As I’m not generally a fan of musicals, I cannot say that I knew that much—other than an outline—about the career of Eva Peron. A visit earlier this week to the fascinating, if hagiographical, Eva Peron Museum in Buenos Aires has gone some way to putting that right. The undercurrents to her story are intriguing, much more so than I had expected.
Within a room or two of the main entrance, you find yourself contemplating blurry slo-mo footage of her funeral (accompanied by a no less evocative nuevo tango soundtrack from—I’d guess—the Gotan Project), footage that with its images of cascading flowers was reminiscent of the scenes—pagan, hysterical and strange—that followed another early death of a princess, that of Diana.
Under the circumstances, it wasn’t then too much of a surprise when, wandering on through the exhibition, I discovered that Evita had officially been given the title of “Spiritual Leader of the Nation”, something that might explain, well, this….
Gods, goddesses and their kin will, it seems, always be with us. To think otherwise is madness. The only question is the form that they will take.
I can see Sarah Palin’s more rabid acolytes setting up a similar shrine to her.
I am sure you can, Susan. It is always easy to imagine all sorts of vile hypothetical misdeed by those one despises.
Of course, with Obama you do not have to imagine. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17927102/
Like Obama, Palin attracts followers who behave as if they were cultists, or members of a religious movement. When I hear some of Palin’s fan refer to her as “Our Lady Sarah,” as I have, many times, I wonder how long it’ll be before I see an image of her with a photoshopped halo.
Obama and Palin attract fans who attribute to them god-like capabilities. Although I give Palin credit for not promising to lower the seas.