"Like everyone, I am many people at once. And one of those people is a narrator who, in turn, is divided into multiple narrators who have a complicated romance with the act of writing, in which that moment always ends up arriving when you question your fit in that relationship and how to keep it alive without ceasing to be yourself." The contagious rhythm of Universo em desencanto, by Tim Maia, starts while, leaning on the bar, the writer Jordi Amor sips a Voll Damm, wondering whether to have some tapas for dinner or, "in a fit of nostalgia," opt for a combined dish, "despite the digestive effort it entails."
They say that being a reader or writer is living several lives in one, and Jordi can boast of that beyond having filled several hundred blank pages. He has been a tourist guide, waiter, translator for UEFA, librarian, and Catalan teacher in Argentina, where he lived for seven years. "I have traveled, I have walked, I have talked to many different people, I have seen and heard, I have read and I have eaten." And he has also written. In 2016, he debuted with El forat, which earned him the Documenta prize, and now he has just published his next novel, Enfosquiment (La Magrana), which talks about interpersonal relationships, work relationships, relationships with our environment; about what we see, what we believe, certainties and deceptions. About falls and illusions that are lived and broken in an elusive, hostile, and addictive world.
"I experience books as magical objects, like lamps that, depending on how you rub them, different things happen. In that dynamic, one might ask what role the author plays, who he is," he reflects. He takes a sip and continues. "The act of literary creation becomes more and more indescribable to me, where the only absolute reality, the only foothold, is language. The fact is that I know less and less who the author is. Who I am." While reflecting on these matters, he decides on some tapas.
---Order up.
In constant transformation
The feeling, when talking to the regular, is that he is constantly transforming, reshaping ideas, evolving concepts, questioning the key aspects of life to give, each time, different answers, approached from other angles, nuanced, from the different densities of the core.
"I look for a way to invent resources that stimulate me vitally and allow me to continue growing as a person," reasons the author, satisfied with his capacity for literary survival. "To be able to exist on this plane which is, above all, a matter of discipline and enthusiasm." A rigor and vitality that give rise to worlds that multiply in the multiple interactions established between author, text, and readers, a symbiotic, volatile, and explosive relationship that is never the same. That always transforms.
"Another aspect that has helped me in this process of constant transition is life as a couple, with all its ups and downs, its good and bad moments," adds Jordi regarding the presence of María, his partner, with whom they started in Buenos Aires, a companion of countless moments, diverse moods, beautiful trips, and all the mutations that derive from it.
A city hard to kill
"The next time I hear that old rant about how everything used to be better in Barcelona, I swear I'll grab a bar table and smash it against the wall," jokes the regular who confesses that, despite his relationship with the city never being easy and that there are a good number of corners he no longer recognizes as his own, he is aware that "what happens here happens in all cities in the world. The tourist mob and depersonalization affect them all equally, and believe me, I suffer from it, living in Sagrada Familia," he points out.
And, he takes a few seconds to finish eating, after which he concludes: "I have the feeling that this city will know how to lose control, despite institutionalization. It is very heterogeneous. Barcelona is very hard to kill."
---What must not die is this conversation, so have something to wash down dinner, you're invited.
Jordi Amor's blue gaze shines and he thanks the offer.
---And?
"Well, now I don't know whether to have a good Japanese whisky or, in homage to my days in Buenos Aires, a Fernet Cola," he replies with a smile.