VALENCIA. She has already taken possession of her domain in full. We already have her invading tree wells, terraces and clocks. Spring is an overwhelming certainty in our streets and in our lives. The season where being a little cheesy is not only allowed, but almost becomes a moral obligation. The season to let down your guard against cynicism and let yourself be fooled by floral explosions and their sensitive peripheries (buy yourself that bouquet, eat those strawberries, go to the park for a while to read in the sun and pretend that this is what existence consists of!) .
In culturplaza we are unsuspecting: we know that the horrors of climate change want to steal these months from us (see the absent April rains) and turn them into an extended version of the summer suffocation. But we are not going to let ourselves be twisted by the imminent environmental apocalypse. On the contrary, we launch ourselves to defend the sweet enthusiasms that fiction has in store for us for this time of year. Here we are from the Rohmer school: we want a story for each season.
And if something is very clear to us, it is that, no matter how devastating a winter has been, spring always comes back. As a reminder that nothing is so serious, that you can still start over. Like a promise of possibility. In our ambition to compile the most fascinating springs that the creation of others has left us, we have assembled a committee of experts in the field. Here are his recommendations for the season of rebirth. To sprout has been said!
Lucia Ros
dacsa productions
My first proposal is The dog in the mangerof pilar miro. There is nothing that reminds me of spring more than a good sitcom. and more if it is an adaptation of a work of Lope de Vega, in verse, with pompous seventeenth-century costumes and shot in a Portuguese palace. Pilar Miró’s masterpiece is delicious, bright, bustling, romantic and chaotic. Like spring, wow.
The next title is Emmaof Autumn de Wilde. Interestingly, another movie that reminds me of spring could also be considered a sitcom and, coincidentally (or not), is also a film adaptation of a literary classic. Jane Austen he criticized the upper-middle-class society to which he belonged like no other, camouflaging himself in the romantic comedy and perhaps with Emma signed his lightest work. Autumn de Wilde did justice to the playful side and matchmaking cravings of her leading lady with a fresh staging. If we could smell her, surely she would smell like flowers.
On the musical level, I think of Come on, destroy me, you plansof Salvador Sobral. With his beautiful and particular voice, he talks about how he is bored with routine and tranquility and needs someone to spoil his plans and accompany him to dance. Leaving the boring winter and entering the spontaneous spring and all this, with a melody that, indeed, invites you to dance.
and i finish with Sunflower vol.6′ of Harry Styles. Yes I know. Sunflowers aren’t spring flowers, but this Harry Styles song is about the beginnings of romance, and what is more spring than that? Plant new seeds in the melody and kisses in the kitchen. The last 30 seconds make me want to go boating across the countryside surrounded by poppies and daisies.
raquel bada
Director of Bamba Editorial
An essential recommendation is The house by the sea of May Sarton (and also his previous bibliography: Longing for Roots either Diary of a loneliness, if spring pushes you further into the field). Both his writing, marked by his desire for change, to find the ‘weeds’ to make room for the new, and the editions of Gallo Negro evoke this season. In The house by the sea, she writes in a journal after moving from the New Hampshire countryside to the Maine coast. The sea here is one more character. Sarton poetically registers how he experiences that renewal of his life and his work in that new place. “It is essential that true joys be experienced, that the dawn does not leave us impassive” he writes.
This spring I’m also reading Glory Strong in What happens is that I love you. It is a volume with the author’s most romantic poetry, which she discovers Julia Old in this well-cared edition for Blackie Books. On the cover we see the writer with her great love, Phyllis Turnbull. An anthology full of the purity of Gloria, which comes through a hundred poems.
And, as planned readings, I want to discover The art of telling nature, that Lucy Romero It will soon be published in Barlin Libros. In it, he explores ‘nature writing’ and what it offers us in this fast-paced world.
Visually, I recommend following the programming of the mythical Cinestudio D’or. It helps to get even from that obsession of not having arrived on time for the premieres this winter.
jordi sapena
Musician, hail monstera it’s his last job
One of the movies that reminds me the most of the spring period is A love of jeunesseof Mia Hansen-Love. Although it does not take place entirely in spring, it does capture the spirit of that season, just as if I think of summer it comes to me. call me by your name.
Chromatically, it is very powerful and has that light so characteristic of spring, in which the days lengthen, the afternoons become almost endless… People always talk about summer love, but I think spring love is also important (Easter ones, even), which are sometimes more fleeting, more ephemeral and more intense than the summer ones. The play tells us about the story between Camille and Sullivan, about that strong youthful love they share. Later, he disappears from her life and she is left very marked by that romance.
To me, it’s a very powerful image of what spring and love is: something you’re always a beginner at. Also, I love how it ends, he goes to the river with her, his hat flies off and it sounds The Water, of Johnny Fyn and Laura Marling. They also remind me a lot of spring two of the songs from purple vine that sound on the tape, Back to 17 and Thanks to life.
Muriel Villanueva
Author of libres com A pianist in a cellar (Sembra), Paula and the hummingbird (Bromera), The ball of the sneezes (Adia editions)
When I thought about that time of year, I immediately remembered live sense youd’Antonia Font. It is the most favorite song of the group and for me it represents a very powerful image, with a tauleta in the sun at vermouth time with the person you like the most. The “spring and trinaranjus” of the seua lletra is almost a motto for a lot of people, a way of understanding life.
They have stolen my springof May Yo carla collado. A song that has been published in a few days. They are very empowered, very young and who are very good music, with our concepts. This ‘stolen spring’ does not stop being a metaphor, always with an endavant gaze. Who is this stolen spring, could she be young?
Lunch on the gespad‘Edouard Manet (1863). There are a lot of eating images about the scene of quadres and movies, but I especially like this one. I think it’s an idea that I automatically associate with spring.
the book Spring d’Ali Smith (Raig Green). The title is part of the seua tetralogy of the seasons and talk of spring with a metaphor of hope and openness.
Raul E. Asencio
Editorial Director of La Caja Books
I have been reviewing the shelves of my bookshelf and I have come across The seed and the heart, an anthology of Japanese poetry edited by Alba. It is not itself a ‘spring’ book, but some of the poems have a ‘kigo’ or ‘season word’ that temporarily fixes the poem and many of them, of course, occur or are set in spring.
lourdes toledo
Author of titles com america endins (kidding), restlessness (Pages), Lluny d’America (Bullent)…
It is a common place, but, without doubt, the music that most relates to this time of year is Spring of Vivaldi.
D’altra banda, spring is full of libres. In general, the cycle of the seasons is a very present theme in non-fiction literature, like the dietaris of Miquel Pairoli (Gavarres) either the hoursof Josep Pla (Destination). If I speak of fiction, tenim, for example, The Roman spring of Senyora Stoneof tennessee williams (Bruguera). It will be a scandal when it is going to be published because it narrates the adventures of a freedwoman. An other classic is Spring consecrationd’Alejo Carpentier (Alliance), which is going to be a revolutionary new art within the Latin American literary scene, an other way of saying. It is not an easy novel to get to, but it will open our horizons. EITHER L’Agnese is going to dieof Renata Vigano (afers). It is located in Italy during the Nazi occupation and shows the contrast of the life of the mateixos partisans during spring and winter. Als episodes of spring tot és màcil, s’organitzen millor, tenen els ánims más amunt; a l’hivern tot es fa cru, tot es mort i desolación. I és així, spring ho fa tot más amiable.
In l’àmbit filmic, fa poc vaig veure The Quiet Girl. Faced with the fact that it is set in summer, as it is the Irish summer, it is more reminiscent of the atmosphere of our spring: the great beauty of nature, eixe wake up to a more pleasant life …