Life of Che: An Impressionistic Biography

Status: OnGoing

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."