Tapestries of hope, threads of love

by Marjorie Agosín

This book tells the story of ordinary women living in terror and extreme poverty under General Pinochet's oppressive rule in Chile (1973-89) and how their lives did and did not change following his reign. These women defied the military dictatorship by embroidering their sorrow on scraps of cloth and using their needles and thread as one of the boldest means of popular protest and resistance in Latin America. The arpilleras they made - patch-work tapestries with scenes of everyday life and memorials to their disappeared relatives - were smuggled out of Chile and brought to the world the story of their fruitless searches in jails, morgues, government offices, and the tribunals of law for their husbands, brothers, and sons. Marjorie Agosin, herself a native of and exile from Chile, has spent over twenty years interviewing the arpilleristas and following their work. She knows their stories intimately and knows, too, that not one of them has ever found a disappeared relative alive. Still,