Eva Pern: La Santa Pecadora

Coral Sabino History of Latin America and the Caribbean Spring 2013

Eva Perns life, documented by historians, novelists, and playwrights alike, reflects the works of a saint or a sinner, depending on the perspective of the contemplator. Raised in poverty, she fell in love with theater and found her way to Buenos Aires, where she initially struggled professionally.1 Her encounter and subsequent relationship with Juan Pern raised her to incredible influence and power, first as his mistress and eventually as the First Lady. In this position she advocated for the rights of laborers, women, and the lower classes through a number of foundations and non-governmental organizations. Despite the success of the movements she led and was part of, there are those who will contest the goodness of Evita, as her people affectionately knew her. Though the public has long debated whether Eva Pern was a saint or a sinner, most scholars agree that despite her hard work in service of charity, laborers rights, and feminism, she remained a key part of a corrupt and fascist government that resulted in an indebted and unstable country. An example of the dichotomy is the difference between the musicals Evita and Eva, el gran musical argentino. Lecturer for the Department of Hispanic studies at Sheffield University, Lauren Rea, presents a comparison of the two musicals and their ties to politics in and outside of Argentina. Eva acts as an Argentine response to its internationally acclaimed counterpart Evita, and plays as much a part in the realm of Argentine politics as it does theater. Though Rea concedes that it does contain Peronist propaganda, she focuses instead on the connections between Eva

Bourne, Richard. Political Leaders of Latin America: Che Guevara, Eduardo Frei Montalva, Juscelino Kubitschek, Carlos Lacerda, Eva Pern. Harmondsworth (Middlesex): Penguin, 1969. Print. Pg. 259.

and another actress-turned-politician, Nacha Guevara, who has had a monopoly on the titular role of Eva in the musical since its penning. The allusions made during the piece that connect Nacha, as a member of the Peronist party, serve the purposes of Guevaras foray into politics. Current president Cristina Fernandez has also been connected to Eva Pern as a former First Lady and accepts a continuation of Evas legacy. It is a comparison that isnt negative to the Argentines, as Evas extensive work ethic and passion for those in need were not outshone by either Juan Pern or her troubling past. Eva, el gran musical argentino, aims to reclaim Evas identity prior to marriage and shows her as a woman who existed in her own right, with her own career and who was not simply a appendage of Pern.2 Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webbers interpretation of Perons life, Evita, concentrates on her failed European tour and the mismanagement of the Foundation Eva Pern as opposed to her dedication to her many causes.3 Rea quotes Webber as having said I hope that I have made it clear by all this where my sympathies lie. I find Eva Pern a very unsympathetic character, easily the most unsympathetic character about whom I have written except perhaps Pern.4 The picture of a woman driven to extremes by her apparently insatiable need for power and acceptance5 is exactly the one Rice and Lloyd Webber meant to perpetuate. Webber and Rice wrote Evita from a foreign point of view, and Rea surmises that the popular British composer and lyricist duo used Mary Mains biography The
2

Rea, Lauren. "Que Al Fin Todas Somos Eva: Nacha Guevara, Cristina Fernndez And Eva, El Gran Musical Argentino." Journal Of Iberian & Latin American Studies 17.1 (2011): 83. Advanced Placement Source. Web. 10 Apr. 2013. 3Rea, 89. 4Rea, 81. 5 Ibid.

Woman with the Whip, published under the pseudonym Mara Flores, as a source. Though Lloyd Webber and Rice deny ever reading the books before the creation of this musical, Rea believes that the two must have at least spoken to very similar sources as the criticisms of Eva found in the musical parallel very closely those described in Mains book. It is commonly understood that this biography is biased as well as inaccurate, as Mary Main was part of the upper class in Argentina during the time that Peronists were committing atrocities against the middle and upper classes. In addition, certain indisputable facts, like Perons age when her father died, are misinterpreted throughout the book.6 Eva was a child born of an unrecognized union between seamstress Iris Ibarguren, and Juan Duarte, member of an upper-middle class landowning family and a political Conservative. She had an impoverished upbringing. Her mother had been Duartes mistress, but after a few years he abandoned her and their four children to return to his first family with Adela dHuart. Despite how common this situation was, her fathers other family purportedly never recognized Eva and her siblings, and are said to have tried to keep them from Duartes wake in their home after his death in a car accident. They were wealthier and looked down upon their relations. Richard Bourne, Oxford historian, cites this time in Evas life as a catalyst for future actions as the experience of class prejudice they gave her would haunt Eva, helping to make her conscious of herself as an outsider.7 Eva herself writes in her book La razon de mi vida: I remember very well that I was sad for many days when it occurred to me
6 7

