My poetry and wine on Spanish television

A couple of months ago I was approached by Canal Extremadura, the regional T.V. channel in this part of Spain, with a view to being featured in a new show called "Un lugar para quedarse". After some initial misgivings, I agreed, and it was broadcast last night.

The format entails telling three people's stries of how they ending up living in Extremadura, interweaving each narrative thread. I appear in three separate sections. Firstly, I'm shown in the vineyards around Almendralejo, talking in Spanish about my early life in the U.K. and my move to Spain, and reading a poem about it in English  (01252 722698, from Inventing Truth). The second section, meanwhile, focuses on my working life at Viñaoliva, with interviews with me and footage of the winery. The final section concentrates on my current life in Almendralejo and my recent poetry, also including another poem in English (Extranjero, from Inventing Truth).

Here's the programme on the Extremaduran version of the i Player, where you can watch the whole thing or simply fast-forward to the three sections that feature my poetry and wine. It would be good to know what you think!

Spain in a mess

This blog rarely enters the dodgy realm of politics, but I just can't ignore the current situation in Spain. The national picture is perhaps best summed up by a recent BBC article on how corruption is rife at all levels of society. It's very much worth a read and you can find it here.

The story in Extremadura, however, is even bleaker. Down here in Spain's poorest region, all the national problems do exist, but they are also compounded. On a nationwide basis, the housing boom has come to an abrupt halt, waiting for an economic revival. Nevertheless, in Extremadura, that revival is inconceivable to us on the ground. The boom was fuelled by E.U. subsidies that have inevitably run out and are being diverted to other member states. We're now left with the ruins of a house of cards and few resources to rebuild the local economy on a stable basis.

There's a whole lost generation in the area, men in their thirties and forties without education who worked on building sites and made a lot of money a few years ago. Those few years seem a long way off! People have been surviving on their savings and their parents' pensions, but the endgame is now stepping up a gear. Row after row of boarded-up shops line the town centre of Almendralejo and units are for sale throughout the industrial estate, yet this is just the start. The problem's now gone beyond bickering politics, as the very fabric of Extremaduran society is starting to come asunder. I shudder to think what the next few months may bring.

Autumn in the vineyards

As soon as the grapes are picked, each vine sends a message out that kills off its leaves, turning them russet in a matter of a few days. The clay soil of Tierra de Barros is covered by row after endless rolling row of these vines right now, all combined with dusks that turn a more purple hue with every night that passes. On such evenings I love heading out to the mountains and looking down on the vineyards, on the shades of gorgeous autumn. New England, eat your heart out!

Ham from Extremadura

Tasting Notes, my forthcoming HappenStance pamphlet, allows the wines that I blend to speak for themselves. More about them in the next few days. However, it also deals with how wine matches with food. In that respect, one of my personal favourites is a glass of decent red from Extremadura with some of the local ham.

Ham from Extremadura is the best in the world. Forget about that Italian stuff (cry your eyes out, Parma!) or even Guijuelo or Jabugo in Spain. An acorn-fed, free range, on-the-bone Ibérico ham from Extremadura is unbeatable. Ibérico is the local breed of pigs, offering up delicious, marbled fat. Cut wafer-thin, it just melts on the tongue!

Fair enough, you might say, but why isn't it world-renowned, sold in the best restaurants and talked up by glossy magazines? Well, it certainly is making a major name for itself among foodies, but marketing has long been one of Extremadura's failings.This is maybe because of the old farmers' mentality in what is one of the poorest and most remote regions in Spain - Extremaduran people were just glad to get a good price for the animals at slaughter, letting companies from other parts of the country cure their hams, create brands and thus an image.

Nevertheless, things are now changing. Ham from Extremadura is now served at some of the top London restaurants. Moreover, it's coming to a poetry reading near you very soon for the price of a chapbook, together with a fair whack of that red wine I mentioned above. This is going to be a launch with a difference!

Solar farms

I might love complaining about the heat in Extremadura, but I have to admit there are certain major plus points. As this article from the Guardian indicates, we're now home to the world's largest solar power station. In fact, numerous solar farms form an integral part of our regional landscape along with vines and olives groves.

Acetre, music from Extremadura

Forget about 40ºC, that's for lightweights - I've just measured 43ºC on my balcony!

At these temperatures my brain turns to mush and begs for trashy novels, dodgy computer games and viciously chilled lager, none of which come high up on my list of priorities in normal circumstances!

An Extremaduran summer offers few highlights, but open-air concerts in cool night air do prove an exception. Here's a clip from just such an evening. The band is called Acetre, one of the best groups in this region:

Ángel Campos Pámpano

Ángel Campos Pámpano, who died almost a year ago, was best known on the international literary stage as an excellent translator of Portuguese poets into Spanish, especially of Pessoa, but his own poetry is also extremely interesting in its own right.

I remember meeting Ángel on many occasions over the years at readings both in Zafra and Badajoz. He loved the cut and thrust of poetic debate, and I'll always remember the look of exhilaration on his face as we left a reading by José Ángel Valente, one of his favourite poets.

Just before his death from cancer at the age of fifty-one, Ángel Campos Pámpano had the chance to see a copy of his collected poems, La vida de otro modo (Calambur, 2008), and it's a book that I've been enjoying ever since. There are poetic echoes of Jorge Guillén and César Vallejo, both infused with the emotional landscape of Lisbon and Extremadura, but I feel his poems about his mother stand out. They seem to me to be in constant dialogue with Antonio Gamoneda. The latter had always shared many aspects of his poetic aesthetics with Ángel, but in certain poems this key maternal theme coincides and resonates:

"sabrás que lo que queda
es tan solo una ausencia compartida..."

"you'll know that what remains
is only a shared absence.."

These words could also be applied to the many friends and colleagues who still mourn him. A poet who's still with us through his work, Ángel organised numerous readings in Badajoz. Thanks to his efforts, many of us had the chance to see some of Spain's top talents down here in deepest Extremadura. Now it's our turn to keep his talent alive.

The garden of forking paths

I gave myself a straight choice at the age of twenty-two – either I headed for the smoke in search of a mentor a la Lumsden, Donaghy, etc, or I left for the poorest, most remote part of Spain (as described on my travel website at Extremadura Guide), which I knew and loved from my year abroad. I was aware that I’d go for several months at a time without speaking English except a weekly phone call home, living in a dusty town where I’d be the only foreigner. Bear in mind this was when the internet was in its infancy.

I obviously chose the latter route. It might not have helped me in terms of climbing ladders or having someone to tap me on the shoulder and tell me where I was going wrong, but this isolation enabled me to develop a distinctive poetic tone. What’s more, I had no choice other than to write if I wanted to express something in English.

Have you ever imagined how your writing might have developed if you’d taken such a route? Exile sharpens understanding of your home, as it provides an incomparable counterpoint, while immersing yourself for years in a foreign language sheds new light on your original tongue. However, many critics would argue that you lose touch after so long away, that your views lose validity as a result of such a decision. The garden of forking paths, as Borges would have it.