16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gary Hart is the author, January 24, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: I, Che Guevara (Hardcover)
In Hollywood, they call it high concept. Here's the pitch: Che Guevara is not dead. Having escaped execution in Bolivia -- don't ask how -- he shows up back in Cuba 30 years later as Ernesto Blanco, just in time for Fidel Castro to abdicate in favor of free elections. Are you with me? Because there's a payoff here.
While the old Cuban communists run against the Miami exiles in a dead-on parody of American politics, Guevara/Blanco grabs the balance of power. Merely by sipping coffee (how '90s) in village plazas, the viejo leads a peaceful revolution as a Jeffersonian disciple who teaches radical democracy and falls in love (he's not that viejo) with a washed-up American TV personality.
OK, it's a stretch. A pretzel twist -- Che tramping the mountains preaching the gospel of T. Jefferson -- admits the author, John Blackthorn. But as the thrillers go, I, Che Guevara works on most levels. You turn the page. You learn the physical endowments of most of the female characters. Somebody shoots at somebody else (there is even a hot-blooded, curvaceous, ex-Marine, mob-connected hit woman). And, as an unexpected bonus, you get an insider look at the media, pollsters, political hacks and soft-as-George-W.'s-hands money.
And when you find out Blackthorn is actually a pseudonym for Gary Hart, the book works on a couple more levels. Is Che a stand-in for Hart, busily serving his own exile? It sounds like Hart, himself a Jeffersonian disciple, come down from his own mountain to offer the truth -- if people would only listen. Of course, Hart is not quite the iconic figure Che has become. For example, in Cuba today, you can get nail clippers with Che's likeness on them. Hart, meanwhile, is a mere footnote to the politics of personal destruction, a prequel to the Clinton drama.
Could I, Che Guevara be read as I, Gary Hart?
"There's no personal identification," Hart says laughing. He's calling from London and won't say quite what he's doing there. I like that. It's got a spy ring to it. Hart has been a semi-official emissary to Cuba for years, which is how he got the idea for the book. He used the pseudonym -- this is second Blackthorn/Cuba novel -- because he didn't want the Cubans to know he was writing about Cuba. But then, he says, it got to be too Primary Colors for him not to admit to being the author.
"I'll 'fess up to the philosophy, though," Hart says. "I've been working on the idea for a while -- whether Jefferson's ideas of radical democracy in republican form are applicable to the 21st century.
"I think it's possible. The two traditional ideologies don't have much persuasiveness, particularly among young people these days. We need some new alternative, beyond Clinton's Third Way. Something with intellectual content, with some serious political philosophy behind it."
You shouldn't get the idea that the book is heavy. It's as light as a book can be that uses Plato's Republic as a source.
"It's an entertainment," says Hart. "That's the exact word Graham Greene used. It's like what Sam Goldwyn said, 'You want a message in the movies, use Western Union.' Only today he'd have said to use e-mail. It just seemed natural to me that if you're going to have a book about a revolution, you have something of substance to say. I just put Jefferson in Che's mouth. It's not message writing. It's meant to be an interesting story."
With Elian Gonzalez dominating the news, it was certainly the right time for a Cuba story. Hart believes Elian should be returned to his father, but he takes the story further.
"Oddly," Hart says, "this might be a political blessing in disguise, by dividing Cuban-Americans on this issue. Many in the newer generation are saying, 'Don't use this boy to beat up on Fidel.' I've met with a number of them -- one or two in our law firm -- and they shake their heads in disbelief and embarrassment."
But the book is not only about Cuba. It's an easy boat ride back to the States, where Hart takes on the political process, including the, uh, media. Ask Hart if the relationship between politicians and the media has improved, he says, "I have a lifetime prohibition against talking about this. Whenever I talk about it, the lead paragraph is always Hart attacks the press."
And yet (note: in the 14th paragraph) he talks anyway: "It's probably gotten worse. But hopefully politicians will get their spines back and the system will correct. I see where (Bill) Bradley has even refused to say what his favorite color is. It's a slippery slope. If you say your favorite color, then it's what's your favorite cereal. Then it's how often do you change your socks?"
He's laughing, but if you want Hart's true feelings, look to the text. In an unintentionally (I'm guessing) hilarious scene, Che is reborn in order to offer his defense of, well, Gary Hart.
"Now, del norte, the new style is to assassinate them but leave them walking around," Guevara/Blanco lectures. "It has the advantage of being legal. No one pulls a trigger. No one fires a bullet. But someone is assassinated ... Unlike anywhere else in the world, if someone -- even a political enemy -- says that one of your your national leaders may have had a romance with some lady to whom he was not married, it is enough. He is finished. You call it a 'scandal.' He too is assassinated."
Of course, he can live again. All you have to do is buy the premise. And the book.