Davis, Helen. "Evaperonnovel." Evaperonnovel. Word Press, 23 Jan. 2013. Web. 23 Apr. 2013. Bourne, 257.

that in the world there were poor and there were rich; and the strange thing is that it was not so much the existence of the poor that made me sorry as the knowledge that there were rich at the same time.8 Her later work with the Social Aid foundation reflects the sense of injustice felt in her youth. She would distribute tens of thousands of toys for children, and while her beneficiaries cheered she would shout, You have the right to ask!9 She never stopped identifying with her roots, and those who had started in the same way she had. As to her beginnings as an actress, there is some dispute as to her levels of promiscuity. Bourne asserts that she had several lovers, some of whom were able to help her career, such as Olegario Ferrando, the boss of Pampa Films, was hardly surprising. But she was not a prostitute.10 In addition, that it was the freedom and independence of a woman in theatre that put of the restrictive Argentine elite.11 In fact, the aristocratic Sociedad de Beneficiencia, a charity organization, denied Eva the position of President of the organization that usually goes to the First Lady, arguably because they couldnt stand her even though they claimed the true reason was her youth.12 Bourne, rather than condemning Eva for her sexual liberties, pinpoints here the serious dislike the elite had for Pern and how that affected her reputation. Enrique Krauze states a bit more harshly that her rise in the acting world depended solely on her skills on the casting couch. Apparently, every step was due
Ibid, 258. Krauze, Enrique. Hank Heifetz. "The Blonde Leading The Blind." New Republic 216.6 (1997). MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 22 Apr. 2013. Section I. 10 Ibid, 11Ibid, 259. 12 Bourne, 265.
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to the patronage of one or another impresario, with the exchange of sex for work a given, though some were nicer about it than others.13 Krauze is a Mexican historian, essayist and publisher. He later describes Eva as the least sexual woman in the world and someone you couldnt get excited about even if you were alone with her on a deserted island, quoted from the author of Santa Evita and a lead actor from one of her starring films.14 These statements do point to the theory that the relationships she had before meeting Juan Pern were of a professional motivation. Still, as Bourne alludes to and Krauze states, she had received jokes and insults as a result of the assumption that shed been a prostitute, not the confirmation of those assumptions.15 In some ways, Evas relationship with Pern would redeem her. In addition to his position opening up career opportunities for her, he gave her new purpose at his side. Bourne comments on the uniqueness of Peronism, in that it was a twoheaded personal movement16, both Perns equally necessary to the movements success. The strength of this arrangement, he says, was in that Eva, in her rhetoric, always boosted Pern and offered herself as a humble intermediary between the descamisados and their leader.17 On the other hand, he says, her glamorous lifestyle allowed ordinary people to attach fantasy in order for them to escape vicariously through her their plain existence, were she herself had started. Bourne focuses here

Krauze, I. Krauze, II. 15 Ibid. 16 Bourne, 283. 17 Ibid.

