Video Essay: ALLENDE, Chile’s Legacy

Allende, my grandfather and the legacy of these two men

Hi, I’m George Westcott. I know I haven’t posted much as of recently. The reason is, and not surprisingly, because I have been working on a long-form video essay. Find the attached YouTube link here in addition to the full script and sources. I’m incredibly proud of this work and would really appreciate it if you gave it a watch/read. This has been a longtime coming and a serious passion project of mine.

Script:

(Play the last words of Salvador Allende)

On September 11th, 1973, the Chilean coup occurred centered in La Moneda, Chile's central government building. What you just listened to are Salvador Allende's last words. These were spoken directly to Radio Magallanes as his surrounding building was bombed by a violent military coup. Right after these words were spoken, Salvador Allende, the first democratically elected socialist president died, suspected to have taken his life by his own hands. Half of his iconic glasses are now one of the pieces to remember him by.

Hi, I'm George Westcott. Allende has been an interest of mine since I first really got into politics during my IB history course. This later became a fascination during my university studies. Growing up, Allende was this mythical figure but also hushed, present yet only spoken about on occasion. I think in the circles in which I grew up around, Allende was seen as calling the name of the devil in some way. The socialist Voldemort to the mainstream neoliberal institution. It almost felt like invoking his name would summon the presence of the long-gone socialist, an invocation of sorts. Even in our history class, I never felt truly connected to Chilean history due to my feeling more mixed than Chilean. As much as I would like to admit, I didn't feel connected to it. At that moment I felt too Dutch in my Chilean circle to really feel any sort of connection to Chilean history. It was only when I attained some distance by joining an international school that the history surrounding Allende's presidency began to resonate.

Regardless of what you believe, a lot has been said about this man, especially on YouTube. He seems to be the YouTube communist's go-to case of American interference during the Cold War. He is the boogeyman to neoliberals in chile, what happens when we elect a left leaning figure. Most people invoke Allende, on the left at least, in anti-American-imperialism without delving deeper into his unique history. Furthermore, in these circles, it is constantly repeated how he was a successful socialist, used as a rejection of the "Communism/socialism always fails".

Yet, it bugs me. A lot of non-Chileans on the left don't want to grasp the cultural legacy of this man. Maybe it's just purely out of reach, hidden behind the Spanish language barrier. Yet Allende represents something more than just a history, an event that still has consequences. Allende is something stranger, more difficult to describe.

Before I can go any deeper into this, I feel like I should go through the history.

Part 1. Allende

Salvador Allende was born in 1908 in Santiago de Chile. He was born to one of the upper-class families in the country. His family had a long history of political involvement with his grandfather being part of the Reform Party and his father deeply involved with the Partido radical and anticlericalism. Allende from a young age had an interest in anarchist authors such as Juan De Marchi, creating his political foundations.

With all of this said, it is fair to say that Allende was almost destined for politics. Raised within the upper crust of the Chilean circle. It is strange because it certainly looks like a circle I grew up in. During his youth, he was a member of the Everton sports club which I grew up around in the Anglo-Chilean scene. In some way, it seems insane how a revolutionary figure, something I look up to in some ways and has been pointed at as a bastion of leftist values, grew from a circle I felt was so vastly conservative.

During his stay in medical school at the Universidad de Chile, Allende went on to become president of the student center. Eventually, in 1929 he became the vice president of the Federation of Students of the University of Chile, later on becoming the representative of the students of Medicine at his university.

Allende went on to become an activist and worked in the Frente Popular's campaign headed by Pedro Aguirre Cerda. He was even one of the Chilean senators at the time who sent a letter condemning Kristallnacht and Germany's persecution of Jews in 1941. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Allende served Valparaiso, Chiloé, Valdivia, Concepción, and Antofagasta, amongst others. Regardless of whether or not he would become president, Allende had a storied political career that would make even the most dedicated career politicians blush.

