The flour hangs in the air like snow. Thick, white, everywhere. On the floor, on the shelves, on the hair of Stanisław Nowak, who for forty-five years has been getting up at three in the morning to bake bread for his neighborhood. He is seventy-two years old, but his hands – wrinkled, covered with burn scars – move with the precision of a surgeon.
The Unseen Struggle of a Celebrated Writer
In a world increasingly dominated by fleeting trends and the relentless pursuit of virality, the plight of a seasoned writer seeking an audience can be both poignant and darkly humorous. Such is the case of Jaime Bayly, the Peruvian author, who, in a recent candid reflection, laid bare his desperate attempts to secure an interview on Spanish television for his latest novel, ‘Los golpistas.’
Bayly’s narrative unfolds with a blend of self-deprecating humor and a palpable sense of exasperation. His new book, he laments, is not enjoying the same commercial success as its predecessor, ‘Los genios.’ This commercial dip has spurred him into an “shameless propaganda campaign” to land a spot on a Spanish TV program, hoping for even a “few pious minutes” to discuss his “misunderstood new work.” The results, he admits with a sigh, have been “devastating.”
The Futile Quest for Airtime
His assistants in Spain, Domingo and Luis, a charming couple, have relentlessly bombarded the most popular interview shows on both private and public Spanish television channels. They’ve offered Bayly as a star guest, shamelessly – and with his express consent – fabricating his virtues: “celebrity of American televisions, enfant terrible of Hispanic American letters, former president of my country in exile, retired CIA agent, man of suspicious fortune and a confused and good-hearted lover.”
These pleas and supplications, Bayly recounts, have fallen “like a rain of Iranian drones” upon the productions of Spain’s most successful, high-rated programs. He lists them: Pablo’s, David’s, Marc’s, Aimar’s, Bertín’s, Iker’s – just the night shows, not to mention the incessant pestering of morning and afternoon programs like Ana Rosa’s, Susanna’s, Sonsoles’s, Risto’s, and Cristina’s. The response? A resounding silence, “not even out of pity or compassion.” Only one, Jenaro, a “gentleman, a man of honor,” took pity on the “loser massacred by misfortune” and offered an interview, tentatively scheduled for the second half of next year.
A Mirror to the Past: When Fame Was Kinder
Bayly poignantly recalls a more “benign” era, two decades ago, when he was thinner and “looked like a successful writer.” He reminisces about interviews with now-departed legends like Fernando Sánchez Dragó, with whom he discussed “atheistic, ungovernable erections” and the “bluish pills” they took to encourage them. He remembers Quintero, “the madman of the hill,” who, in a beautiful theater in Seville, made him weep with his long, calculated silences, reminding him of the father he wished he had. Buenafuente, a “genius of humor,” left him indebted with his noble and endearing nature. Even the “vociferous, carnival-like orgies” of Sardá and the “stately Ana Rosa,” who offered him a well-paid gig as a regular commentator, are part of his past, a testament to a time when his public profile was more contoured by relevance.
The Existential Dilemma of a Trip to Madrid
Now, however, “no one wants to waste their time with me on Spanish television,” a truth he must accept with “humility and resignation,” seeing it as a “corrosion that the passage of time exerts on the contours of my public profile.” Yet, the need to boost his novel’s sales remains. This brings him to a profound, almost absurd, dilemma: a pre-booked flight and hotel for a trip to Madrid to attend the Retiro book fair. He questions the wisdom of this journey, explaining that “every day I spend in Europe, I lose two days of life in America.” Europe, with its sleepless nights and travel fatigue, shortens his life expectancy. He humorously suggests that his demise at the book fair, perhaps captured on video and uploaded to social media, might be the ultimate promotional campaign for his books.
This morbid contemplation, shared by his wife who considers the inheritance, leads him to conclude that the trip to Madrid is, paradoxically, a good idea. The “inevitable fatigues of the journey,” the “bad nights poisoned by so many sedatives of different colors,” the “inhumane queues at airports,” and the “thick flatulence of passengers” on planes, would all “steal days of life” and bring him closer to the “ideal state to sell the new novel: that of a stiff, deceased writer, to whom, suddenly, virtues are found that were denied to him in life by critics and peers.”
The Unyielding Pursuit of an Audience
Bayly leaves the Madrid trip to chance. If, by some stroke of luck, a Spanish television program deigns to invite him, he will board the plane without hesitation. If not, as he suspects, he will resort to even more desperate measures: offering himself to the “interview spaces, bland chats, frivolities and auntie teas that are broadcast on various YouTube pages,” even if their hosts are often “truculent, morbid or quarrelsome.” He is willing to discuss literature, politics, football, religion, hurricanes, love, and, “in particular, anal sex, a counter-current topic in which I am considered a wise, enlightened voice.”
Ultimately, Bayly will not give up. He dreams of a moment on Spanish television that will send his novel’s sales soaring, surpassing ‘Los genios,’ which sold over a hundred thousand copies. He imagines a weary producer, fed up with his and his assistants’ persistence, finally relenting: “Well, that’s it, invite that unbearable, libidinous, disheveled fat man, and let him come and talk about his books, but don’t take us for fools, let him pay us for the interview, because they say his mother has a lot of money and supports him.” This, he concludes, would not be a report, but a bribe, a “bribed interview,” a testament to the lengths one goes to succeed as a writer.
Source: https://www.abc.es/cultura/jaime-bayly-morir-madrid-20260524001817-nt.html
