He orders a pisco sour, a drink that this Barcelona native of Leonese descent has grown fond of in Peru, where he usually lives, although he has now returned to his Barberà del Vallès, where he grew up, to take care of his parents.
--"A pisco sour, at this hour?"
He frowns, wrinkling his forehead like a Star Trek Klingon. In the background, fragments of the recently re-released Dimensioni Sonore, a clash of titans between Bruno Nicolai and Ennio Morricone, play, and Hernán Migoya replaces his frown with a knowing smile.
A self-sufficient devourer of Pop culture, a "declared enemy of God," Migoya prides himself on having remained entirely on the sidelines. "Of having written a book of short stories that was on the verge of being banned by good officials in full democracy, which you'll agree has more merit than being banned in a dictatorship; of having survived marginalization and censorship by many institutions, publishers, and media; of also surviving the ---on the other hand, hilarious and splendid--- current times, ideal for satire, but, for that very reason, disastrous for the satirist. And doing so without giving up writing what I want."
Pulp Retelling
Delighted to continue mocking "the right and left-wing Taliban in a country as politically fundamentalist as ours," this forty-something devourer of Pulp novels by Nero Wolfe, Ian Fleming, Richard Matheson, and Travis McGee, and enthusiast of the literature of DH Lawrence, Daphne du Maurier, Tanith Lee, Shirley Jackson, or Julio Cortázar, combines his intellectual diet with comics and authors who continue to mark his path: "Joyce Carol Oates, Lisa Tuttle, Richard Parra, Enrique Prochazka, Sergi Puertas, Abel Posse, María Zaragoza, Frank Miller, Peter Bagge, Aroha Travé, Beroy, Comès, Alfonso Font, Édika, Monteys, Abulí, Carla Berrocal, Juaco Vizuete, Riyoko Ikeda." And a long etcetera. "They all confirm me in the literature I write."
In collaboration with two dozen "of the best artists in the country," he has written the Nuevas Hazañas Bélicas (New War Exploits), which he considers "the best comic ever made about the Civil War, so good that a French academic has proclaimed it to be the only comic about the conflict that can ever be taught in Universities."
Right now, and in the company of cartoonist Bartolomé Seguí, he is preparing the third comic adaptation of the Carvalho series, Los mares del Sur (The Southern Seas), which earned Manuel Vázquez Montalbán the Premio Planeta 41 years ago. "This is possible thanks to the success of the two previous albums: Tatuaje (Tattoo) and La soledad del Mánager (The Manager's Solitude), published in Spain by Norma Editorial and, in France, by Dargaud."
In parallel, he is taking his time to write his first crime novel and does not neglect his priority: "to accompany my parents, in this time of illness, and give them all the affection I can to compensate for my ineptitude in domestic life."
Lima-Barcelona
"A while ago, four years after I had moved to Lima, I returned here to present a novel and was overwhelmed with happiness by the flood of friends who came. Many very dear people, who made me feel missed. I was glad I had left, because thanks to that they welcomed me back with unspeakable affection."
--And as an adopted Limeño, how do you see Barcelona?
--It's an ex with whom there's always the danger of getting back together.
Of this "ex," Migoya highlights the libraries. "I sincerely believe that the ones here are the best libraries in the world. If I didn't have family obligations, I would settle into one and stay to sleep among its shelves."
What he doesn't miss is "the lack of spontaneity and inner spark from its citizenry. With so much imperialist uniformization in recent years, that lack of worldliness and 'charnega' waist is its downfall," he laments regarding the more convivial atmosphere in the bars and public spaces of his Barberà, "where striking up a conversation with strangers in a bar is the most natural thing."
The themes of the Nicolai-Morriccone tandem end.
--Do you want me to put something in particular on the radio?
--I like Reggaeton.
--But come on, man, don't mess around!! Reggaeton?? Seriously??
And Hernán Migoya frowns again, though this time with an amused expression.