeing it grey so he would be unrecognizable as Che Guevara. On November 3, 1966, Guevara secretly arrived in La Paz, Bolivia on a flight from Montevideo, Uruguay under the false name Adolfo Mena Gonzalez, and posed as a Uruguayan businessman working for the Organization of American States.
Guevara's guerrilla force, numbering about 50,was well equipped and scored a number of early successes against Bolivian army.
Guevara was unable to attract inhabitants of the local area to join his militia during the 11 months he attempted recruitment. Near the end of the venture Guevara wrote in his diary that "the peasants do not give us any help, and are turning into informers".
"Above all, always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world. This is the most beautiful quality in a revolutionary".
Before he departed for Bolivia, Guevara altered his appearance by shaving off his beard and part of the top of his head as well as dyeing it grey so he would be unrecognizable as Che Guevara. On November 3, 1966, Guevara secretly arrived in La Paz, Bolivia on a flight from Montevideo, Uruguay under the false name Adolfo Mena Gonzalez, and posed as a Uruguayan businessman working for the Organization of American States.
Guevara's guerrilla force, numbering about 50,was well equipped and scored a number of early successes against Bolivian army.
Guevara was unable to attract inhabitants of the local area to join his militia during the 11 months he attempted recruitment. Near the end of the venture Guevara wrote in his diary that "the peasants do not give us any help, and are turning into informers".
On October 7, an informant apprised the Bolivian Special Forces of the location of Guevara's guerrilla encampment in the Yuro ravine. On October 8, they encircled the area with 1,800 soldiers, and Guevara was wounded and taken prisoner while leading a detachment with Simeon Cuba Sarabia.
Later that morning on October 9, Bolivian President Rene Barrientos ordered that Guevara be killed.
Later that morning on October 9, Bolivian President Rene Barrientos ordered that Guevara be killed.
The executioner was Mario Teran. He shot Guevara nine times. This included five times in the legs, once in the right shoulder and arm, once in the chest, and finally in the throat.
Over all these years after his execution, Che's life and legacy still remains as a one of the greatest and inspiring.
Source: Internet
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