Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, more popularly known by his byname Che Guevara, was born on this day in the year 1928. Today marks the 90th birth anniversary of the revolutionary and the "theoretician and tactician" of the Guerrilla warfare. The communist icon who was an integral part of the Cuban Revolution is still remembered fondly for his book "The Motorcycle Diaries" by the "lovers of revolution" and has become a poster boy for resistance and struggle. Even 50 years after his death, the revolutionary remains a polarising figure who is seen as a hero by many but also pitied by scores of historians.
The writer of the Motorcycle Diaries has also become one of the most sell-able "marketable" icons, though he himself would have hated to see his image of T-shirts selling across the globe. The leftist radical and anti-imperialism icon has some memorable quotes to his credit. Here are some of the best quotes:
1.If you tremble with indignation at every injustice, then you are a comrade of mine.
2. The true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.
3. I know you are here to kill me. Shoot, coward, you are only going to kill a man.
4. The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall.
5. Whenever death may surprise us, let it be welcome if our battle cry has reached even one receptive ear and another hand reaches out to take up our arms.
6. Silence is argument carried out by other means.
7. I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves.
8. We cannot be sure of having something to live for unless we are willing to die for it.
9. I don't care if I fall as long as someone else picks up my gun and keeps on shooting.
10. Many will call me an adventurer - and that I am, only one of a different sort: one of those who risks his skin to prove his platitudes.
Che Guevara 's friend, associate and former Cuba's leader Fidel Castro, said about Che and called him "the paradigm of the revolutionary" and added that Che would be present wherever there is a just cause to defend. Che Guevara died on October 9, 1967 in Bolivia but not before becoming a symbol of hope, armed rebellion and revolution.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 14, 2018 12:00 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).