given for seven

In today’s general election, we are rolling the past or future dice for Spain. If out of them we go back to the Middle Ages, I’m like a writer Clarice LispectorI leave on record that I will be on the side of the wizards. I would also be a supporter of chemists, palm drivers, and horseback riding; of the masons who carved Roman capitals with a plexus of creepers; minstrels who recited Provençal verses at the foot of the battle where a princess was being held captive; Of the monks who copied Aristotle’s metaphysics in parchment manuscripts, but not of the clergy who beat their bare backs to sing the faithful in a choir die irae. I leave this to those who voted for the cave. If the far right in this election sent me back to the 16th century, I would like to meet Lazarillo de Tormes And to Celestina, but not to the racist fanatics who expelled the Jews and Mohammedans from Spain. If the polls force me to go back to the seventeenth century, I will be for heretics and against the flames, on the side of Cervantes and Gongora and not on the side of Quevedo and Lope de Vega.

If the popular party triumphs and imposes its law and takes me back to the eighteenth century, I will be French, friend of the Enlightenment, but not from the black Spain that cried Long live the chains! Nor the misery, hatred and injustice that led us to civil war. On the contrary, if in this miraculous election the left votes in a big way and the future wins, my country will always be the one where intelligence, solidarity and freedom of expression are rewarded, and my flag is the flag that is flown on the podium in all fields in the world when our athletes win, Nadal, Alcaraz, John Rahm and people like that and not the same flag that some wear on their bracelets and on one of their own. My bet: The seventh side of the dice.