Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin [Paperback]

Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1988

Miguel Littin, a well-known film director permanently exiled from Pinochet's Chile, returns to his native country disguised as a Uruguayan public-relations agent. His purpose is to film Chile today, to record the "abominable silences" of his beloved country under siege.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In 1973, Chilean film director Miguel Littin was exiled during the turmoil that followed the assassination of President Salvador Allende. Twelve years later, disguised as an Uraguayan businessman, he returned to his country and spent six weeks "making a film that made fun of the dangers of military power." In Nobelist Marquez's hands, this is a scary, exhilarating and sometimes hilarious tale of bizarre coincidences, hairbreadth escapes and ludicrous foul-ups (getting a shave and haircut in Concepcion, Littin discovers afterward that his meticulous disguise has been ruined). His brashness is impressive: at one point he manages to shoot some footage inside Gen. Augusto Pinochet's private office. In the end he escapes by air, fantasizing that the dictator will soon be "dragging behind the 105,000-foot donkey's tail of film we had pinned on him." A rousing adventure story, this is also the best reportage available about conditions in Chile today. Illustrations.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

YA Miguel Littin secretly returned to Chile in 1985 after having been exiled 12 years earlier following the death of Salvador Allende. The purpose of his trip was to make a film of Chile today, which he did with six film crewsnone of whom knew of the existence of the other five. Garcia Marquez met Littin in Madrid in 1986 and felt the account of the filming needed to be told. He interviewed Littin for 18 hours, and the result is this exciting book. In order to avoid arrest, Littin underwent a complete physical transformation. Placing himself in the role of a wealthy Uraguayan business man, he experienced the bittersweet pain of returning to his homeland, yet not being able to reveal his identity. Garcia Marquez is a master storyteller who admits that Littin's thinking is not his own, but who believes that the story must be told. Elaborate passwords, film smuggled to Europe, and fear of being followed make for a daring adventure that has the wonderful advantages of being true and providing the best examples of character, patriotism, and courage. The film was shown on television and has been edited and released for movie theaters. Barbara Weathers, Duchesne Academy, Houston
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 116 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt & Co (P) (November 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805009450
• ISBN-13: 978-0805009453
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,128,365 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant Non-Fiction By A Master, April 3, 2007

By 

Mr. Fellini "Fellini" (Orange County, California United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin (Hardcover)

Gabriel Garcia Marquez is known the world over mostly for his novels, especially "One Hundred Years Of Solitude," and one non-fiction book on the drug wars in Colombia, but one of the least recognized of his jewels is "Clandestine In Chile: The Adventures Of Migue Littin," it is both a chronicle of an exiled artist's return to his homeland and a study of what Chile was like under the right-wing dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. So infuriated was the regime when the book was published that Pinochet ordered thousands of copies to be burned Nazi-style. Like Marquez's novels, "Clandestine In Chile" is poetic and lush, heartwarming and heartbreaking as Littin returns to Chile in disguise to shoot a film on Chile under Pinochet and finds himself wandering a nation changed by rabid capitalism and silenced by intense fascism. In one tense moment Littin lies down in his hotel room bed, only to realize that the city of Santiago is DEAD SILENT after Pinochet's curfew is implemented, no cars, not even dogs make a sound. In beautiful prose Marquez describes the epic landscapes of Chile, of the Andes and the mining communities where the workers almost breath fire from the coal they mine. He chronicles the revolutionary days of Salvador Allende, Chile's and the world's first elected socialist president who sparked the fury of the Nixon White House and was overthrown in a September 11, 1973 coup by Pinochet's forces. We meet Chile's poor as they remember Allende and secretly keep mementos from his days in office before "The Terror" came and the Mapucho river flowed with the corpses of the fascist junta's innocent, often young victims. The passages where Littin and his crew shoot their film under the guise of an environmental documentary team are exciting as they try not to be discovered by the regime's informants and police force. At one point they film inside La Moneda presidential palace and come an inch away from Pinochet himself. Marquez obviously respects Littin very much and his admiration for the man and his work is palpable, and being a friend of Cuba's Fidel Castro, Marquez's contempt for Pinochet and the fascist system that was then in Chile is also evident. This adds a unique emotional intensity to the work, like the best non-fiction he brings history to life instead of just providing a kind of academic report. Film buffs will also enjoy this book for Littin's insights into the guerrilla filmmaking process as he gets his shots by any means necessary, always avoiding getting caught even under the most dangerous circumstances. "Clandestine In Chile" is a masterful book, and of the more underappreciated titles in Gabriel Garcia Marquez's remarkable catalogue.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Stasi State, October 29, 2009

By 

Luc REYNAERT (Beernem, Belgium) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Clandestine in Chile: Adventures of Miguel Littin (Paperback)

This book tells the extraordinary story of the clandestine return of movie director Miguel Littín to Chile 12 years after the military coup against the democratically elected President Salvador Allende in 1973.
Miguel Littín's life was saved during the coup by a movie buff: `Didn't you direct "El Chacal de Nahualtoro"?'

The tragic scenes of the coup continue to haunt the director: `gangs of men in civilian clothes clubbing President Allende's supporters to death. We also saw a line of prisoners with their backs against a wall and a squad of soldiers pretending they were going to execute them.'

After the coup, Chile's society turned into a fascist State with book burnings (15000 copies of this book were burned by the Chilean authorities on Nov 28 1986, Nobel Prize winner Pablo Neruda's house was sacked by soldiers who threw his books onto a bonfire), with summary executions, outright killings of opposition militants and spies all over the place; in one word, a Stasi State.

Chile's economy
After the military coup, `within a five-year period more goods were imported than in the previous two hundred years by using dollar credits. But when the time came to pay up, the illusion fell away. Chile's external debt increased to $23 billion, almost six times the debt of the Allende administration.'
Chile's economic `miracle' made a few of the rich much richer and the rest of the Chilean society much poorer.

Free Mason
Salvador Allende was a Free Mason. His grandfather established Chile's first Masonic Lodge. Another member of Salvador Allende's Lodge was Augusto Pinochet. Allende made the terrible mistake to consider Pinochet as a brother, while in fact the latter was a member of an international network of intelligence services. It was his job to keep an eye (and report) on the Lodge's activities.

Salvador Allende's humanistic philosophy, as well as his outstanding statesmanship, continues to be deeply ingrained in the memory of the poblaciones.

G. G. Márquez's book gives a true picture of life under the boots of a fascist dictator.
It is a must read for all historians and for all those who want to understand the world we live in.

0 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Marquez again, February 12, 2006

By 

Pawel Gotlib "sickac" (terzetto, ca usa) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin (Hardcover)

Book is simply awsome. Intriguing characters, especially Hanna. Is she ready? Is she ready???