13 14

on her theatrical ability, playing to class discrepancies throughout the spectrum, and surmises even that she had been working through some of her acting aspirations.18 Eva begins an approximation of what her role will be at Perons side on the days leading up to October 17th, 1945. Following Perons capture by police officials, she is said to have spent the next few weeks rallying support from laborers and other Peronist leaders and organizing demonstrations that reached a summit on the 17th. The final demonstration on the Plaza de Mayo, the courtyard in front of La Casa Rosada (the Presidential palace), was a veritable mob, shouting for Perns release. When he appeared on the balcony with then-president Edelmiro J. Farrell, the crowd went wild. Pern askd the laborers who have rallied in his support to be still, and proceeds to give them a day off. El Da de los Descamisados, as Argentinas proletrariat was reffered to by the Peronistas, was then established. Bourne, in typical balanced fashion, comments on this version of that days tale and the events leading up to it, and on the theory that Eva was instead trying to pull strings all so as to obtain habeas corpus and go into exile with her lover.19 He states that it is not unlikely for her to have been taking both plans of attack, as she often teetered between the lines of lover and political activist. Krauze, on the other hand, cites this day as the beginning of Evas stardom rather than a day of importance for all Peronistas. He says of her moving in to the palace after Pern is made President: From these heights, she could remake her history from its rootsNothing could

18 19

Bourne, 283. Ibid, 255.

ever be enough.20 Here, he limits Evas depth of character as he describes her as nothing more than a girl playing dress-up so as to spite those who once rejected her.

20

Krauze, II.

Eva and the laborers Eva's significance in the labor world was that she understood and was keen to channel the aspirations of those farm workers who had come to the cities in that growing urban explosion which was occurring in Argentina as in most other Latin American countries. p.268[1] They were Evita's people, and she was Peron's perfect partner in the enterprise of power, the orator who could mesmerize the shirtless ones, the co-caudilla of the justicialista movement. Sec II[2] Eva and societal aid (About the Social Aid Foundation) But, in fact, though it had a lot of achievements to its credit, it was unstable bureaucratic, and too personal to offer more than a transitional panacea for Argentine social problems. p.272 (see p.270-272 for specifics on Eva's Foundation)[3] Her sainthood in the eyes of her countrymen was purchased for her by the treasury of Argentina and by the workers themselves, with their "voluntary" donations, and, of course, by the future generations whom she and her husband impoverished with debt and inflation. Sect. II[4] Eva and feminism Eva became president of the Peronist Women's Party, set up in 1949, which was designed not only to organize women voters behind the Perons but to act as a continuing pressure group for women's rights. p.273[5]

Eva and the Nazis But there is no mystery at all about the direct aid given to the mass murderers of

Croatia, one of Hitler's most savage satellites.SIII

Juan and Eva Peron had their opponents jailed, often tortured, sometimes killed. SIII

The admiration of the Argentine army for their German counterparts, proverbial during the final ecades of the 19th centurey, had grown even stronger with the crisis of 1929-a humiliating time for Argentina. SIII

SUM UP: Evas role in Argentine society as Perons right hand and her significance to the public. (need a source maybe not primary but reflecting the publics opinion at the time) [PEEP KRAUZE] Conclude with final argument, restatement of body, what scholars say her significance is, if any, and a personal take (not using I) on the topic.

[1] Bourne, 268. [2] Krauze, II. [3] Bourne, 272. [4] Krauze, II. [5] Bourne, 273.

Works Cited Books Bourne, Richard. Political Leaders of Latin America: Che Guevara, Eduardo Frei Montalva, Juscelino Kubitschek, Carlos Lacerda, Eva Pern. Harmondsworth (Middlesex): Penguin, 1969. Print. Web Allison, Victoria. "White Evil: Peronist Argentina In The US Popular Imagination Since 1955." American Studies International 42.1 (2004): 4. Advanced Placement Source. Web. 11 Apr. 2013 Davis, Helen. "Evaperonnovel." Evaperonnovel. Word Press, 23 Jan. 2013. Web. 23 Apr. 2013. Loveday, Veronica. "Eva Peron." Eva Peron (2005): 1. MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 22 Apr. 2013. Rea, Lauren. "Que Al Fin Todas Somos Eva: Nacha Guevara, Cristina Fernndez And Eva, El Gran Musical Argentino." Journal Of Iberian & Latin American Studies 17.1 (2011). Advanced Placement Source. Web. 10 Apr. 2013. Periodicals Krauze, Enrique. Hank Heifetz. "The Blonde Leading The Blind." New Republic 216.6 (1997): 31. MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 22 Apr. 2013.

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