What most people don't know is that Allende ran for president unsuccessfully 3 times. I remember vaguely having this told to me in history class when I was 13 but reading into it has been quite fascinating. In Chilean "lore," we tend to describe Allende as this mythical figure, who rose out of the Mapocho River in Santiago and became president. The socialist Excalibur was taken out too early. Instead, this man went through it. In 1952 he was temporarily expelled from the race for his support of the then-outlawed communists. In 1958 he lost to the Conservative-liberal Jorge Alessandri. In 1964, he again was defeated by Social Democrat Eduardo Frei. It got so bad in fact that Allende joked that his epitaph would read "Here lies the next president of Chile." A joke that foreshadowed more than he could comprehend at the time.

It's 1970, stakes are high. It was the peak of the Cold War and coming down from the Frei government. Nixon was in power in the United States with Kissinger as his assistant in national security affairs. Allende faced two opponents, Radomino Tomic, running with the Christian democrats, and the returning Alessandri, having now parted ways with said Christian democrats. This specific divide between the right and center support base for the two opposing candidates was common knowledge. The right and the center were divided and this could be the perfect opportunity for Allende to win the presidential race. This was especially known by the US government which had paid attention to the presidential race after the agrarian reforms of the previous government had redistributed wealth away from US-aligned corporations and landowners. They feared that Allende, a well-known Marxist aligned with the popular unity, a coalition party of socialists, communists, leftists, and dissident Christian Democrats would weaken their control over the Latin American economy through continued "tomas". The US could not let Allende win.

The CIA had funded Frei's presidential campaign years before. This time, it would be different. The CIA decided this time around to create propaganda against Allende, funding a "spoiling operation" according to Henry Kissinger. They poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into anti-Allende propaganda, funding posters and pamphlets. The CIA wanted to destroy Alledne's image, framing him as an anti-democratic despot all with the direct intention of linking Allende deeper to the USSR. During this, Allende had been in contact with the KGB, receiving a 400 thousand dollar support payment for his presidential campaign since the US had refused to offer financial aid.

Now, with the country divided between the three running candidates, one of these three men would become president. Energies were hot and a lot of eyes were on this election.

After the votes were counted, these were the results.

Tomic came out with a 28.11%, Alessandri with a 35.27% and Allende with a 36.61%. He had done it. After three failed presidential runs, Allende had done it, he was the president-elect.

His appointment was not smooth sailing, however. Since none of the candidates had won a majority of the "popular vote", congress had to decide who had won. As they had done before for Alessandri, they decided on who had won the most votes, making Allende the president-elect. On November 3rd of that year, Allende took office.

On the day of his inauguration, Allende opened Palacio La Moneda to the public speaking publicly and openly to the Chilean people. He hoped to have a democratic government and styled himself as "Presidente compatriota" or the compatriot president.

This election had infuriated Nixon. According to the Guardian, Nixon met with Agustin Edwards, the owner of the conservative newspaper El Mercurio, to begin plotting what they would describe as a "gameplan" to overthrow the newly appointed Chilean president. Allende would be going down. In one of these meetings down the line, a declassified CIA document from a meeting between Henry Kissinger and John Mitchell refers to their game's goal as "make the economy scream. This would serve as an ominous foreshadowing of events to come.

Regardless of this, Allende was now president. While in office, Allende went on to pursue what he would call "La vía chilena al socialismo" or "The Chilean Way to Socialism".

Now, what is La Vía Chilena Al Socialismo? Well, the plan essentially focused on nationalization. The nationalization of industry, mainly the copper mining business, the nationalization of education, and finally the continued nationalization of land, a policy being continued by Eduardo Frei's government. Allende in his presidential speech posited that this way of socialism was done with democracy in mind, claiming his majority in Congress from the Left-wing coalition and Christian democrats.

"The Popular Unity government represented the first attempt anywhere to build a genuinely democratic transition to socialism - a socialism that, owing to its origins, might be guided not by authoritarian bureaucracy, but by democratic self-rule."

So, before I can describe what Allende did in his government, I will divide this into a couple of parts.

For a while, Allende seems to stay off of economic nationalization. The first couple of months were set to mainly reassure the Chilean capitalists that he would not be as radical as the previous government's policies. After these months, Allende went on to nationalize a wide variety of businesses in Chile. The main one that is brought up whenever the point is brought up is the copper industry.

In terms of welfare and education, Allende was able to follow through with some of his proposed reforms. Noteworthy of these would count his legalizing the feeding of children and the right for the children to get food and milk in school through the National Supplementary Food Program. Alongside this, Allende raised social welfare.

