Evita--An Intimate Portrait of Eva Perón

Abstract

TOMÁS DE ELÍA and JUAN PABLO QUEIROZ (eds.): London, Thames and Hudson, 1997.

With the end of the blitz of conflicting visual images of Evita--"the woman with the whip," "the lady of hope," and the montonera--and Peronism as portrayed in the films of Alan Parker (1996) and Juan Carlos Desanzo (1996), the time has come for photo albums. Several such books have appeared over the last two years, but Tomás de Elía and Juan Pablo Queiroz's offering is perhaps the most impressive so far. Although the book's introduction, written by Naomi Ramallo, a history professor at the University of Buenos Aires, does not shed any new light on Eva Perón's character or actions, it commendably emphasizes the different interpretations--academic, journalistic, and political--of the image of one of the most charismatic women leaders of the twentieth century. This is not, strictly speaking, a biography, although it serves that purpose as accompanying text for the story told by the pictures; throughout the book, the photo captions add supplementary information about the life of Eva Duarte de Perón.