Che Guevara on Tram 17 in Prague
Prague, April 1966. At Café Slavia, or Kavárna Slavia, the historical coffeehouse in front of the National Theatre, a man, one would imagine in his fifties, sits at a table. He looks at the Vltava flowing slowly out the window, drinking a coffee, he writes. Incipient baldness, with a slight hump, well-shaven, protruding teeth and square-rimmed glasses. It is not the first time he comes to Slavia. Concentrated, austere to the point of gloom, he could be a professor. The physique of an old soldier (a veteran?) is betrayed by coughing fits. Who knows what he thinks of the artists and the leaders of the cultural revolution of the Sixties? Who knows what the artists and hippies who meet his eyes think of him? Nothing, probably, except that he is a foreigner, conservative in appearance, Argentine to those who dare to ask – but who is often accompanied by a young black man with very thick curly hair, who at least attracts the attention of the girls. It is not as if so many dark-skinned strangers are seen around here. What does he write? Notes on “el hombre nuevo”, the new man. Indeed, nothing could be more banal for a...