1. The crisis

So, as much as a lot of Allende's were successful or vaguely successful, he had brought on the wrath of the CIA. Henry Kissinger, as I said before, was set on bringing down the new Allende government. After the nationalization of the copper mining industry, the US implemented an embargo on the Chilean economy. Even though Allende had tried to have amicable relationships with US foreign dignitaries, the US was set on "making the economy scream". Still in need of foreign aid, Allende had to do something. In the middle of the Cold War, there were few options for requests for foreign aid, especially when the US has put an embargo on your nation. This cut off most US allies at the time, Europe, US aligned Latin American nations were out of the picture. Allende went on to request foreign aid from the Soviet Union. This was the perfect justification for the US to claim national security risk and Allende's cabinet knew of this.

Allende, in making this connection, had put Chile in the crosshairs of the US sniper rifle, aiming straight at their head.

The US had commenced its campaign in Chile. One of the first of these steps according to their game plan was to fund the trucker strikes in the south of Chile. The truckers had messed up most of the transportation of food around the country, messing up the Chilean economy and eventually being one of the leading causes of what would be called "a bread shortage". Still, you can find images of the lines at grocery stores of Chilean people from around the country waiting for bread. Enough, the growing right-wing and opposition towards Allende would go on to push the blame fully on the sitting president. Understandable, since it was not yet known that the strikes were directly being funneled by the CIA.

Meanwhile, this was going on, in the conservative newspaper, El Mercurio (I told you they would come up again). Started their written anti-Allende news campaign. The newspaper, being one of the most popular sources of news in the country, was instrumental in shifting the popular opinion against Allende.

Allende was facing a full economic crisis. While they had nationalized the industries from around the country, the truckers were the lifeblood of the economy. Allende was facing the full brunt of an economy that was beginning to scream.

It was around that time that the military was losing respect for the Unidad popular government. Several members of the high command had begun conspiring to create a coup d'etat. The day before, one of the members of the high command had reported the conspiracy to the current minister of Defense. 9 people were arrested but did not stop the coup attempt.

On the morning of June 29th, Roberto Viaux, a high-ranking military colonel who had been fired that morning led a group of armed vehicles and led an insurrectionist force straight at La Moneda and the Ministry of Defense. The armed vehicles were stopped at the Ministry of Defence, firing machine guns killing several people and wounding 19. One of these was a group of Argentine reporters, their footage of a haunting final moment as they were shot down by a hostile military force. It is still not known who exactly the culprit was. General Prats had gone to the military for support and reluctantly the military had agreed to protect the president. With nearby military regiments, the protecting and rebel forces faced each other in front of La Moneda. Eventually, the rebel forces were dealt with, leaving Allende with a massive problem on his plate. This attempted coup would be labeled as el Tanquetazo.

His congress had largely turned against Allende at this point. After Allende tried to reorganize the military to prevent any further military coups, Congress declared him anti-democratic and acting outside the constitution. The Christian democrats, who put in all their votes for Allende for his election had now voted against him. It is said that a large reason for this movement was the fear that people had to maintain Allende in power. They knew that if Allende stayed as the sitting president they could face a second, more violent coup. Allende was on thin ice.

In an attempt to correct and reform the military, General Prats left his post. This was both due to the tanquetazo and a series of protests outside his house after he had previously shot a woman named Alejandra Cox during a traffic dispute. In his stead came a military general from Valparaiso. This man, Augusto Pinochet.

1. The coup

As I mentioned before, Allende's control over Chile had begun to slowly corrode. Even if he had the interests of the people in mind, previously pointing out the success he had with policy early in his campaign, he had lost a large portion of his base of support. In 1972 there had been a rise in opposition groups alongside the aforementioned truckers strikes. Allende had even gone to New York to address the United Nations in an attempt to reconcile with Richard Nixon. Nixon refused.

Throughout this entire time, the military had begun plotting. It was known that there was a growing dissatisfaction with Allende's government and the recent change in Leadership, now under Augusto Pinochet, had begun reforming the military to take over the government. On the morning of the 11th of September 1973, Pinochet sent the navy to take over Valparaiso, a strategic point, controlling most radio, TV, and imports into the country.

