Peridis, cartoonist: “We live in a moment of dismantling, disheartening, because the scandals are widespread” | Culture | EUROtoday

Peridis has one other identify (José María Pérez) however that is his figuring out mark. A cartoonist (his whole life in EL PAÍS) and an artist of different topics (the Romanesque, restoration, cultural heritage, friendship), he’s like Kim of India, the pal of the entire world… He is from Aguilar de Campoo and all of the geography that he has managed to convey collectively, for instance, within the Romanesque Encyclopediawhose volumes are his satisfaction. That encyclopedia, the reminiscence of his dad and mom, the fervour he has for the newspaper of his life, make Peridis a nationwide hero of the enjoyment of telling. Here he talks about all this, as if he had been drawing it, following the discharge of his fictionalized memoirs. (The treasure of the Fallen Convent, Espasa), which additionally coincides with the printed of the episode devoted to him by this system In scoop, collection in regards to the nice Spanish journalists [realizada por RTVE junto a la LACOproductora, productora audiovisual de PRISA, empresa editora de EL PAÍS]. In the primary years of this newspaper, Peridis gave cookies to the editors. That is why it turns into troublesome to deal with you because the Stylebook from EL PAÍS…

Ask. He is a benefactor. But he fought with the boys. Once he felt that he had harm somebody badly.

Answer. Carlitos. We had been taking part in and to say goodbye we insulted one another. So I took one cachoteja that fell on his temple.

P. Do you keep in mind so many issues?

R. Childhood is superior. And I’ve lived so much exterior of that space. Everything was saved there. Here are all of the sensations, the environment. The guide tells the whole lot. It is a completely Proustian childhood. I’ve returned to it to revive it and, in a manner, to reside it once more. And to inform it. In different phrases, I’m twice a Proustian.

P. He wrote it to satisfy that youngster.

R. Yes, sure. You at all times look in life for the kid you had been.

P. And the look he had.

R. The key in life is to maintain the center and look of the kid you had been. He is the boy who was searching for friendship. I lived on the outskirts of city, we had been the final home; I used to be searching for pals, which was like respiration. Wherever you go, the saying goes, make pals.

P. The father additionally defined to him how essential coping with kin was.

R. Yes, with my uncle Laureano. That I must be grateful, my father wrote to me. My uncle was a really extreme priest. He had suffered so much within the warfare, in Santander. He was about to be shot. And that modified his character. My mom instructed me that when my uncle arrived on the town he was within the chassis. It was after Franco conquered Santander. My mom nearly did not acknowledge him, with out a cassock and in a skeleton. As a younger man he was very jovial, however the warfare modified his character.

P. His father instructed him to care for him. Is it a warning that you simply carried all of your life?

R. He instructed me to be grateful, that he had helped us so much. He was the benefactor of the household. I arrived in Madrid and wanted a stern father. I needed to make a future for myself and assist get forward, like so many emigrants. Whoever goes first is the bridgehead.

P. In Madrid, clueless, he discovered a gaggle of pals who saved his future.

R. I used to be already leaving my uncle’s home, I had discovered a job and immediately, misplaced, I discovered myself on Arenal Street with two companions from the Marists of Palencia. They yelled at me “Pérez, Pérez, Pérez!” I bought misplaced, I instructed them. They took me to the Employee’s Home, on Cadarso Street. It had a chapel, a film membership, a fitness center, a trainer. The trainer was José Ramón, the one who created the caricatures years after the marketing campaign that introduced Felipe González to the presidency of the Government.

P. How did you end up on this metropolis?

R. I arrived in Madrid when the 2 millionth lady was born. The second I added a little bit, she added extra. We had been two million inhabitants. An immense metropolis. Just come from city. The furthest he had been was in Palencia. Madrid was large and grey, and appeared ugly, unhappy. It was a tragic metropolis, of survivors.

