The book of the new, two-part epic movie on Che Guevara starring Benicio Del Toro as the legendary revolutionary. Director Steven Soderbergh has based his two-part movie "Che" (Part 1: The Argentine and Part 2: Guerrilla) on two classic diaries written by Che Guevara: Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War (an account of the guerrilla movement led by Fidel Castro that overthrew the Batista dictatorship in 1959) and Bolivian Diary (Che’s famous, unfinished diary discovered in his backpack when he was captured and killed in Bolivia in October 1967). Che includes a selection from each book, showing the young Argentine’s evolution from the wide-eyed medical student of the Motorcycle Diaries-era to the revolutionary hero the world knows as Che. Features: Key excerpts from Che’s Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War, his final Bolivian Diary, and his fiery address to the UN General Assembly, New York in December 1964. Che’s first encounter with Fidel Castro in Mexico, when he immediately commits himself to join the guerrilla expedition to Cuba. The dramatic moment when Che has to decide his future either as a doctor or a guerrilla fighter, symbolized by the choice of two backpacks: one with medicine, the other with ammunition. Che’s poetic letter to his parents before he sets out on the fateful Bolivia mission. Maps, chronology, and a useful glossary. 24 pages of original photos from the period Movie tie-in cover. Blurbs by Benicio del Toro and Steven Soderbergh. Also published in Spanish this season is Che: Los Diarios de Ernesto Che Guevara, 978-1-921235-48-1.
Author
Ernesto "Che" Guevara, commonly known as El Che or simply Che, was a Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, intellectual, guerrilla leader, diplomat, and military theorist. A major figure of the Cuban Revolution, since his death Guevara's stylized visage has become an ubiquitous countercultural symbol and global icon within popular culture. His belief in the necessity of world revolution to advance the interests of the poor prompted his involvement in Guatemala's social reforms under President Jacobo Arbenz, whose eventual CIA-assisted overthrow solidified Guevara's radical ideology. Later, while living in Mexico City, he met Raúl and Fidel Castro, joined their movement, and travelled to Cuba with the intention of overthrowing the U.S.-backed Batista regime. Guevara soon rose to prominence among the insurgents, was promoted to second-in-command, and played a pivotal role in the successful two year guerrilla campaign that topled the Cuban government. After serving in a number of key roles in the new government, Guevara left Cuba in 1965 to foment revolution abroad, first unsuccessfully in Congo-Kinshasa and later in Bolivia, where he was captured by CIA-assisted Bolivian forces and executed. Guevara remains both a revered and reviled historical figure, polarized in the collective imagination in a multitude of biographies, memoirs, essays, documentaries, songs, and films. Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century, while an Alberto Korda photograph of him entitled "Guerrillero Heroico," was declared "the most famous photograph in the world" by the Maryland Institute of Art.