At the same time, Allende and the current defense minister at the time had attempted to call the military, only getting in contact with the PDI (policía de investigación) and Carabineros (police force) which came to aid Allende's government in La Moneda. It is said that Allende, even to the last minute, believed that Pinochet was still on his side. There's a specific quote he is said to have said to his security. "I wonder what they have done with poor Pinochet".

By 8:30 Pinochet and his army had declared themselves as government and with it, a state of emergency. The rest of the military began taking control over the rest of Chile through a deliberate military campaign. The main force stood in Santiago, facing la Moneda. They had called that Allende had been officially deposed, with backing through the previously mentioned backlash from the senate. Allende refused.

By 9:10, Allende called into Radio Magallanes, a prominent radio station at the time. Allende was able to give his final words, words of departure and hope for the future of Chile. These were the words you heard at the start of this video. This was a while Santiago boomed with the echoes of fighter jets, the sounds of bombs being dropped on La Moneda.

The assault lasted hours, Allende arming himself with a Kalashnikov, a gift from Fidel Castro, against the incoming military forces. His sparse defending force was no match against the full force of the military.

Now, the next series of events is difficult to say, there is contradicting evidence of what exactly happened. What is known is two things. At 1 pm, he asked the force defending La Moneda to surrender. As he thanked the soldiers who had laid their lives on the line for the president, Salvador Allende walked into his office. There, armed with the assault rifle he had used to defend against the military coup, Allende took his own life. Allende was 65 years old at the point of his death.

This was not the ending to this story. As it is commonly known, Pinochet was placed as the military dictator of Chile. The months following the coup were some of the most violent in modern Latin American history. Pinochet rounded up thousands of intellectuals, socialists, and activists and rounded them up in the Estadio Nacional in Santiago. Here, iconic Chilean poet, Victor Jara, was murdered by the military force. This was followed by military campaigns all over the country. In the following 3 years, 130,000 arrests were made, it is still unknown the exact number that was tortured, being theorized to have been conservatively 30000 people. This doesn't account for the large portions of Chileans who were exiled, being around 200000.

The Pinochet government went on to remove and undo most of the reforms and programs that were set forth by the Allende government. He set back all the land reforms and, a large portion of the nationalization of industry. In addition, Pinochet destroyed a vast majority of files and documents from that era, things about Allende only being revealed after the dictatorship. Of these projects which was needed was an early version of the internet being developed alongside American computer engineers which was a preliminary version of what ended up being the internet. Project Cybersyn is only one of various projects and ideas that ended with Allende. The Chilean road to socialism had sailed away.

Allende still, even in his death, has a great presence over the modern day Chilean left. A tragic figure. Even for me. A lot of my political education has been grounded on the fact that Allende was deposed, that the great imperial capitalist forces will attempt to bring down any form of radical thought. In addition, a lot of work has been done in an attempt to tell what Allende’s chile would have looked like if he wasn’t deposed. It all is theoretical, an activity in speculation. He was even name dropped very recently as of writing this in the Colombian President’s letter to Donald Trump. I sometimes think of him as some form of catholic saint, who’s miracle was to be elected and his death was the great sin, akin to a Christ-like figure. At least that’s how he’s treated.

Allende is a man who has been mythologized but he was a Chilean man with typical Chilean faults. A man with pride and still an issue to how he was perceived by the Chilean public. I was sitting with a psychiatrist recently while I was in Chile, I told him I was working on this project. He told me about how he had known the guy (Allende) when he was younger. As he tells it, when Allende had become president, he faced several criticisms from his opposition including those of him being a champagne-socialist. The focus of these claims coalesced into saying that Allende had a yacht, a socialist with a yacht. The story goes that when he was elected president and Allende opened La Moneda to the public, he placed his small sailing boat in the fountain of the palace, living proof that he owned no yacht. I think Allende, at the fact of being in politics, felt a great discomfort to how he was perceived, especially by the general Chilean public.

Now, why do I tell this story? Well, my grandfather was the one who taught Allende how to sail. My grandfather taught Salvador Allende how to sail. I'm not making this up. Why do I want to talk about this? Because to me, Allende and my grandfather have striking similarities that I would like to cover. But before I do that, I must give a little background.

Part 2. My Grandfather.

