An antidote to Bill Gates? I taught an Argentinean during the Falklands.
He was a very cultivated fellow who left his Red Poncho with black trim with
me as a parting gift. I have it next to my Sandinista Mask from the brother
of another student who ran the National Library in Nicaragua. Both
brothers are children of culture and affluence who tried to rebuild what
Samoza had destroyed.
Well, here's the answer to Milton Friedman and the current English ax on the
only English identity that seems worthwhile. Constant chatter is no
substitute for poetry of music. Ann Boleyn was one of the favorites on my
reservation when it came to poems about life and love. It seems that the
spirit of poor Ann has revived and the English culture is now her surrogate.
Better we should listen to the Argentineans, the Venezuelans and the Costa
Ricans. Or maybe the great Scandinavian cultural programs. Their
orchestras regularly come to New York and blow the critics away. And then
there is Anna Netrebko and the Russians. Damn!
REH
Books venerated in a land where culture is everything
Argentines have a different understanding of government's obligations
By Andrew Cohen, FreelanceAugust 12, 2010
To call El Ateneo Grand Splendid a bookstore is to call St. Peter's Basilica
a church; it does not begin to describe its breathtaking, celestial beauty.
This emporium of books began life in 1919 as a theatre, with a deep stage, a
brocaded curtain and a painted dome (with its allegory of peace) designed by
an Italian artist, Italians having built much of this elegant capital. For
decades the Grand Splendid featured silent film, orchestral music, ballet
and of course, the tango, the soul of Argentina.
Since 2000, it has been a bookstore, the largest in Latin America. This is a
temple of books, a literary shrine, a cathedral of curiosity.
Some 3,000 people come here every day to browse, read and buy. You find them
reading in every corner of the place, curled up under the cornices, sipping
an espresso in the cafe (which was once the stage) or lounging in the
blood-red velvet boxes where patrons once watched performances.
The performance today is books, and books alone, playing every day and night
to a loyal, rapturous audience. Forget the Internet and online book sales.
Forget Amazon and Indigo. Forget e-books. They are here, but they have not
yet breached the citadel of Buenos Aires, what may be the world's last
refuge of books, the kind made of paper and ink.
This is a city in love with books. There are said to be more bookstores in
Buenos Aires than in Brazil, a country of 190 million (compared with 42
million in Argentina). In some neighbourhoods, there are more bookshops than
in all of Santiago in neighbouring Chile.
Booksellers claim there is one bookstore for every 6,000 residents of Buenos
Aires. Books matter here, which is why there are so many of such variety.
Bookselling is "a true profession," they argue, which isn't to say that it
is a hugely profitable one, or a safe one.
Help comes from the state. By law, books are sold at the same price
everywhere in the country -- Germany follows a similar practice -- which
means that independent bookstores are not undercut by the big-box retailers.
Booksellers also benefit from tax breaks.
Why is this so? Books have been part of life here since Argentina became
independent in 1810. Two of the founding fathers -- Jose de San Martin and
Manuel Belgrano -- donated books from their own collections to found the
national library, just as Thomas Jefferson donated much of his collection to
the Library of Congress after it had been burned by the British in the War
of 1812.
Both Belgrano and San Martin thought books, and the ideas they germinated,
were central to the survival and success of the new republic. In the 20th
century, the generals would think the opposite: among their assaults on
democracy, they would ban and burn books, arrest authors and close presses.
Books, though, are just one example of the extraordinary commitment to
culture in Buenos Aires. It holds a literary festival here every year, one
of many festivals celebrating theatre, dance, music and film. Its annual
international book fair draws a million visitors.
In a city of 13 million struggling to get by, it spends three per cent of
its budget on culture. The sidewalks are heaving and the subway stations are
crumbling, but there is money, by God, for free tickets to the Tango!
It is about civic priority. Argentina has not recovered from its economic
collapse of 10 years ago, when it defaulted on its debt and deflated its
currency, but the show must go on.
"If you don't invest in culture, you go home," Hernan Lombardi, the minister
of culture, says of governments that ignore this deeply human need. "In a
crisis, we worry about losing identity. That's when we need to support
culture." So the city finds the money to run 10 museums, while the national
government maintains even more, with minimal admission. Some are minimal,
some are often closed, some are under renovation.
There is money to restore the spectacular Colon Theatre and support for
sophisticated free guidebooks to the city's pizzerias, ice-cream parlours as
well as bookstores. And subsidies to keep tickets to the performing arts
affordable, especially for young people, whom Lombardi says will walk rather
than take the bus to afford a play.
Cut culture? Not here. The reverence for culture represents a different way
of looking at life, a different understanding (like public transit) of the
obligations of governments to citizens. It is a common attitude in Europe
but largely foreign in North America.
Lombardi -- a man of humour and warmth who sweetens his conversation with
classical references -- will take that message, and more broadly, one
celebrating the charms of Buenos Aires, when he visits Canada this autumn.
We should listen.
Andrew Cohen is president of the Historica-Dominion Institute. These views
are his own.
C Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal
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