My "I Blow My Nose on Ché Guevara" Story

In the late 1970's I wrote a short story, "El Gaucho", in which Ché Guevara appears as a character. He is a long-time friend and accomplice of the main character, who babbles in the romantic, overblown language of a Marxist revolutionary while he spends his time living off the rich and pining after his sister.

I sent the story to The New Yorker, where I got the top of the line rejection letter, signed by Charles McGrath, who wrote that they were quite impressed with the language and authenticity of the story (set in Argentina) but that my "intentions were not clear enough". I supposed that he meant that my narrative intentions were not defined, but it is also possible that it was not clear whether I was praising or condemning Guevara, nor whether I was praising or condemning incest.

As for the authenticity of the story, I had never been in Argentina, the South Buenos Aires that I described was an invention, so I was delighted that I had been able to convey something that I did not know. As for my vision of Ché Guevara, I was quite sure that I shared little with him, but the story was not about Ché Guevara at all ... or so I thought.

The story was meant to be an exploration of the language of revolution and its irreal romanticism that justifies just about anything in the name of revolution -- including incest. In the story, I did not spefically condemn this language nor incest, and an unsuspecting reader might have have assumed that I shared my main character's (and Mr. Guevara's) revolutionary zeal.

Nothing could be further from the facts. I was fascinated by the astonishingly creative abuse of language endemic to totalitarians. To listen to Castro (or Hugo Chávez) for 3, 4, 5, 6 hours is about as close to torture as you can get without being locked up in Guantánomo. My challenge in writing the story was to use that language in a way that explained the real passion that revolutionaries feel despite their horrific poetics.

Mr. McGrath at The New Yorker thought the story was a nice try. And as a young writer, I should have been happy to have a written rejection letter from The New Yorker that also included an invitation to send more.

I never sent more, and eventually published the story in "West Branch", a small literary magazine that is still going. I started a second Ché story when my daughter can home from school one day with a facial tissue that had Ché's famous photo stamped on it. It so happened that trading facial tissues with designs on them had become popular among the girls at school. Most of the tissues were manufactured by a German company, Paper Products Design, under the trademark "Sniff". I was baffled by daughter's decision to trade facial tissues, but respected by daughter's choice.

I was quite impressed as my daughter's collection grew. Every couple of days she would show me her new acquisitions and I would ask the customary polite parental questions. And then the Ché photo showed up on a red facial tissue and had to have it. I offered my daughter a Euro for it, which she gladly took thinking that I was out of my mind and that she would have given me the Ché facial tissue for 50 cents, 25 cents, maybe even for nothing -- a present for Daddy.

... That was a couple of years ago and I still have the Ché facial tissue. I use it in my Entertainment Industry class to talk about how pretty much anything can become a mass entertainment product. I finish up my little Ché class skit by holding up the Ché facial tissue and remarking that I am thinking about writing a short story starring Ché Guevara with the provocative title, "I Blow My Nose on Ché Guevara".