Analect 2.526x

7 July 2009. Even gray.

Narrative and its discontents. A figure in a boina. "En Europe aparece históricamente documentada tanto en miniaturas de la Baja Edad Media como en figuras que adornan construcciones góticas..."

Trails and paths. Salta. Story of Juan Panadero--Juan the baker, as in the poem by Manuel Castilla, retold here by Cuchi Leguizamon, who set it to music:

"Nosotros teníamos un amigo, don Juan Riera, quien era propietario de una panadería en la calle Lerma. Manuel todas las mañanas le compraba el pan calentito, pero una vez al Barbudo lo dejaron sin trabajo en el diario El Intransigente, entonces no fue más. Pero al poco tiempo Rierita comenzó a llevarle personalmente el pan de la mañana. Manuel le dijo que no lo aceptaba porque no podía pagarlo y ¿sabe qué contestó Rierita? 'Antes, cuando usted podía, venía y me compraba el pan, pero ahora que no puedes es mi obligación llevarselo todos los días.' Mire qué filosofía."

"We had a friend in those days, don Juan Riera, who was the proprietor of a bakery on the Calle Lerma. Every morning Manuel would buy from him some fresh warm bread, but one time el Barbudo (the poet, whose nickname was "the beard") found himself out of his job at El Intransigente, the newspaper where he worked, so he stopped his morning visits to the shop. Nevertheless, after a little time, that Riera fellow personally began to bring him his morning bread. Manuel told him that he couldn't accept it because he wasn't able to pay him--and do you know how Rierita answered him? 'Before, when you could, you'd come to me to buy the bread, but now that you can't, it is my obligation to bring it to you each morning.' Look at that philiosophy."

(Note: The second figure is Themis Riera, Juan's daughter, who tells the story on El Blog de Themis.)