Freedom, democracy and literature merged yesterday in the speech with which the Venezuelan poet Rafael Cadenas (Barquisimeto, 1930), author of such celebrated poems as Defrota, collected the Cervantes prize from the hands of the Kings at the University of Alcalá de Henares. The 93-year-old writer, who has crossed the Atlantic to receive the most important award for letters in Spanish, did not directly attack the regime of Nicolás Maduro, but he recalled the mass migration of his country and noted with relief that the Central University of Venezuela, where he was a professor for so many decades, "even though it hasn't been good for a few years, it's still plural".
However, he reminded that totalitarianism is advancing in the world and made an urgent call to defend democracy, renew it and recreate it. And also "the bases of culture". He said this in a speech interwoven with the two great characters of Cervantes in which he vindicated Sancho Panza, "who represents what is real", and, instead, warned that "the imprint of Don Quixote was present in the believers of the utopia that would fix everything and it ended in disappointment".
If during the address Felipe VI praised the writer pointing out that "Rafael Cadenas' work is that of a great modern poet, who does not want style, but honesty", and that "righteousness of mind and integrity are needed at the time of work", the laureate used Seneca, Orwell, Goethe and, of course, the author of Don Quixote - "Cervantes was a great defender of freedom" - to call for cosmopolitanism and democracy, since its poor condition, he pointed out, is related to the poor condition of the language.
"It is already known that nationalisms, ideologies and creeds divide human beings, but at this time, the world, thanks to the development of communication, should be cosmopolitan; in a way it already is - he acknowledged - but the factors I have mentioned oppose it, especially nationalism, which, according to Einstein, is the measles of humanity". And he let it slip that he believes that "the time may have come to review the foundations of all culture, although I do not know if when I say this it is a contagion of the two famous characters of Cervantes. Everything should be examined, seen, change the illusion for what is real, the most arduous work that the human being has to face”. He rightly reasoned that, "in my opinion, Sancho Panza has been underestimated by the quixotists, he represents what is real, and our time will probably enhance him, since we are witnessing a revaluation of ordinary life, and it is also where the mystery
And continuing with the idea of revision, Cadenas, forced into exile for four years in 1954 by protests against the dictatorship of Pérez Jiménez, said that this revision also "must be applied to democracy". "It is urgent to defend it from everything that harasses it, and that is why it is necessary to recreate it. This task falls to education, which has neglected it. The Democrats must loudly ask for its renewal. It must be internalized, become transparent, give primacy to what is social by abolishing poverty, support culture. It is not a dream, but everyone's work, only feasible with full freedom".
A freedom for which the language, which is damaged, must also be repaired. "I can't point out the errors, because there are too many, some from English translations", he asserted. And he quoted Orwell when he said that "the current political chaos is related to the decline of language".
"Language is inseparable from the human world. More than in the field of linguistics, it belongs to the field of spirit and soul". Iceta also recalled that in Ars poética, the last poem of her book Intemperie, you can read: "Let each word carry what it says." Let it be like the trembling that sustains it. Let it stay like a heartbeat”. And he emphasized that Cadenas has been committed to "the fullness of what is real" recalling one of his powerful quotes: "I have eyes, not points of view".
Iceta represented the Executive in a ceremony held in the midst of the electoral pre-campaign and which began with controversy because the regional president, Isabel Ayuso, found it unacceptable that Pedro Sánchez did not attend, and was asked if he did not do so to avoid congratulating a poet who defends the freedom "that their Bolivarian friends destroy". From La Moncloa they explained that it was a matter of schedule problems and that Rajoy had also not been to the Cervantes several times.
Cadenas closed the speech by quoting the freedom that Cervantes zealously defended: "I will remember his well-known words, although they should be spread more widely: 'Freedom, Sancho, is one of the most precious gifts that men have been given in the sky; with equality cannot be equaled the treasures which the earth encloses nor the sea conceals; for freedom, as well as for honor, life can and must be ventured, and, on the contrary, captivity is the worst evil that can befall a man'".