So, before I can say much of anything, I want to make a disclaimer. As much as I would like to give the full recounting as I did with Salvador's life, I can't do that for my grandfather. This is mostly for privacy reasons (I'm not revealing my whole family history) but also because I don't have all the information. My grandfather passed away when I was 3. What I do have access to instead is his memoir, family stories and the things he left behind which I will be pulling from to tell his story.

My grandfather was born on the 8th of July 1932 to an English father "Frank Westcott" and a Scottish mother "Molly McKay". He was born in Chile and grew up there during his early years, attending an Anglo-Chilean boarding school that I went to as a kid. My grandfather was a rugby player and lived surrounded by friends within his spaces.

Eventually, throughout life, my grandfather went on to move to England where he went to study at Cambridge. He wrote in his memoir that he valued this dual element of his identity and while in Chile stayed connected to his British roots and connected with other Latin American students in the Cambridge Latin American Society.

During his time in university, my grandfather was a member of the footlights, a Cambridge based theatre troupe. He says that he used to compose music for his theatre friends and that it was “one of the best times” in his life. He credits his time in the footlights as “the area from which I may have artistically developed”

My grandfather was constantly surrounded by friends. His memoir and my family give the impression that Tony was an incredibly charismatic man and someone with an incredibly active social life. He has stories and stories of adventures he went on, places he’s seen and people he met. Half the book is names I have vaguely heard and names I have not.

Eventually, he married my grandmother who had both my dad and my aunt, living in Chile. Eventually, they both separated and my grandmother went on to move back to Holland with my dad and my aunt, where they grew up.

My grandfather went on to remarry, had another kid (my uncle), and got separated again.

Overall, he didn't have the greatest luck when it came to his romantic relationships. His whole memoir was a recounting of his relationship with the women throughout his life. I hate that I cannot share more of what I want to say but due to the wishes of my family I have decided to keep a large portion of the details away from this essay.

Aside from his love life, my grandfather went on to work for the family company and on the side enjoyed his hobbies. He was an artist in many ways and a published writer. He also acted and did theatre and movies. He was also an incredibly talented piano player. He also had a love for the ocean, being a sailor and it being the main muse for his writing, most of his books being in some way related to the subject.

Throughout his life he published three books. “10000 millas a Valparaiso” is an account of one of his first trips from England to Chile, serving as a form of journal of his trip. “Reminiscencias Náuticas” is in a similar vein, serving as an early attempt to a memoir, directly trying to account for his whole life experience of sailing. Finally, “El Tesoro de Lord Anson” is an account of a lost treasure on the Island of Robinson Crusoe. The book goes over my grandfather’s experience with Bernard Kaiser, a Dutch treasure seeker and the history of this hidden treasure. Overall, his books are strangely personal accounts and I find myself feeling closer to my grandfather through reading them.

During his time in Chile, he had a house in Algarrobo, a beach city in the Valparaiso region. They lived down the street from Allende. According to his memoir, they were good friends and my grandfather taught the man how to sail, an interest they both shared. They would sit by the pool and have drinks while Allende wore a large straw hat in his bathing suit. The best story that I love to hear is that from my grandmother. According to her, Allende was infatuated with my grandfather's boat, a small sailing boat he had imported from the Netherlands. Allende consistently asked where he could get one of those or how they were made. My grandfather, in an iconic Gatekeeper move, told him that the ship was Dutch and very specially made there. That night, according to my grandmother, she woke up to light being shone in the garden. Apparently, Allende had snuck into their garden to take pictures of the ship. My grandmother went out to check out what was happening.

"Hello?"

"Ah!"

All this to say there's some connection, even if distant in some regard between the two men.

As much as it might seem strange to say it, I never really met Salvador Allende. I was born way after Pinochet was out of power and way after 1979. However, my grandfather did. There's something to be said about the way that distance interacts with humanity. We look at these historical figures, figures of myth in some ways, and on a basis of pure scale and distance, we reject their humanity. I think knowing the story of Allende sneaking into my grandfather’s garden and knowing that he enjoyed sitting by the pool in a big straw hat makes him more human, and more tangible. The documentary “Beyond my grandfather Allende” has served as another reinforcement in this idea, in humanizing this historical figure. The documentary follows Marcia Tambutti Allende attempting to deal with her family history and the emotional impact that it’s left on her family. If you can take anything away from this video is please watch this documentary, I may be able to attempt to create a human image of this man but I think there’s something of deeper worth when coming from Allende’s own family.

