Chávez on a Plane

There’s lots of good reading this morning on the life, death, and legacy of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. I wanted to share two pieces, both reports by incisive writers of conversations they had with Chávez while flying. First, Gabriel García Márquez describes what he learned of the venezolano while flying with him from Havana to Caracas in 1999. In the second, Christopher Hitchens paints a (decidedly less favorable) portrait of the man he got to know while flying around Venezuela with Chávez, Sean Penn, and Douglas Brinkley in 2008. Enjoy!