Romance Apps & The Piropo
Thursday, October 09, 2014
“All our souls are written in our eyes.”
Cyrano de Bergerac
 |
| Claire Love, Feb 1991 |
These days I have been thinking a lot about the words I use and their meaning when you think about them. To share, a verb in a state of possible extinction thanks to facebook, in Spanish translates to compartir. This literally means to break with, alluding to what Christ did with a loaf of bread at that final supper. While we chat and talk we rarely use converse. In Spanish it is more usual to conversar which means to [to speak] in verse. By now you may be getting the idea.
There is this lovely
verb much in use in Argentina
(even though it is a Spanish word) to lisonjear. It involves saying something
nice to someone usually for ulterior motives.
lisonja1. (Del prov. lauzenja).
1. f. Alabanza
afectada, para ganar la voluntad de alguien.
A similar word, not so nice sounding is exact in its meaning. It is a piropo
which comes from the Latin and it can mean red bronze or a purple garnet.
piropo. (Del lat.
pyrōpus, y este del gr. πυρωπός).
1. m.
Variedad del granate, de color rojo de fuego, muy apreciada como piedra fina.
2. m. Rubí,
carbúnculo.
3. m.
coloq. Lisonja, requiebro.
Note the third meaning
lisonja or requiebro defined as a flirtatious remark.
A piropo, then is the
exact term in Spanish that defines those nice things you might say to someone
who is pretty or good looking, whom you might not yet know, or will never know
and you say it in passing on the street for example. The English compliments, flirtatious
remark or amorous compliment simply do not cut it.
Spaniards of the 17th
century and in earlier centuries were experts at the flowery piropo. Cyrano de
Bergerac was accomplished at that sort of thing in France.
In the late 60s when
my wife was visibly pregnant she had to navigate albañiles (brick or
construction workers) who would utter all kinds of flowery and not so flowery
remarks perched on their scaffolding in Mexico
City. I remember one in particular as the albañil was
next door to where we lived. I asked her what the man had said. Blushing, and indignant, she told
me, “Gringüita (blonde American) hagamos un taquito de carne y tu serías la
tortilla.” This translates to
“Let’s make a little taco. I will be the meat and you the tortilla.”
Much tamer was an Argentine piropo of my youth that you might tell a beautiful young woman coming your way. It drew on the three names of Columbus's caravelles, !Santa María, que Pinta está la Niña! It translates to, "Holy Mother of God how pretty the girl is!"
Much tamer was an Argentine piropo of my youth that you might tell a beautiful young woman coming your way. It drew on the three names of Columbus's caravelles, !Santa María, que Pinta está la Niña! It translates to, "Holy Mother of God how pretty the girl is!"
In my younger days I
could lay it thick and say nice things. I feel that now it has become
impossible to tell a beautiful woman, a handsome man, a man with nice hands, a
woman with interesting hair that you have noticed. In those younger days when I wore a uniform of the Argentine Navy women would come to me in the street (a very pleasant Argentine superstition, in my opinion.) and touch (demurely) some part of my uniform and say, "¡Marinero, suerte para mí! or "Sailor bring me good luck!"
It was a month ago
that Rosemary and I were leaving Oakridge Mall. We passed the very oriental
Peninsula Restaurant. At the door was a woman dressed in what I call a Susy
Wong, blue Chinese silk dress with a slit on the side. I found myself stopping
and telling her, “You look wonderful in that beautiful dress.” She took it as a
compliment. She smiled and thanked me.
That sort of thing
does not happen too much now. If the woman is young and you are an old man (as
I am) you are risking alleged sexual harassment or portraying yourself as a
dirty old man.
There are small not quite insignificant decisions that a man must make on the street when he spies a beautiful woman coming one's way. Do you avert your eyes? Do you make eye contact? Do you stare at her cleavage while avoiding her eyes? And most difficult of all do you look back at her obverse side as she walks past you?
There are small not quite insignificant decisions that a man must make on the street when he spies a beautiful woman coming one's way. Do you avert your eyes? Do you make eye contact? Do you stare at her cleavage while avoiding her eyes? And most difficult of all do you look back at her obverse side as she walks past you?
A week ago I told the
Artistic Director of Early Music Vancouver (before a concert) that lutenist
Sylvain Bergeron was a matinee idol. I was corrected and told Bergeron was too
old to be such a person. On the other hand that Artistic Director was aware
that the term matinee idol was a term reserved to describe good looking men. It
never applied to women. You might say that it is a gender specific compliment.
For too many centuries
and perhaps one of the high points was
the Arthurian times of literature when spotlessly clean knights (who did
not even sin in thought) sought out the Holy Grail while wearing a token from
their lady love back home perched on a high pedestal.
The equality of the
sexes, or the near one in this 21st century has taken away from men
and women the heretofore sparring that preceded any kind of amorous
involvement.
Just a week ago while
watching Emily Gibbs (played by Lauren Jackson) and George Webb (Chris Cope) in
some old-fashioned mating dance in the second act of Osimous's Our Town, “Lauren can I carry your books?” I came to
understand how lucky I am to be 72 and over all that. Could I cope with on line
dating and sexting with my smart phone? No! Romance has been replaced by the
concept of a partner with privileges. The other side of the coin, when Dawn
Petten playing Mrs. Gibbs says,”When I married I went into it blind as a bat,”
now has as the reality knowledge of everything you ever wanted to or did not
want to know about your partner. Discovery
has been replaced by a “romance app” that automatically chills the Champagne, and reminds
you to break open a box of Trojans.
The simple idea that
as humans we are attracted to beauty or of a beauty of our choosing, be it a
landscape, a house, a painting, a vacation spot, a man, a woman, both, a suit,
a dress, a symmetrical tabby, and that all that does not include our right to
utter such a preference when spotting a human of our visual predilection (where
it all begins unless your predilection comes with a voice like Grace Kelly or
Debora Kerr) is a shame. If you hold open a door for a woman you might get
slapped or sneered at.
Which brings me to
this photograph of Claire Love which I took in February 1991. I went up to her
and said, “I would like to photograph you because you are stunning.” She looked
at me, up and down, and said, “When and where?” I photographed her two more
times. In these I went the route of George Hurrell glamour. I believe I used a
hair light, a light to project an out of focus gobo of stars, a boom light
shooting down and a filler or kicker central to her face. Note that while Love and my camera were hugging the floor, in my mind and in that photograph she is up on a pedestal.
I wanted to make the
beautiful, more beautiful and ethereal. Can there be anything wrong with that?
Claire Love lives in France and I am
sure that when she takes a stroll in her town, there are willing Cyranos everywhere
uttering delights her way.
Love at the Arch
More Claire Love
Love at the Arch
More Claire Love
