I appreciate Che Guevara and his heroic efforts to nurture socialism in South America, however, this book is written like I used to write my diary when I was a child; in the style of "I went here, then I went there." It is tragic that there is not more depth to this book, because Che's story deserves to be listened to.

E' sempre emozionante leggere la biografia di un personaggio famoso, e questo caso non lo è da meno, sapendo che anche grazie al viaggio nel Sudamerica riassunto in questo diario Guevara conobbe la miseria dei popoli e maturò le sue convinzioni.
A caldo posso dire di aver avuto l'impressione che Guevara fosse un tipo molto pratico. Il diario è ricco di particolari sulle tappe e sui mille modi con cui Ernesto e l'amico Alberto riuscivano a scroccare un passaggio e un pasto da gente anche misera ma sempre ospitale. L'altra impressione è che i due amici dovevano essere molto coraggiosi o incoscienti per partire alla completa avventura, senza certezze economiche, affrontando enormi disagi fisici ma spinti da uno spirito indomito frutto della gioventù e della sete di conoscenza. L'ultima considerazione è sulla difficoltà di Guevara di scrivere in maniera diretta i propri sentimenti, che sono appena accennati, ma traspaiono ugualmente ad esempio nelle descrizioni degli indios, dei lebbrosari o anche delle città, in particolare di Cuzco. La lettera che chiude il libro, diretta a sua madre, compensa in parte questo aspetto, restituendoci un figlio affettuoso e appassionato.
Molto bello, da leggere.

4.0 ⭐️

GENRE - MEMOIRS.

Whilst in college I would often come across the cool dudes of our class wearing T Shirt of this flamboyant and appalling figure in beret with his name printed on the T-shirt that read ‘CHE GUEVARA’ Some how that figure fascinated me and I would research and learn about him in the years to come. ERNESTO “CHE” GUEVARA a cult figure of our era was an Argentine Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, guerrilla leader, diplomat and military general who played a major role in Cuban Revolution 1953 - 1959. Post war he hold the position of President of the National Bank of Cuba aswell as Minister of Industries, he was killed in Bolivia after trying to stage a coup against the Bolivian Government by fighting a guerrilla war.

About the book :- It’s about two young boys Argentina one of them “CHE” and his friend who set out from Buenos Aires to explore South America on a road trip. The travel through Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Venezuela through dense forest muddy landscapes, mountainous terrains, rivers,lakes and the Sea.
The come across Native Indians living under extreme poverty, deprivation, sickness and bad governance.The never knew where their next meal or drink will be coming from, where the next bed is to be found and who may be around to help them!

A truly captivating and breathtaking journey which will keep you thrilled and entertained throughout!

Thank You

I would have cried and/or died during most of the problems Ernesto and Alberto face—they crashed La Poderosa 9 times one day. Hilarious to me was halfway through when Che writes to his mom that he’s afraid of the dark (????)

I don’t think I’ve ever read a young person’s dreams and aspirations for growing old (“Perhaps one day, tired of circling the world, I’ll return to Argentina and settle in the Andean lakes, if not indefinitely than at least for a pause while I shift from one understanding of the world to another.”) that will be killed by the CIA in not too long. I think he was 23 when he wrote that, and was killed at 39.

This book chronicles Ernesto’s first Latin American journey, he is not yet a revolutionary, but the trip is clearly formative for him, especially when it comes to his former goals as a doctor. He wanted to make big scientific discoveries and help people through medicine, but he essentially comes to the conclusion that the social context medicine exists in is more important.

“I knew that when the great guiding spirit cleaves humanity into two antagonistic halves, I will be with the people.”

(Meeting a woman in poverty suffering with asthma and a heart condition): “It is in cases like this, when a doctor knows he is powerless in such circumstances, that he longs for change; a change which would prevent the injustice of a system in which until a month ago this poor old woman had had to earn her living as a waitress, wheezing and panting but facing life with dignity … it is then, for people whose horizons never reach beyond tomorrow, that we see the profound tragedy which circumscribes the life of the proletariat the world over.”

