Life of Che is one of the most anticipated entries in Fantagraphics'
The Alberto Breccia Library. Originally released as part of a graphic
biography series in January 1969, it came out in Argentina only a year
after Ernesto Che Guevara had died and reached an audience beyond comics
readers. In the 1970s, the military government raided its publisher,
destroying the means to reprint the book. The comic was presumed to be
lost to history, until a publisher in Spain restored it in 1987. It has
never been translated into English until now.
The book begins in Bolivia in 1967, then flashes back through Che's life
-- his childhood, his radicalizing motorcycle trip with Alberto Granado,
his taking up of arms in Guatemala, his meeting with Fidel Castro, and
his subsequent military and political maneuvers, ending in a fade-out to
his death. Alberto Breccia and his son, Enrique, drew Life of Che.
Enrique draws the Bolivia passages in a woodcut style, while Alberto
depicts the flashbacks in his trademark, expressionistic
black-and-white. It is primarily set in the field and with the people.
Héctor Germán Oesterheld (The Eternaut) blends his authorial voice
with Che's first-person. Life of Che is imbued with a sense of
immediacy, as both Che and, eventually, Oesterheld would meet their ends
by a military government backed by the American CIA. As Pablo Turnes
writes in his afterword, it is the testament of someone consciously
marching toward his revolutionary death.