"Allende has become a sort of mythical figure for the latter-day left wing, and yet he was a human being with typical Chilean faults, who had an obsession with being President (he ran three times)and I used to see him often on summers in Algarrobo … "El Chicho" would clomp down for a drink with us wearing a bathing suit and a large straw hat"

The point was, that this was a living man. But so was my grandfather. I used to mythologize (and I still think I partially do) my grandfather. As much as it is strange to say, I never really met the guy. He passed away when I was three, not conscious enough to know that he was gone, or that I knew him. However, he always had a presence in my life. I went to his same school and was also artistically inclined. I sang and was interested in stories and writing. Even if I didn't know it at the time, I had this strange connection to my grandfather.

I don't think I had a pleasant time in school overall. Privileged, absolutely but I struggled heavily growing up. I think everyone writes this or feels it to a certain extent but I truly believe that my surroundings were not where I would thrive. I was a misfit, a kid who was too soft and creative for the rugby-centered school I attended, shadowed by a history of amazing rugby players who had attended the school all coming from my family. I was bullied for a large part of my life by my peers. Regardless, I had no idea why I was like this, sentimental and soft. My dad and mom were "popular" all things considered and the rest of my relatives hadn't grown up with my struggle even though a large majority of them had gone to the same school. It was one of those mysteries that haunted large parts of my youth. It was only when I started playing piano and taking singing lessons that it finally clicked. I remember being told by my mother and grandmother that I reminded them of Tony. It was like a click in my brain, I was just closer to my grandfather than anyone else, at least in personality and interest.

I think I'm quite blessed in the fact that I know I'm similar to my grandfather. That people see a spark of him in my eyes. That something I do resonates in a way that reminds them of Tony. I see a lot of people constantly questioning as to why they turned out the way they did. I think this is one of those questions that follow us into our grave. We pay therapists to analyze us and find reasons for our current situations. An essential query. I, to a certain extent, feel at peace in knowing that there's something I can explain, a framework I can follow in some abstract way.

I’m fascinated by an analogy my grandfather made. In his book he describes a conversation he had over lunch with my uncle. My Uncle asked him exactly where he got his bohemian personality. My grandfather draws a divide between the family personality types. On one hand are the “workers” of the family. This included my great uncle, several of my uncles and my father. On the other hand, my grandfather describes the “bohemians” including himself, and the rest of my uncles. I have always fixated on his analogy, of the workers and the bohemians. This is where this whole idea for an essay has stemmed from, labelling directly the possible reason for why I feel this sense of kinship.

My grandfather passed away when I was 3, as I said. At the same time, my uncle had started his sail around the world, a longtime dream of his. My grandfather went to see him with Juan Fernandez right at the start of his sail. Only a couple months later he would pass away. My uncle finished the sail in his name. His book and series "Shangrila, búsqueda del Tesoro". I used to love the series, and still do (even if I haven't watched it in a good while). I romanticize and romanticize this idea of a grand piece of art, deeply connected to our family history. I remember hoping, as a child, that I would one day make something of significance. I still haven't gotten there. My attempt with this video is not to offer a self-aggrandised view of myself, but of the great connections that I have. Instead, I hope to explain why I feel kinship to these two men.

However, I don't think I will ever know 100% if the kinship is fully justified. That's one of the tricky things with people who have passed away. It’s possibly one of the reasons I feel the kinship with such ease. I can't ask either of them in which ways we connect. I will always say that I feel a heavy kinship with my grandfather regardless. So I’d love to analyze what this kinship means to me.

Part 3. Kinship.

So, why am I talking about these two men who may have crossed paths at some point? Why do I talk about dead people as if I knew them, as if they had a direct impact on my life? Because I think they did.

I think we all have these moments in our lives. Moments of connection with things long gone. Sifting through old papers with nobody to help you through them. Notes on music that you never got to hear played. A piano that has been well used but never heard the process of wear and tear. A country so deeply distasteful towards the poor. A possible plan of revolutionary internet plans before any internet was invented. A legacy that hangs in the air with all your interactions lying in what could have been. These are fundamental human experiences, a baseline in how we develop and connect with the world around us.

