Entering the library of Luis Alberto de Cuenca (Madrid, 74 years) is to go into a book museum. The apartment in the middle of Madrid was his house, but now he lives in his wife’s: the books have been throwing only the small space of his work table. There are between 40 and 50,000 volumes spread over the ground, shelves, kitchen cabinets, bathrooms, tables and chairs. “I always have the blinds, because the sun hurts the books,” he explains. It is a cave, an intricate and happy labyrinth in which comics, poems, novels and many, but many first editions are mixed. “I have loaded my great -grandfather. I fell the other day,” he laments pointing to the target picture of a man with a mustache, supported by an armchair.
“Maybe my most valuable book is this first edition of Dracker”, Sopesa with the yellow volume between the hands.“ Or these first two editions of Juan Ramón’s first books: Nymphas y Violet souls. He thought that they were not up to his poetry, and they strive to get and destroy the copies, so they are very difficult to find. ”Look where there are jewelry at height: a first edition of the Parnassus Quevedo; one from The long goodbyefrom Chandler; another of The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde… Hellenist, translator, essayist, from Cuenca was director of the National Library and Secretary of State for Culture, won the National Translation Award in 1989 (for the Song of a Valrario) and that of poetry in 2015 (by Vacation notebook). And with everything, this May may be its great month: it has just won the Reina Sofia of Ibero-American Poetry, one of the most important of the genre, and on the 29th its entry in the RAE is voted (the other candidate is the architect Luis Fernández-Galiano).
What does an award like Queen Sofia know? “He knows Nectar and Ambrosía,” he says in the midst of a laugh. “I feel surprised because I had no idea that I was proposed for the prize. Because this is a candidacy award: the University of Valladolid presented me on its own and it was a surprise. It is beautiful, important, and the best thing is that it is Latin American.” And what do you think of your possible entry into the SAR? “I don’t think anything!” “People who compete to the post are always very good professionals. I can only miss the days, and what has to happen.”
If asked about his last poems, you always get late. On the same day of the interview the following has been published: Wing of swan (Viewfinder). It is what eclecticism has. “I would say I’m hyperactive,” he confesses. And he doesn’t lie: he soon has the recording of his podcastone of the most listened to and loved in Spanish speech, Midnight cowboys. “In the last episode we left the light,” he recalls about the chapter they recorded on the back of the blackout. “It took a long time to know what was happening.” This plural refers to José Luis Garci, Eduardo Torres Dulce and Luis Herrero, the space driver. None, by the way, remember very well when it began to be broadcast, but it was in the early 2000s, which makes them real pioneers of the pioneers of the podcast Hispanic. “I confess that we almost ignore that we do a podcast; Actually, what we do is practice friendship in front of a microphone. ”Have you noticed that this leads to an audience that is not aware of strictly literary or academic activity?“ Yes. I have noticed that any activity that you do different from your usual work, such as the lyrics of the songs, or the podcast… Well, first of all, it enriches my writing, because he wins with all those sources, but later, yes, he takes me to many heterogeneous audiences. ”
These two halves make up the work of a writer capable of translating the Odysseythe Eneida O off Epigrams From Calimaco and, at the same time, write like lyrics as “hello my love, it’s me your wolf” (from Feroz Little Red Riding Hoodof the Mondragón Orchestra). “A thousand years ago, when Javier Gurruchaga came to Madrid, a common friend said: I know a poet who can make you letters. And so it emerged.” There began a path that led him to also write for Loquillo and others. Are you at ease in that mixture of poetry and rock? “Much. Much more, look, between poetry and singer -songwriter. There are some very good singer -songwriters, of course, I have raised with Paco Ibañez; but everything is a bit more monotonous.”
In all corners of his house there are, in addition to books, figures: the X-Men, Conan, Tintín, Darth Vader and Leia, Astérix … are part of their other half, half pop, which together with half Hellenist conforms one of the most personal, recognizable and luminous voices of poetry of the last decades in Spain. “I am fascinated by popular culture and I am fascinated by the great culture. It is unfair to relegate the first to the detriment of the second. And it is absurd to renounce the great culture for the popular, which is full of bullshit. I think today there is a successful conjugation between them. But there are people who disconnect from tradition,” he says. “It is a huge mistake, which is born with the Law of Education of the Tardofranchism made by José Luis Villar Palasí (the General Education Law of 1970). It was terrible, a reduction of culture,” he says. “Memory is anathematized. Memory is fundamental, but pedagogues decided that it was very bad, because they thought it was only to recite the list of the Goths kings. That, by the way, it is a great exercise.” The journalist has no choice but to encourage what he remembers with hearing: Chintila, Tulga, Chindasvinto … and the poet ends it: “… recessing, Wamba, Ervigio, Égica and Roderico, which is the same name as Rodrigo.”
The issue of educational reform has been taken out who was secretary of Culture, with the PP, from 2000 to 2004. Does wounds from its political stage? “No, no. In the end, it is one more thing, if you have done it in a non -sectarian way, and you get along with everyone …”. That is weird, it is well known that there are always friction among poets, but Luis Alberto de Cuenca is not known enemies: the verdict is unanimously favorable. “I imagine what enemies I will have, but they are so discreet that they do not imply that they are my enemies. Keats said in a letter endorsing a martial say that happiness was that: having two or three friends and two or three enemies,” he jokes. Does it identify today with any political option? “No, I have never had a card. My political option is the skepticism that leads people to become conservative. That is, conservative to skeptic.”
“My poetry today is in the phase of Senectud, which Cicero would say,” he jokes when he is asked to judge his current verses. “But that does not mean that it is not vital, or that it only reflects tanatic aspects of the world. I think it has a certain optimism, not at odds with realism. Look, I do not conceive writing as a torture in front of the blank page, but as a party to celebrate between paper and me.” And what do you think of today’s poetry? “It has been said a lot, but I think the clear line It is not exactly dominant. There are clear line poetry, yes, but on the other hand there are hermetic poetry, narrative … I think that in all those areas there is someone worth it. I believe in contemporary Spanish poetry. ”
And follow the book and volume carousel. Your favorite author? “Although I am Hellenistic, Shakespeare, who exhausts the human fact; there is no more psychology in man than the one that develops in his works.” What if I had to take a book to a desert island? “Maybe… The manuscript found in Zaragozaby Potocki. Fascinated me. ”
– Hear, throwing an eye around … a fortune will have been left here.
– No no. I have spent my life, since the age of 15, looking and tracking books that were affordable. Some have taken many years to find them. But I am a psychopath.
– The last question is forced then: how much is the maximum paid for a book?
– Not much. About 2,000 euros for the Dracker. It is much more fun to collect when you are not rich. That’s where the real adventure is.