“I began to come into close contact with poverty, with hunger, with disease, with the inability to cure a child because of a lack of resources… And I began to see there was something that, at that time, seemed to me almost as important as being a famous researcher or making some substantial contribution to medical science, and this was helping those people.”

To be up front here at the front of this review, I didn't know Che Guevara was a writer. According to the bio info, not only travel journal writing, which he developed here the year after his peregrinations throughout South America, but short stories, even.

I did know he had a medical background, however. Dr. Che, Renaissance Man. And, to his eventual and early demise, Angry Young Man who predicted (incorrectly assuming men preferred principles and justice over profit and greed) the end of capitalism was nigh.

Yup. Just like the Holy Rollers who come out of the woodwork every now and again to say the END is nigh. Judgment Day. When the Lord settles some old scores, Old Testament-like.

But where was I? Ah, yes. Argentina, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, and so on and so forth. Che with his medical pal, starting first on an old motorcycle at age 23, and then bumming rides on truck flatbeds, rough-hewn rafts, etc.

Che who becomes a master at begging for food without seeming to beg for food. Che who suffers from serious asthma attacks without the proper medication for them. Che who, as you'd expect from any journal, comes across as oh-so-human and oh-so-sympathetic that you, too, would be pissed about CIA-backed goons executing him some 15 years later (Che probably being a better Renaissance man than soldier schooled in evasive maneuvers).

A yeoman outing, it is, more interesting because of the man than his writing ability, which is... yeoman. Meaning: this is of historical importance, in its way, and it certainly humanizes the icon who is now best known for his trademark face and beret, now available to the proletariat as a T-shirt or poster (via the capitalism he so detested) by clicking to "CART" at an online merchant near you. Or your computer, maybe.

Diarios de motocicleta = The motorcycle diaries: a journey around south America, 1995, Ernesto Che Guevara (1928 - 1967)
The Motorcycle Diaries (Spanish: Diarios de motocicleta) is a 2004 biopic about the journey and written memoir of the 23-year-old Ernesto Guevara, who would several years later become internationally known as the iconic Marxist guerrilla commander and revolutionary Che Guevara.
تاریخ نخستین خوانش: بیست و هفتم ماه فوریه سال 2005 میلادی
عنوان: خاطرات موتور سیکلت: روزنگاشت سفر به آمریکای لاتین؛ اثر: ارنستو چه گوارا؛ مترجم: تبسم آتشین جان؛ مشخصات نشر: تهران، حوض نقره، 1385، در 160 ص، نقشه، شابک: 9647961332؛ این کتاب با عنوان: «خاطرات سفر با موتور سیکلت» توسط انتشارات اجتماع در سال 1383 چاپ و منتشر شده است؛ چاپ دوم زمستان 1386؛ موضوع: چه گوارا ، آمریکای لاتین، سیر و سیاحت - سده 20 م
ا. شربیانی

Beautiful and evocative-this book really made me want to visit a South America. However, I found it's dreamlike style of writing hard to follow at times, and the jumps in time and place confusing. It's definitely more a series of beautifully written musing and notes than a comprehensive account of their travels.

Why wouldn't you become a revolutionary after a journey through the thicks of Latin America ?

Rarely do I see a movie and then read the book, but in this case I did, having liked Diarios de motocicleta (as one with a deep interest in South America—Chile in particular—and a love of the landscape travelled). However, this superficially charming book itself left me wanting more. To begin with, call the book what you will—a travelogue, or early mini-bio—this mish mash is haphazard, often poorly worded … what one might expect of what the text actually calls itself: a diary.

The overarching question then becomes, why dive into the rambling, less than literary diaries of others? I keep a diary, and am confident that it will never see print. Myriad would-be starlets, politicians and revolutionaries surely have penned equivalents, never published. The point is that ultimate fame gives retroactive interest to what academics call juvenilia, and special interest to cultural icons such as Ernesto (Che) Guevara, who competes with Marilyn Monroe for perhaps the most iconic photograph of modern times … so enduringly iconic indeed that in Wikipedia there is a separate article on Che Guevara in Fashion (“The face that launched a thousand T shirts.”)