P. How did it evolve? What is Madrid now for you?

R. Now it’s a implausible metropolis, a metropolis that has grown. But then it had one thing that it nonetheless maintains now: the lifetime of the neighborhoods and the neighborhood. People are known as don and doña. And it was a spot of alternative. It was additionally the time of Madrid of the Five Cups. The stadium was subsequent to my uncle’s home and I noticed Di Stéfano like right here now, at this distance. In Palencia I had broadcast the matches for the Maristas, and so they gave me a cross right here to attend the coaching periods. I went to typing, to accounting, to discover a job as a pen-sucker.

P. And he discovered work.

R. In a implausible place. In the Literary neighborhood, Quevedo avenue nook Cervantes, in entrance of Lope de Vega’s home. But I needed to be a cartoonist. And then I used to be additionally an architect. Architecture has been an important a part of my life.

P. And why a caricaturist?

R. Because since I used to be a baby I used to be good at drawing. I beloved cartoons. A tailor in my city had one which Córdoba, well-known on the time, made for him. With a masks and with out a masks known as his drawings. Bernabéu, Celia Gámez, Panizo, Chicote appeared there. All the well-known folks of the time.

P. That ardour pressured him to look.

R. What I’ve accomplished all my life. And I began making albums of soccer gamers. I fell in love with the road with Cronos, who was a cartoonist from Mark, steady line. The steady line captivated me since I used to be a baby.

P. Many years within the cartoon and nobody ever felt offended.

R. Not a lot. Tierno Galván bought offended, and mentioned so in a guide that I invited him to put in writing. He gave him a beard if he was Galván and Tierno if he wasn’t. He did not wish to exit with a beard, so I killed Galván and solely did Tierno, I did not wish to upset him. When there’s a window just like the cartoon in a nationwide newspaper, particularly whether it is EL PAÍS, what weighs essentially the most will not be going out. If you allow you might be within the first division.

P. By the way in which, which was the cutest caricature?

R. Felipe González. In the Transition it was the closest. He was a social democrat, a European, a co-religionist of Olof Palme… Olof Palme, who was the one with the piggy financial institution in favor of the liberty fighters in Spain, was the one for whom I had essentially the most devotion. They killed him quickly, a fanatic killed him.

P. EL PAÍS opened the door instantly…

R. From the primary difficulty. Until right this moment. That was my luck. Being there, additionally, when the Transition started. When Franco died I had already ready myself to look in a newspaper, as a result of I had by no means stopped making cartoons. They accepted me in Information, the place Jesús de la Serna, Juan Luis Cebrián, Martín Prieto had been… They appreciated my drawings due to their novelty. And I noticed that EL PAÍS, a progressive liberal newspaper, would come out. “This is my newspaper,” I instructed myself.

P. And he grew to become pals with all the COUNTRY. He went within the afternoons with items…

R. What higher may I do than hand out Aguilar de Campoo cookies just like the one who distributes communion? I appreciated going to the newsroom, I used to be taken with what was accomplished. I used to be a fan of the newspaper, as I used to be of Information… It was the biggest newspaper at the moment. He was conquering freedom of expression at pressured marches.

P. How did your concept of ​​journalists change?

R. I checked out them with admiration. We had been a gaggle that was preventing at the moment to overcome areas of freedom. And journalism needed to conquer that place, which is that of freedom of thought. Then I noticed myself on a ship that was going to overcome some Americas that had been freedom. And additionally those that had been there have been from my age.

P. How do you determine this second in your nation?

R. It is a harmful second as a result of it could possibly open a darkish retracement. Apparently, not violent, however violating the rights and freedoms which were achieved. It is a time that doesn’t assist politics. We reside in a second of dismantling, disheartening, as a result of scandals demoralize society and are actually fairly widespread. This second jogs my memory of what Ortega y Gasset mentioned: “It is not this, it is not this.”

P. The future?

R. We already made the Transition. It’s as much as the younger folks. They haven’t got many alternatives and lots of are left behind. They would not have entry to housing. Economic well-being doesn’t attain them. There is uncertainty. We now reside in unsure instances.

P. At the top of his guide he has a phrase that pulls a title by Knut Hamsun, The final pleasure. What, Peridis, is the final pleasure?

R. There isn’t any final pleasure… I’m open to any pleasure that involves me. The final pleasure is the primary pleasure.