As I said, I have historically been compared to my grandfather. I was told that I had a similar presence. I was told that my interest in singing and playing piano was the spirit of my grandfather flowing through me. I had a framework for why I was like this. When I started writing, I was told that my narrative voice read similarly to Tony's work. I always felt like I was inheriting something that I couldn't put my finger on. I have a lot of love for the man I was barely alive to meet.

While in university, I began learning about leftist theory, something that had always been in the unspoken or in my periphery. Automatically when I was introduced to leftist theory I went straight to researching Allende. There's something to be introduced to the first democratically elected socialist coming from your own country, from similar circles that you grew up in. I think that the fact that something like this existed made me feel like there was space in the history of this. That someone who grew up with a similar style of life could be such a prominent historical figure. Look, I'm not going to act like I'm this great intellectual thought leader and that I am a student of Allende, I'm not self-aggrandizing myself to that level. What I mean to say is that Allende is a fundamental character in how I understand the world, and how I understand my own socio-political context. I connect with him because we did come from similar backgrounds and hold similar values and I connect with his unfinished dream of chile.

I think the whole point I want to make is that sometimes the most motivating thing that can happen is when people die. When people pass away, we tend to feel like we have a torch to carry. We carry the history of those who are not there to see the new history being made. It fundamentally changes the way that we interact with the legacy that someone leaves behind and I think that's the oldest motivator in life. I think that, at least in my own experience, we carry these torches, there is some history, some tradition, of the thing you do. We all have someone, maybe you know them or not, but you feel a sort of kinship with them. These figures who seemed familiar even though you never met them, never were able to talk to them as an adult.

Kinship is a powerful motivator. Kinship is the reason we carry torches. Kinship with the dead is the reason we carry on traditions of thought, of art, of history.

I think about the stories that we tell. The figures that keep appearing over and over again. Those with tragic ends, that had things they failed to do. We become fascinated by these figures not only in how they end but how their life leads to their death and the things we leave behind. I am fascinated by the cultural fixation on these torches that are left behind to be passed on. My grandfather, even if he had a resolute ending in his own right with little strictly unfinished business aside from not being able to see the end of my uncle’s sailing trip, feels incomplete to me. My own perspective paints his picture, I didn't grow up with my grandfather.

These unfinished stories are mostly about perspective. A lot of political discussion around Chile is whether or not to discuss the dictatorship. “Ya paso” they say. To these people, the story of Allende doesn’t feel incomplete or at least doesn't feel the call of his unfinished work. The call is mostly solidified by the fact that they share certain things, a worldview, a passion, a fascination. I consider myself staunchly on the left so hence I feel a calling of Allende’s story. I consider myself a writer or at least fascinated by writing hence I feel a calling of my Grandfather’s passion in the artform. It’s about perspective. In addition when it comes to perspective, my grandfather lived an incredibly full life, a story as complete as they come. But since I didn't grow up with him, there’s something that remains unfinished. I don't think there’s something like “completing” some late person’s work. Instead, we continue to be influenced through our daily lives.

We tend to look at people who were taken out before their time more or at least in a different light. Figures like Heath Ledger will forever be spoken more about than other actors in his direct vicinity and level. Kurt Kobain is more directly referenced than Dave Grohl. James Dean weighs heavier than his contemporaries. Maryln Monroe is more discussed than other figures in her field. Unfinished work or a life taken-too-soon greatly increases the length of legacy a person leaves behind or at least greatly shifts our entire understanding of their work and life. It also shifts their legacy in a distinct way, allowing for retrospective mythologization. A tragedy is something out of both something incomplete and lends itself to being able to create narratives and stories of these people’s lives. We tend to connect with these tragedies or unfinished business, not just because of the media frenzy that is led after their death but by something more human, more intrinsic about the way we interact with these people.

Kinship, in my eyes, is one of those great motivators that is as human as things come. Napoleon looked at great conquerors throughout history, Stephen Hawking looked up to Albert Einstein and I write because my grandfather did before me. Recently however, I think we tend to look down upon when people claim that they were inspired by people directly or that their work is a continuation of someone else’s work. We call it derivative, an insult. I think that this element of making, of creation on an artistic level, is grounded in how we parse through the things that came before us. I think this is why I feel so passionate about research, the feeling that I am carrying on certain ideas or at least directly interacting with them, unfinished in essence.