Diarios de motocicleta presents itself as a foolhardy, youthful jaunt—and this is its delight. Picaresque in the best Spanish tradition, it putt-putts from adventure to misadventure, the two picaros straddling a broken down motorcycle which is something like a mechanical Rosinante . Certain episodes are sophomorically bawdy (In her introduction, Guevara’s daughter refers to this most delicately, and I personally will not take this matter further). The language is often baroque, again in the best Spanish tradition. And no one could fault the humanitarian nature of the journey’s end of these two medical students at a leper colony in the Amazon. All this held my interest to varying degrees—sometimes with a raise of brow—but ultimately I felt short-changed by these “diaries” as not forthcoming where I desired them to be: namely, as giving scant hint of what turned a young Argentinian medical student into a revolutionary. He rubs shoulders with campesinos and the proletariat, here and there, little more than that.

Diarios de motocicleta is a wonderfully wild, sophomoric South American road trip through extraordinary landscapes and rich culture, with a leper colony as its strange goal. But no more than the movie does it reveal in what fashion—or to what degree—this madcap journey forged the revolutionary ultimately executed in Bolivia, and photographed for the world in the laundry room of a hospital. And, I regret to say, much of the fascination is that future’s retroactive overlay,

This book taken at face value does not amount to much. It is the status of the mythical figure behind the text that gives the book its appeal. On the pages of these notes we observe the transformation of a bored middle class kid looking for an adventure into a person ready to sacrifice himself in a fight for dignity of those least fortunate. It is not surprising that the strongest passages in the book are devoted to the descriptions of terrible living and working conditions at the Chuquicamata mines, the constant humiliation of the indigenous people of Peru, the suffering of patients in leprosy colonies. The notes do not have significant literary value but you get a glimpse of a real person behind that iconic image - "the most famous photograph in the world".

Sometimes my job sees me heading off to the worst kind of places (chemical works and sewage plants being two prime examples), however sometimes the gods just smile down and I find myself being sent somewhere really good. Really good, like where? Well, I'll tell you. I've been sent to work in a library for five days.

WHOO HOOOOOOOOO!

The local liberry (to quote Richard Derus) has been closed for a big refurbishment which partially involves whole scale demolition of parts of the building. Want to demolish a historic building? Whoyagonnacall? The archaeologists, that's who. So all these books are being given away, chucked out, pulped or sold on to make way for an e-liberry. Ye Gods! And I found this in the recycle bin - astonishing what people are willing to throw away really! It was not own its own either because it was accompanied by copies of Wuthering Heights, Pride and Prejudice and many many many others. In total I liberated about 40 books all of which have now been dusted off, registered on bookcrossing and released around the city for other people to enjoy. If you don't know about book crossing then go to http://www.bookcrossing.com immediately. Go on, off you go!

Overall I enjoyed this special random free "book-in-a-bin" find, but it was not quite as inspirational as generations of Che t-shirt wearing wannabee revolutionaries would have me believe. Maybe I'm just too old? Is this something you're supposed to read when you're young and perky and stoned? Up there with Kerouac in that this book sells loafing and free loading as a form of modern spiritual enlightenment. See? I am too old.

There is no doubt that his writing is good and the trip was an exceptional and entertaining journey, especially since Che and Alberto made the journey relying on the charity of strangers. The most amazing part of the book was the way that the police could always be relied on to provide a place to stay and some free food when all else failed. Not to discredit our loyal band of polis, but I can't imagine that ever being likely in the UK!

Adventure and travel literature is my go-to genre when I'm reading books, and a couple of years ago I came across a book called Chasing Che: A Motorcycle Journey in Search of the Guevara Legend. The author decides to revisit the famous route Che Guevara took across South America when he was 23/24. I thought about it and thought that perhaps I should read Guevara's book first, so I picked it up and put it on the shelf, waiting to get to it someday.

