His latest novel is titled Nosotros: who are “we”?
Those of us who live
Us, sixties.
Fuck six! outside I have twenty!
We, the merry ones.
I’m in love with life, I’m cheerful. Did your parents want you to be happy?
Yeah.
So you honor them: be happy, cheerful!
Us atheists?
Since I reread Mi último suspiro.
Memoirs of the Aragonese Luis Buñuel.
I re-read them when I was 60 and whenever I was experiencing some delicate trance, which was the case.
Wasn’t he an atheist before?
In profile: he was agnostic. I am now a joyful atheist.
joyful?
The beauty of life needs no creator.
Since when do you taste beauty?
As a child, I heard that my parents were handsome, and that’s how I entered the order of beautiful things.
Let’s follow the thread of beauty, then.
If we follow him… we get here.
Here? It is the window of a jewelry store.
Look what beautiful watches!
D’or…
Gold remains, incorruptible, it is inheritable.
You are looking for: hours, minutes, seconds…
They contain time and beauty, like a good novel
I see luxury in it.
I see beauty in it: I value it more than the rich man who trivializes it. This is my tragedy!
which one
I have good taste and no money. Ah, the gold Cartier! Look at him, how beautiful!
Square box, Roman numerals…
They invented the hours, the Romans.
…blue needles…
They are heaven And the fine secondary search goes into every second and crosses it, because it is a winding clock. It does not advance in leaps and bounds, like democratic quartz watches…
…bevel screws…
They screw up time. This gold Cartier is the watch I want! It’s 17,000 euros…
The prices appear in his novels!
I wear them for a militant act of precision. The price is accurate to describe, more than an adjective! I find it hypocritical to cover it up.
We, capitalists?
Money gives independence and freedom.
There are more expensive watches than the Cartier.
Yes, Rolex from 30,000 euros… but they are heavy, ostentatious: they distance themselves from beauty.
Would you dare to compare these watches with literary works?
A Rolex is a Proust: overwhelming heaviness. A Cartier is a Scott Fitzgerald: charming lightness.
He began as a poet: value some.
Vicente Aleixandre and Federico GarcÃa Lorca have a mysterious charm: it is easy to feel and difficult to explain.
Now he mentions Lorca, before he mentioned his colleague Buñuel…
From Lorca I learn mystery and from Buñuel I learn to see the world as a great comedy. Not light at all, but very deep.
Us drinkers?
A divorce and the death of my mother came upon me: I became alcoholic, then I abandoned the reins of my life.
Us ex-alcoholics?
I drank alcohol until June 9, 2014: I haven’t drunk a single drop since that day.
And was he born again?
Between drinking and living, I chose v: I refounded my psyche. And I can explain it. Anything you can explain is fine.
And he explained himself to Ordesa and swept…
He connected with the Spanish lower middle class, his daily odysseys, his car models… The father’s patriotism was to always drive a Seat, without fail! A 600, then an 850…
My father too! Then a 124, then a Seat 1430…
Exactly! And then a Seat Málaga, which was my father’s last car.
And mine too! He just died.
Did he die well?
Sweetly, without suffering, in peace.
There is no beauty in suffering. I want euthanasia, to die without agony, without sordidness, without ruining anyone’s life. With elegance, in short: I have every right.
Us, the kissers?
The erotic kiss, deep, with tongue, changes your life: you enter another dimension.
We, the lovers?
You fall in love and feel euphoria, urgency to live: it’s addictive, like alcohol. And it tempers so we can stay alive.
Us teachers?
As a teacher, I used to play El verdugo de Berlanga and when I saw it, I would kick myself laughing. And they were looking at me. The good teacher entrusts the student with joy and faith in life.
Us writers?
The greatest good is life. Literature is just this light that allows us to see something of life in order to explain it, to celebrate it.
