Toni Aira has presented in Girona “Cos a terra”, a novel of mystery and humor. An act of pasting the poster starts a new election campaign, but this time it will be stained with blood and splashed by a long list of suspects
«Body on the ground, ours are coming». Is Pío Cabanillas’ phrase still valid?
The phrase is eternal. From Julius Caesar to Pedro Sánchez, they can corroborate it.
In politics more than anywhere else?
I have seen more daggers flying in journalism and the university than in politics.
Does he belong to this “aristocracy of totalitarians” that he talks about in the book?
I am too republican to belong to any aristocracy. At most, and to be honest, he would be part of an oligarchy.
But he must be a totologist, because he has an opinion on everything in talk shows.
Years ago I was one of the first to say that I don’t know everything. That’s why I don’t get involved in some issues. I especially like to talk about politics, which since I was young is what I’ve been most interested in, but if they make me talk – for example – about events, I step aside.
What does it mean to be talkative?
Being a talk show host is not the same as being a journalist. I take being a socialite in a positive way, for me it means having a point of view and also wanting to share it. Another thing are those who play social gatherings and have neither judgment nor much desire to share anything, but only to be listened to.
There are those who play social gatherings and have neither judgment nor much desire to share anything, but only to be listened to
Are there many of these?
A few, and some I kill in the novel.
Advisor – like the protagonist – is the best job ever invented?
Before they were better paid, there were few of them and it was more important to distribute. It has become very professional and now it’s time to share it with others. It’s like everything, there is inflation of advisers.
Would a murder make boring election campaigns more interesting?
They would be more dramatic, less typical of our spa environment.
Which great current leader “has eggs like a piano”?
Perhaps to find leaders as testosteronic as the one in the novel we should go to the past. Fraga when he said “the street is mine”, or Felipe González, whom Benegas referred to as God. Or Pujol, which was what it was. Or Pasqual Maragall. There are no more leaders of these.
Are election campaigns still of any use?
They are like the main party of politics. An accentuation of things that happen the rest of the year, an excess that everyone knows is an excess. They should serve as an incentive to vote, the problem is that they often serve more as a deterrent.
Are the parties leak machines?
Totally. I was there one year and discovered that if there is anything that leaks as much or more than Barça, it is a political party. And see that at Barça it seeps up to the scorer. Luckily, both in politics and in Barça, he was like a tourist passing by, he knew rather little. This I take for granted.
Campaigns should act as an incentive to vote, the problem is that they often serve more as a deterrent
Doesn’t Catalan politics deserve satire because it already is in itself?
My book looks like a satire, but when politicians, journalists and talk show hosts read it, they will see that it is a portrait of reality.
Will they recognize each other?
Many have already recognized themselves. In order to still get invited to some dinner or some cocktail party, I escape by saying that no character is one hundred percent nobody.
Which is a lie, I guess.
Of couse.
Who will win the election?
To end with Pío Cabanillas: “We don’t know who, but we’re going to win.”