In 2004, a film version of The Motorcycle Diaries was released, and I had the dvd from Netflix about a year later. I was nursing a dying dog at the time, and never finished watching it. I was, however, interested in the overall story. Like most Americans, my knowledge of Che Guevara was binary: he was either a thuggish, Marxist, murdering revolutionary, or a pop culture icon for disaffected youths who knew nothing about him. The movie, and now the book, allowed me a chance to meet the real Ernesto Guevara, later known as Che, in the formative days of his early 20s, before he was radicalized. Every revolutionary is someone's freedom fighter, and vice versa, so I was open to learning about the man, good and bad.

Now that I've finished the book, I'm not completely sure what I really know about Guevara, to be honest. This book has a nice introduction by Guevara's daughter, and a lengthy Foreward by some academic who is in thrall with Che the revolutionary. My thoughts going into the book would be that of a clear, concise evolution of a young, not-so-naive medical student, into an angry intellectual so appalled by living and working conditions of the people he met that he was rushing to take up arms against the capitalist order. We really don't get that. Instead, Guevara writes about his trip with his traveling companion, the ways in which they con people out of food and shelter, how nice the Civil Guard is in various countries, and Guevara's frequent asthma attacks.

Ok, it's not that blase. Guevara does write some about the people he meets. The bourgeoisie are described with acrid wit, hardly ever in a positive light, whereas the indigenous peoples are barely dealt with at all, except as backdrops, traveling companions who rarely speak but have filthy hygiene. In fact, in much of the way Guevara describes the peasantry, he reminds me of a limousine liberal; aware of the plight of the underclass and even an advocate for them, but probably not people to be invited over for Sunday dinner. In Venezuela, I think it was, he encounters a good number of Black people, and describes them as "lazy" and "indolent." Thinking of how Che became a great hero of Cuba with its large Afro-Cuban population, it was quite a surprise to read that. Guevara and his friend, a bio-chemist, are quick to use their education as status when possible, and have no trouble cheating people out of money for food, etc. I suppose he wasn't much of a Marxist at this point.

Truth be known, Guevara comes across as kind of an asshole. He doesn't exhibit any real tenderness or concern about anyone other than himself, excepting perhaps the patients he met in a few leper colonies along the way (Guevara and his friend were interested in leprology). He leaves behind a girlfriend to make this trip, he quarrels with his friend, he's mean to animals and has no sympathy for a poor puppy he meets, and generally acts like a spoiled brat. When he's hungry, the future Marxist doesn't wonder too much about the hunger of the peasants he meets, or when he's upset about being ambushed by mosquitoes, he doesn't think about the people living in the jungle who face that nuisance on a daily basis. His trip is mostly taken with blinders on, oblivious to how his own actions affect those around him.

So why a four star review? Well, dammit, he's like that annoying younger brother you have, the one who is a pest and who is always getting into trouble. You always end up admiring his spunk, despite his flaws, and that's what happened to me. Guevara truly had a difficult journey, and with his cunning, and, yes, lies and thievery, makes do with his hardship and sees the journey through. Whether it's Guevara's original text or the translation, this book is a joy to read. The prose is jaunty and personal and funny and sad. You get a real sense of how Guevara must have been in person at this time in his life. Cocky and boyish, it's hard not to like the guy. There are also many fascinating accounts of cities, Machu Picchu, etc. that are riveting to read.

It's in the last chapter that Guevara's future self emerges. I imagine this was written as a coda, but he can see that his life is going to change and it will probably end with an early death. He finally expresses the injustice in the world, and announces he will ally himself with the people when the time comes to be held accountable. Years later, Guevara will be in Guatemala during a CIA-inspired coup takes place, forcing Guevara to choose sides in the great struggle he saw coming.

This edition has as an addendum a speech given by Guevara in the early 60s to some Cuban students. He lays out his view of the role of the people in the struggle, and engages in some typical Marxist doublespeak. It was interesting to see how Guevara the revolutionary saw the world, compared to the journey just read. It was like reading about two different people. I'm not so sure it's a needed part of the book. It's a little spoiler-y, to be honest, about the feelings I had developed about Guevara the young student. I think I would have preferred to keep my rose-colored glasses on for a little while longer, as scratched as they might be.