In addition to all this, the constant questioning of what they could have done extends their legacy. The fact that we question “what would they have done if they would have kept living” is a speculation which constantly extends the legacy that someone has. Allende is a prime figure for this but I do sometimes fantasize and speculate what it would have been like to grow up with my grandfather. I think of this as a sort of metaphysical revival and extends the legacy that one has especially if there’s unfinished work.

I feel a pull to mythologize these figures. This might be the counter to this essay, that I mythologize these figures and hence they become these figures of kinship. I disagree. I believe that these are not mythological figures but humans, and that makes them more real, more influential. Allende was a man who took issue with the way he was being perceived, who lost control of a country and eventually paid with his life. My grandfather was a man who struggled with his relationships and his purpose in life. These are human beings with lives and issues like any other. I think this is why I feel kinship, not because they are great men but because they’re people like the rest of us, that they have certain similarities and point towards my own passions, my own insecurities. I feel insecure about my politics, the state of my country and direction it’s headed, I feel insecure about being an artist but feeling the pull of a traditional work world, I feel insecure about my relationships, I feel insecure about my dual identity.

Kinship is not about believing that one is of equal level to someone else. Instead, it’s finding something of oneself in others, and connecting to that shimmer you see in the other. Furthermore, someone feeling incomplete or having unfinished work connects us even closer. At least in me, I feel drawn towards the unfinished, I think we are unfinished creatures in constant change, full of potential. Hence the unresolved calls to us. On a bare human level we are unfinished creatures with the vast amount of us having unfinished dreams since we are mid living. This is possibly why we are drawn historically to those who never completed their grand work or died before their time. This is why we feel the want to continue someone else’s work, to revive the spirit of someone through the process of art, thought or memory.

I never met Salvador Allende, el Chincho, as his family called him. In the documentary “Beyond My Grandfather Allende”, they discuss the lasting impact that Allende had on his family, the presence both positive and negative that he left behind. I never really met my grandfather Tony. In my uncle's documentary, “Shangrila”, the presence of grandfather looms over the entire journey around the world. Something about the unfinished, the passing of torches, pushes us to make, to think and to be. I hope to carry and pass torches in the future.

I never met Salvador Allende. I never really met Tony. Yet, I still feel an enormous feeling of kinship with them.

Sources:

• Salvador Allende Revolutionary Democrat - Victor Figueroa Clark

• Socialism in Chile - Regis Debray

• La Via Chilena al Socialismo - Salvador Allende

• “Uncool and incorrect” in Chile - Stephen M Steeter

• Nixon, Kissinger and Allende - Lubana Z Quershi

• La Batalla de Chile - Parts 1-3 - Patricio Guzmán

• The collected works of Anthony Westcott

• Footage from the AP archive

• Beyond my Grandfather Allende - Marcia Tambutti Allende

All music is under Creative Commons:

• 1. Own Piece composed by George Westcott

• 2. Chopin - Nocture in E flat Major

• 3. Kevin Macleod - Laid back guitars

• 4. Tschikovsky - Waltz op 40 (Kevin Macleod)

• 5. Debussy - Claire de Lune

• 6. Beethoven - Moonlight Sonata

• 7. Kevin Macleod - Smoother Move

• 8. Kevin Macleod - Virtues Instrumenti

• 9. Kevin Macleod - Amazing Grace 2011

• 10. Bizet - Habanera

• 11. Kevin Macleod - Night on the docs (Sax version)

• 12. Kevin Macleod - Just as soon

• 13. Kevin Macleod - When the wind blows

• 14. Kevin Macleod - Smoother Move

• 15. Kevin Macleod - Thaxted

• 16. Kevin Macleod - Trio for piano, violin and viola

• 17. Kevin Macleod - Feather Waltz

• 18. Chopin - Nocture in E flat Major

• 19. Debussy - Claire de Lune

• 20. Kevin Macleod - Night on the docs (Sax version)

• 21. Kevin Macleod - Thaxted