Dear Reader,
The following is a series of works surrounding Eva Peron, or Evita, the First Lady of Argentina who served from 1946-1952. Out of my curiosity behind her fame, I read Eva Peron: The Myths of a Woman by J.M. Taylor. After discovering the many thoughts and misconceptions about Evita from this book, I decided to tackle the question: What made Evita immortal? Evita died very young, at age 32 and after not very many years of serving the country. However, she is regarded as one of the highest figures in Argentine history, even to this day--almost 70 years later. Everyone in Argentina knows the name Evita, and they will continue to know it. While her work was special to the country, I found that Evita had two interesting qualities that made her stand out against other figures in Argentine history. Evita kept her word. When she said she was going to do something, she did it. And when she did it, she did it well. She avoided corruption from the rest of the government and ran her own show in regards to her acts of service and helping the people. Secondly, Evita remained close to the people, forming more of a personal relationship with them, rather than a ruler/follower type of relationship. Evita was many Argentine people’s friend. She did not create an image of herself that separated her from the general public and/or put her at a higher level above them. She also was able to understand the people’s struggles because of her humble beginnings. It is because of this and her outstanding contribution to the working class and more that she is still remembered today.
My golden thread, or connected idea between all four of my genres is a quote by Evita, that goes, “My biggest fear in life is to be forgotten.” All of my genres incorporate the idea of her spirit and energy living on beyond her death, and people reassuring her that they won’t forget her. It is this reason that led me to research her, so I found it fitting to incorporate this very important aspect of her legacy into each piece. The first genre is a series of haikus, each to or from Evita. While simple, they show the grief that people had after her death, and the sadness behind her absence. The three different haikus from different points of view show the different ways that Evita was remembered, what they thought of her, and how they promised to never forget her, along with one stating Evita’s fear explicitly. There is a sad but strong message between the three that show that Evita’s fear never became true.
The second genre is a letter that someone wrote to Evita while sitting by her grave. This genre is both in Spanish and English, to create a better sense of reality, and what real Argentines would have said in the mourning process. The letter also gives examples of the contributions she made to the struggling character and again, reassure her that she could never be forgotten. This genre was fun to write and I especially liked getting to write one in Spanish and being able to share that side of the story. I included a picture of Evita’s tomb in the Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to give some sense of setting and awareness of where this letter is taking place.
The third genre is an obituary, giving a more professional sense of Evita’s immortality. She is described in all her greatness and shows how much the people loved her by warning them to stay safe during the transfer of her body (when in reality 8 people were killed during this event), and that her body was going to be available for public viewing, so that the Argentines could say goodbye to their friend, and Spiritual Leader of the Nation. The updates at the bottom of the obituary follow along in history, stating the whereabouts of the corpse (it went missing) and its return, stating that no matter where or what she was, she was never going to be less remembered.
The final genre is a journal entry written by Evita, expressing some of her true thoughts on being in the public eye. She expresses wanting to simply help people, and resents a lot of the fluff that comes along with being First Lady. This genre represents both Evita’s caring and dedicated nature, but also her explicit fear. The entry quotes her quote mentioned above that inspired the golden thread, and shows her reasoning behind such a fear and wanting to be able to overcome it. The other three genres show that Evita had nothing to worry about, and prove that she will never be forgotten in many different ways.
This project was very enjoyable to create, as I am genuinely interested in the topic and enjoyed being able to share some of the information I found interesting with my peers. This was a great project to end on, and I feel that I made some true discoveries. I learned a lot about Evita and history, but also about creative writing styles and experimenting with foreign ideas and formats. Being able to try these different formats was a great way to piece all of our work together. I hope that it has become evident why Evita is remembered so well, and that the genres are a way to testify that Evita’s fear of being forgotten was irrational. I hope you enjoyed!
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