Santa Evita - Softcover

Martinez, Tomas Eloy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 067977629X ISBN 13: 9780679776291

Publisher: Vintage Espanol, 1996

Synopsis

El personaje central de esta novela es un cuerpo. Un cuerpo que, con la muerte, cobra una dimensión inesperada y redefine en forma mítica a la mujer que fue en vida. Pocas veces un símbolo ha inquietado de Eva Peron. Santa Evita cuenta por primera vez el larguísimo calvario que sufrió este cadáver embalsamado y retrata en forma admirablemente vivida a los personajes que acompañaron su peregrinaje: militares que enloquecen y asesinan para no perderlo; manos anónimas que depositan velas encendidas y flores silvestres en cada escondite del cadáver; peluqueros; actores fracasados; encargados de la cabina de proyección de un cine; carceleros de la Patagonia; un embalsamador que se niega a abandonar su obra maestra... Todos ellos desfilan por las paginas de este libro, así como la Evita nina, la actriz provinciana dispuesta a conquistar Buenos Aires, la protectora de los pobres, la Primera Dama adorada y odiada hasta la desmesura, la mas arbitraria y magnética de las mujeres argentinas. Tomas Eloy Martinez ha escrito un relato de intensidad y belleza infrecuentes en la literatura actual.

About this title

Review:

Among the great corpses of our age are Lenin, Mao Zedong and Stalin. Mao, at least, is still on view for the masses to see, some two decades after his demise. But no corpse engendered as much intrigue as that of Eva Peron. Elevated to near sainthood in Argentina after her death in 1952, her perfectly preserved corpse was seized by the Argentine Army following the ouster of her husband in 1955. By then, her corpse was the equivalent of a sacred relic, and while army officials wanted to keep it out of the hands of Peronists, they were loath to destroy the corpse for fear of the wrath that might follow. Tomas Eloy Martinez has reassembled the story of the corpse of Eve Peron in Santa Evita, and in the process, produced a riveting, rich book that not only tells the tale of one of the more bizarre sagas in the history of South American politics, but that also gets to the heart of the age-old human impulse to create myths and tell stories.

From the Inside Flap:

From one of Latin America's finest writers comes a mesmerizing novel about the legendary Eva Peron. Bigger than fiction, Eva Peron was the poor-trash girl who reinvented herself as a beauty, snared Argentina's dictator, reigned as uncrowned queen of the masses, and was struck down by cancer. When her desperate but foxy husband brings Europe's leading embalmer to Eva's deathbed to make her immortal, the fantastical comedy begins.

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage Espanol
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 067977629X
• ISBN 13: 9780679776291
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 394