At the end of the Book Fair, Silvia Loustau invited me to present his fine book "Butterflies Red, Black Butterfly. Memoirs of a militant Argentina in Chile, 1970-1973. " Transcribe them-words, fewer words, the text of my speech, using the publication to thank who dared to share with me the memory of a past with many similarities, as unforgivable disabilities to join at that time.
How difficult synthesize much love, so much struggle, so militant, so life is a noun and two adjectives. Much talent to write simply Red Butterflies, Mariposas Negras .
This achieves Silvia Loustau, who introduces herself in the novel as "Mariana" or "Laura"-his old name as a militant. Loustau, an outstanding poet and writer. First Prize for Poetry Illustrated in La Plata, with Letter to Pablo Neruda - when she was 18. First Prize for Fiction Center of Latin America Editor (CEDAL) with 19, to the surprise of David Viñas, who confessed, embarrassed to see that almost adolescent receive recognition "that the jury was convinced that the author of the work shared the generation of the evaluators.
introductions do not end with this "alter-ego", but continue with many "poets / partners" Mombrú Mary, his mother a poet, as described, Carmen Soler, the same Margaret Aguirre, among others, you readers will be delighted to discover between the pages. All he conveyed a message that Silvia made flesh: work, work, work on the words.
The book also appears Silvia, the militant. That girl on the front pages are chatting with the grandfather, discovering another way to Sawdust a nursery rhyme, Aserrán ... , otherwise the changed forever, as the mandate of that old anarchist. Thus we see the promise he made several years later, when he left his birthplace: "I will continue writing, I will be an excellent student; military to become the tortilla." Soon after, with 18 years traveling to "build socialism" with Allende, convened by the magic of Traful, the almost mythical great Viking inspiring a picture of the MIR. Silvia appears that touches all UNLP with his poem "Who cares," probably written in Lettera orange, when the slaughter of Trelew, 22 August 1972. Silvia And the eyes filled with tears of deans, professors and fellow students in the university assembly mass in solidarity with Chile after the coup of September 11, 1973.
We see growth as an activist, not only through personal feelings it conveys, but also through the story of what you read in the eyes of his colleagues, on both sides of the mountains.
And it's essential to share his story of how we were, as we dreamed, as we lived the militants of that time looking and different on both sides of the mountains. On one side, with a tradition of militancy names, difference between open houses or operational, false documents, eye trained to locate the lack of a peephole, or an emergency exit. And the other, all militant enthusiasm. Without innocence, with preparation, but with a tradition of years without dictatorships and measures to address them. Silvia
also reminds us, unpretentious professorial-just as living witnesses, some of the discussions about sectarianism, volunteerism, top-down, authoritarian. This is not an idyllic world, yes a deep love for the people in the midst of search and confusion. And a slogan that is repeated throughout the book: "Tightening without losing tenderness." Not all succeeded, not even all they sought. But crossed all of our organizations. Even in these issues Rispa, Butterflies ... showcases the best of the tension. Without hiding anything. Even the little miseries, anticipating ways and means less neutral, more painful and damaging. It is essential that we bring them back to our days, that displays as evidence of life, it is not easy to explain to those not experienced it: that love and fury that commitment and courage.
What else to say the book we present today, with humility, even though he deserved a room and would be among the best-selling if it had a wink, this brutally commoditized industry?
you read it. Should read it. Red and black are so many ways. Land plowed black, the red sky. Mobilizing February 1972 to support Allende as a joy of gratitude, like butterflies red, black butterflies. Torch red, black night, the mobilization in solidarity against the coup in Chile. Red and black graffiti. Neruda's face red, black his cap. The flag of the MIR. As always, the star of the FAR, in the heart of Silvia. And the kiss of Joseph which coincides with one of his butterflies while you sleep. There are many, many more, you will discover while reading. They are in joy and sorrow, in dreams and nightmares. All reinforce the image on our retinas and our hearts.
There is a phrase enlightening prologue, Alfonso Freire, who says exactly "the Chilean" which is "fictionalized memoir" or "memory novel" a story bound and polyphonic: " say that this memory is polyphonic because it preserves not only the life of Silvia, talking to his grandfather her in the backyard, but the life of each of the people who are playing in their travel, giving name and fleshiness to each of the faces that go with it since his trip to La Plata to the smallest companion which is in its tour of the 'Chilean experience. " I say it is polyphonic because each speaker is allowed to say in his own voice, rescues Silvia insignificant gesture that allows the tenderness is revolutionary ".
And a very interesting aspect is that they are Salvador Allende, and Carlos Altamirano, and Miguel Henriquez, Luis Corvalan-icons and the history of those days, those who speak, those who get "name and fleshiness." It is the people, the "collective hero" in the words of Oestherheld. Thus, with these voices, these presences to be becoming intimate, reviewed in the frame of a musical work-First and Second Movement Third Movement-Intemezzo and touches of context in Argentina before the first and second trip the author to Chile's dictatorship Lanusse, Trelew, the first steps of the FAR and then the unit Montoneros, the populist-Marxist debate, Ezeiza, Field #, and the progress of the Three lopezreguismo and A.
In Chile live the saga of the "volunteer" for Chilean Youth, Latin American, and many countries around the world, building or renovating schools and health centers, census, teaching, vaccinating or providing first aid, experience with 800 Argentine university I lived with the "Santiago Pampillón Brigades" of the FUA. With guidance from Silvia, walk down Santiago, Pomaire, Rancagua and El Teniente mine, Valparaíso ("A city amphitheater" or "hanging of the hill", describes, exquisite, Silvia), Copiapo, populations and mushrooms, the villas Chilean ... listen to the Mapuche in Temuco and see the literacy campaign with moments of great tenderness and disclosures: a poem by Jacques Prevert, or Homer's Odyssey, provoking the imagination. The painting, story and reference life shows that "children are poets' responses." "Happiness is freedom" is the conclusion of a girl in the Callampa after chat and discuss student Evil of Prevert.
we say, too, about Sylvia's novel, a great love story. A story that helps to understand the way that I could love in those years and desperately intense, "as if it were your last day of our lives" . History Silvia and "Flaco," his "non-marriage" in Isla Negra, with Margaret Aguirre as a witness, along with the bells that greeted Neruda passing ships. Magic and nightmare: that love that tore the dictatorship, leaving indelible scars on the soul and body. It is also another great love story, that of many who are, and no longer are, for our people and all peoples fighting.
But Butterflies ... rescue is also a historical memory.
In a recent paper in Mexico in the 35 th anniversary of the last coup in Argentina Argentine internationalist political scientist Norberto Emmerich tells us we need the historical memory to respond to this emergency. Not because they are all the answers, but in the past is broken promises and, therefore, the past tells us about things that concern the future.
The witness, the militant, know what others forget, and talk because the crime, once committed, exists only when stored in the memory of men. Someone recalls Emmerich, once said that "nobody is dead until they forget." Our dead, which certainly died, somehow they are not dead. Not only because we remember, but because we fought. We fight as
Silvia promised his grandfather. Because Sylvia continued to write, was an excellent student and military to "the tortilla again." Met grandfather, Traful, with the Bolivian Ana, to Guadalupe, with the twins (and Ernesto Lautaro), with the boy of Zeta mushroom, with Michel, the Frenchman, with Thomas, with Peter, and the Lumi. Also Alexander, now prostrate, whom his old friends seem to have forgotten. And of course with Jose, "El Flaco."
And now meet us at these butterflies take flight we caress the soul.
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