Víctor Balaguer (1824-1901) was a poet of the Renaixença in Spanish (he baptized the streets of the Eixample with references to imperial Catalonia: Rosselló, Provença, Sicília, Sardenya) and overseas minister of the Spanish government. He was a friend of the Can Blanch heiress and came to Arbúcies with his friends. He accompanied the painter Anglada Camarasa, who painted one of his paintings that I like the most: some mossy stones, so different from the fantasies of the time in Paris. He also invited the cook from the royal household. The shepherd who stuck the pikes around the meadows where the herd grazed (the piconaire), tried the pa de pessic and got the cook to give him the recipe. That is why the pa de pessic, in Arbúcies, was sold in the can Piconaire pastry shop (later also in can Mir). Balaguer wrote a book about his adventures in Montseny, At the foot of the oak (1893). It contains the core of a comedy about that mysterious time, the 19th century, with rich landlords, a poet in Spanish who is a minister of the Philippines, a shrewd shepherd, and a painter who has not yet become a beautician. I have made friends with Marta Dalmau, who has turned Can Blanch into a modern farm and I can go to the farm from time to time and breathe the same air as the minister.
The field of poppies. Tere Recarens, a Catalan artist who lives in Berlin, has signed up to the campaign against rapeseed fields that she started with a tweet by Jair Domínguez. All the people taking pictures of themselves in front of the yellow fields of rapeseed flowers, corny, without any imagination. "Do you remember that field of poppies there were years ago?" Tere –I tell her– that field appears in El pie de la encina! The poet Balaguer tells Anglada Camarasa why he doesn't paint it! “I don't dare, he told me. If he painted it as it is, they would believe it to be an exaggerated child of my fantasy, and not a copy of life”. How much damage has digital photography done.
Flemish Tits. In Al pie de encina Balaguer recounts that one night the girl from Can Blanch sang some arias accompanied by a pianist. The nightingales approach the house, begin to compete with their song and make such a racket that they force the concert to end. Something similar has happened to me these days. On the balcony I have a bowl of water and breadcrumbs for the blue tits. The other day we were listening to Paco de Lucía's Fuente y caudal on the record player. A blue tit climbed onto the railing and began to trill rivaling the arabesques of the guitar. It was amazing. By the way: how wonderful a nightingale. A bird that sings at night and sleeps during the day! In troubadour poetry, the lover leaves the lady's bed when the nightingale leaves and the lark begins to sing. A very modern and fun version could be written with a couple of lovers and a husband who works in a bottling plant, on the night shift. Drink lots of water (it's very hot) and see you next week.
4