You can reach Mike Littwin at littwinm@RockyMountainNews.com.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting, December 9, 2003
This review is from: I, Che Guevara (Hardcover)
[The following is from a paper for a class. Thought I would post it anyway. hope its helpful]
John Blackthorn does an admirable job in taking two traditionally condemned ideas, Revolution and Anarchism, and applying them to his story in a way that makes us identify them for the positive things that they really are. We read as the venom of revolution to society is seeped out of the word and we are redirected to a new definition to the word. After reading the book revolution ceases to be the series of bloody encounters that it is associated with and becomes a concept of change, of reformation through thoughts. Similarly in his discussion of the revolutionary theme where he implants the concept of anarchism in the readers mind the author does an equally commendable job of painting a positive concept of anarchism. As opposed to the image of disorder that the word creates in people's imagination, blackthorn makes anarchism a mark of order and contentment. He presents it in a positive light, as it being the basis of 'our need not to need'. Hence I liked John Blackthorn's book, I Che Guavera, for this strong trait it holds.
The author shows a paradoxical writing in his work as he reveals traces of a non dictator in Fidel as opposed to the image of the tyrant he seeks to portray. Although the author's reference to the 'considerable anger' [of party members upon hearing about his decision to step down] that went 'unexpressed' (p.39) suggests fear in the party and therefore a dictatorship by Castro, the existence of a party by itself contradicts his implication. It draws our attention to the uncharacteristic nature of Cuba's dictatorship, if we call it so. The traditional trend of dictatorship, which includes disposing of the party, seems to be missing in this particular dictatorship. Hitler's Nazi party was only a medium through which he administered massive espionage and control over the people. Stalin communist party was the framework of the ladder he used to climb into power with and got cleaned up in the purges only a decade after his rise to power, whereas Mussolini's was a weapon that was used to create a picture of that so can an individual who retains a party for half a century, sits in a meeting where the same party discusses 'the future of Cuba in a way that didn't include him' (p.41) be really called a dictator? Hence I believe Blackthorn shows a strong weakness in painting a picture of a dictator that Fidel is supposed to be if his book is to have any weight in world politics.
Another flaw in the author's work is in his treatment of the communist party where he shows bias. By 'telling' us through the mouth of one of the party members about how the party was 'getting everybody to vote for it' (p.39) the author tries draw a picture of the state of the communist party in Cuba. However I found it hard to picture politicians sitting around in party meetings and openly 'laugh' about how they manipulate the public to get votes. I felt author's narration was biased in his own favor to create an atmosphere of simple mindedness that could not handle democracy, therefore strengthening his plot. These are people who managed to stay in power for close to 5 decades and according to historian Alan Bullock's theory power is only retained for so long by people with well structured intentions or intentionalists and not these simple minded individuals who gather in an office to disagree on party names and not ideologies. Furthermore as the theory goes when you carry a lie for so long you would forget that it is indeed a lie and hence I see the reality being one where these politicians no longer acknowledge their deceit after so long a time. So I find Blackthorn's use of chapter 7 to be a 'cheap' way of uncovering the truth about Castro's party.
Romanticism is another idea that I recognized in the book. The myth of Che that the Cuban people hold as of the only man who could save them is a demonstration of the romantic thinking that precedes the concept of hero's and heroic actions. Hence when Che makes an observation on the Cuban people and how they are 'longing for a hero'... 'they pray for someone to save them' we recognize elements of romanticism in the society. Ironically enough this observation by the author can also be made on the author. The fact that he had to resurrect a dead hero to help him his theme highlights his romanticism. As he chose to communicate his message through a dead man we realize that, most of the time, it is the messenger that matters and not the message. This is also exhibited in the way that the communist party in chapter 7 dwells on the name of the party for the reality is, due to romanticism, society idolizes the concept of heroes and institutions and the kind more than what they are really about.
Hatred for church is another concept that I recognized in the book and is another source of discussion in class. Powerful rival to the state, Che's expressed hatred of church (p.14) has a clear resemblance to that of 20th century dictators like Stalin and Lenin who openly disowned the Orthodox church and tried to replace it with their cult of personality, Hitler who moved the bible from the altar in the church and replace it with Mein Kampf and Mussolini who entered a concordat with the church to keep it out of his business. Hence in reading about Che's attitude towards the church we read about the forming of another dictator if ever he had wanted to assume formal power.
Gary Hart, alias John Blackthorn, makes a significant contribution to the world for his book is not merely an assessment of history but is a promoter of reflective thinking to any reader. It invites us to examine our stand in the world of the 'visionary' versus the 'practical', for if you are not a revolutionary you are a practical person. While reading his book I was able to examine my inner self and found that I am one who is often satisfied by the state of things, rarely advocating change and generally at the height of contentment. Gary Hart makes me an enemy of the Revolution, a reader who admires his book immensely but fails to identify herself with the Che's of the world. Yet!
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