Rupay - by Jesús Cossío Guevara & Alfredo Villar & Luis Rossell (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

One of the bloodiest and longest lasting revolutionary movements in Latin America described in graphic form.

Rupay, in Quechua, means ardor, fire. On May 17th, 1980, the Shining Path, a Maoist group in Peru, burned the electoral records in a small town in the Ayacucho region to ignite the revolution that would set all of Peru aflame. This graphic novel retells the events relating to the start of the conflict, between 1980 and 1984, and the political violence that continued through 1990. Cossio Guevara charts the first subversive acts by the Shining Path, the government response, the escalation of violence, the response from the media and Peruvian intellectuals, and the brutality and impunity with which the repression was carried out, as well as such brutal episodes as the burning of polling in Chuschi, the Lucanamarca massacre, the mass graves in Putis, and the massacres of Aranhuay and Paccha.

Masterfully drawn, this graphic novel is the chronicle of the tragedy and barbarism that challenged the poorest and most vulnerable members of Peruvian society, revealing the racist, classist, and apathetic attitudes from the criminals, government officials, military officers, business groups, and unaffected civilians alike. This book immortalizes the victims and recounts these events so that this tragic history is not lost to obscurity or repeated.

About the Author

JESÚS COSSÍO GUEVARA is a Peruvian illustrator, author, and editor of comic books and graphic novels. He has published numerous books and zines, including El cerdo volador, Pánico, Juventud moderna, and Ciudades convertidas en selvas. In 2003, Cossio was awarded a Rockfeller Foundation Fellowship in the Humanities, which he used, in part, to complete the graphic novel Rupay: Historias gráficas sobre la violencia política 1980-1984 and its subsequent volume Barbarie: Cómics sobre la violencia política 1985-1990.

Writer, curator, and art historian ALFREDO VILLAR is the author of Papá huayco (2024), Yawar chicha: los ríos profundos de la música tropical peruana (2024), and Búmm! Historieta y humor gráfico en el Perú 1978-1992 (2015). He was awarded a 2004 Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship in the Humanities, alongside Jesús Cossío Guevara, for the research and co-writing of Rupay: Historias gráficas sobre la violencia política 1980-1984.