Josep Pla - Life Embitters

What then is the hostility towards baccarat all about? At the end of the day it means that the last game of chance is suppressed, because there isn’t much chance in the others. They are games where eventually you will be fatally fleeced — literally! In the games we have mentioned, the banker has a real, undeniable advantage, because he automatically collects a percentage of all the money that crosses the table. As we have stated repeatedly, this percentage is stipulated. Then there is what the municipality and the state take: the taxman, in a word. If we imagine a set of gamblers rooted round a table, with a limitless bank, after a certain amount of time, all the gamblers will be bankrupted. If the only chance a game permits is the chance to be destined to lose, where does chance come in?

What will the gambler do? Of course, the gambler will continue to play. The gambler pursues what he thinks is his and respects no holidays. To imagine that the accumulation of continual losses will make him stop and ponder for a moment is to have a partial view of his character. Gamblers gamble, whatever the weather, even though good fortune allows a win from time to time …

In my view, Mentone is the most unforgettable spectacle on the Côte d’Azur. The old town is pure Italian and sits on a small promontory that juts out into the sea. On both sides of the town two slopes open out against the gigantic, purple, fluorescent backdrop of the towering end of the Alps. Covered in mansions, palm, rose, pine and olive trees, these baroque, sunny inclines have a lushness that rather sours in the mouth. The old town, on the other hand, brings a minty freshness to the lips.

These old towns by the sea of Genoa are gracious places. Terraced on either of the church — that’s always at the highest point — precipitously poised over the sea, theirs is a proud, active profile. From out to sea you see houses bunched together, the skylights and windows of the houses of the poor and the loggias of ancient palaces. Pigeons fly in and out of the loggias and circle round the belfry. This bronzed panorama of the town, with its green windows and whitewashed terraces is unforgettable and sparkles with charm. These towns, generally, rise up over a natural port that is its infinitely becalmed and silent with sleepy waters. Four old boats sun themselves by the shore, opposite a street of taverns. Out-of-date advertisements hang on the walls and you can often read loud political exclamations on the walls. Viva l’anarchia or Il Papa è … In the afternoon the whole town is reflected in the port, and the occasional school of small fish leaps over the still waters gleaming like a scattered handful of silver coins. At sunset a limp sail sits in the harbor mouth like a fly in a glass of orange juice. And a bell tinkles and a girl’s voice shouts from a terraced roof: Irmaa sei tuu?

Following the pattern of Genoa, the Italians have created a kind of unmistakably Mediterranean city. They are all the same: a network of the narrowest streets formed by tall tenements, with dark entranceways and windows with shutters that rise up like eyelids. From the street you can see a strip of blue sky despairing between two parallel roofs. A system of ropes helps to hang out the clothes between one window and the next, lo straccio . Rags of every color and shape often blot out the view of the sky. This narrowness creates a concentrated, bustling style of life: it’s simply impossible to describe the lively scenes you encounter on these streets. It’s as if people don’t really know where they live, they all seem to belong to the same house. People bicker from window to window and sometimes you hear epic arguments. Down below, those who are coming and going must take care not to bump into a cot, tread on a child or a dog’s tail that’s splayed over a doorstep. Now and then, suddenly and quite simultaneously, children start bawling, dogs bark, cats miaow, women tear their hair out, men brawl, and girls scream. A hellish din is unleashed that lasts until the carabinieri arrive, then everybody dives into their den and only orange peel dots the street. While the carabinieri are about there is a dull, subterranean hum; people mumble and mutter behind their doors and behind every window two livid eyes follow the shadows from the tails of the carabinieris ’ coats. However, this ferment almost always dies down one way or other. People emerge from their hiding-places as quiet as can be, dogs and cats shush, children laugh, women comb their hair in the window and men sit on the doorstep reading Avanti! When peace is restored, you see baskets descend, touching the wall, tied to a rope used to hoist them up or down from the flats. Sometimes the girl pulling the rope, between a carnation and a fiasco of red wine, tugs too brusquely and the basket leaps and twists like a scalded cat and macarrone is scattered over the ground to general lamentations. If you pass by an hour later, people are still sighing.

Mentone was once a town with this kind of street life. Today it has become too elegant for that hustle and bustle to survive in the old town. The old carcass remains, but preserved, like a relic. Quiet reigns on the narrow streets and it’s difficult to see a basket lowered from a window by rope. The warm charm of life in Mentone gives it a nineteenth-century air. One feels the shade of Garibaldi, with mustache, squib, and red shirt should emerge from the dark stairways.

If you ever go to Mentone, look for the Place de la Tête, go up the street of the Loggette — partly covered by arches — continue along the very narrow Rue Longue, where you’ll find the ancient palace of the princes of Monaco. If you don’t want to walk so far, take the slope up to the church of Saint-Michel, refurbished in Jesuit style. By the church, look for the path hewn out of the rock that leads to the town’s old cemetery, located in one of its highest points. The cemetery is like a kind of amphitheater on four levels, one above the other, and one per religion. You will enjoy wonderful vistas before you and a great expanse of sea; the Italian coast on the left, and the French south-facing coast on the right, covered in olives and pine trees and gardens. Your blue-filled eyes will follow the flight of a seagull or pigeon. You will see the wind gently gyrate the weathervane on the belfry. And if you smoke, you can sit on a half worn gravestone and smoke a cigarette.

Florence was one of the first cities I got to know in the course of my wandering. I lived there a good long time and in excellent company. Some of my friends were staying at the Pensione Balestri on Piazza Mentana on the Lung’Arno. Best friend of all was Lluís Llimona, younger than me, but as lively, sensitive, and intelligent as he is now.

Llimona introduced me to a strange character: a short, abrupt, olive-skinned Mexican painter with thick, frizzy hair who had fought in the civil war with the renowned Pancho Villa; once the revolution was victorious he was given a grant to travel to Europe to study what they call Arte in Latin America. The Mexican had lingered in bohemian, literary cafés across the continent and had now wound up in Florence by virtue of amorous pressure exerted by an imposing northern lady straight out of German mythology — plump and pink with glowing, rippling flesh like a Rubens. Conversely, he was small, bilious, and swarthy with purple lips and greenish teeth.

Another great friend of ours also stayed in the pensione (although only briefly), Ràfols the architect, who is one of the most inspired, serene men I have ever known. He depended on a meager grant he received — always late — from the Council for Further Study. Despite his extreme poverty, Ràfols never strayed from the routine of his daily life. He went to mass every day, wrote a daily letter to his close friend Enric C. Ricart, and had his personal beggar to whom he never failed to give a set amount day in day out — even in his direst impecunious moments.