Subcomandante
Marcos is the enigmatic leader of the Zapatistas, a present day masked
and bandeliered revolutionary icon fighting for the rights of the
indigenous
people in Chiapas, Mexico. When Cinco Puntos an independent press from
El Paso, Texas released a children’s book -- The Story of Colors / La
Historia
de los Colores written by Subcomandante Marcos my first thought was
that
it must be propaganda. It’s not often that you see an armed insurgent
on
the inside flap of a bedtime story. From a distance The Story of Colors
looks like any high quality children’s picture book with beautiful
illustrations
by Domitila Dominguez , an artist from Oaxaca.
The
folktale explains how the gods brought color into the world. Color
in the book is used as a metaphor for ideas. Subcomandante Marcos
suggests
that men and women have forgotten “how many colors there are and how
many
ways of thinking.” A moral which we hold to be self evident. The
peaceful
world of the folktale is related with candour ? the characters
smoke
pipes and cigarettes , drink “pozol” (actually a non-alcoholic beverage
fermented on a base of corn dough, ground cacao and cold water spiced
with
salt or chili) and revel in love making.
“And men and women were
sleeping
or they were making love, which is a nice way to become tired and then
go to sleep.” In the final orgy scene the first seven colors “escaped
and
started to play happily and to make love to one another, and more and
different
colors were made, new ones.”
The comuniques
of Subcomandante Marcos often access
indigenous
folktales in a romantic high style. He 
uses
them to illustrate a solidarity between oppressed peoples and a
solidarity
between man and nature. His goal, as is the goal of this book, is to
focus
the world’s attention on the struggle in Chiapas, a struggle against
the
exploitation of resources, both land and people.
On March 10, 1999,
the
NEA decided that it would pull funding for the publication of the book.
For more information about the
book
and about the controversy surrounding
the NEA's defunding of the book,
visit Cinco Puntos: www.cincopuntos.com
or call or write us at Cinco
Puntos
Press
2709 Louisville
El Paso, TX 79930
800-566-9072
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