Photo of David Gistau: (c) Bernardo Díaz, from El Mundo.
David gistau, journalist and writer, passed away yesterday after two months in a coma due to a brain injury suffered practicing his favorite sport, the boxing. And last night when I found out -few knew of his condition- I couldn't even avoid the surprise first, and the rage and grief later. Because I read it, listened to it and admired it.
For his style, his sharpness and bonhomie, his ease of speech, his witty and sharp verb that, for people who do not master it out loud like me, it was a pleasure. Today I find it difficult to type this article, but it is worth downloading sadness and thinking that this prose will already remain unchanged in its articles y creative writing who also wrote. Rest in peace.
David Gistau - Madrid, 1970-2020
So many things have been written (and I have already read) and for so many great and good of his colleagues about David Gistau, and in so few hours after hearing the news of his death, that I, humble writer of this literary blog, do not dare to comment and much less to compare. I can only add one millionth part to them as reader, listener and admirer by Gistau.
By how his prose fascinated me one day reading one of his articles in The reason, after in ABC and now in The World. And how after I started listening to it on Onda Cero (both in the morning gatherings and in programs like The Cultureta), the COPE -in the mornings with Carlos Herrera- and in other spaces of Antena 3 as lately in Telecinco.
I kept catching her lighthearted tone, his knowing how to jump from one topic to another -whether it was politics, cinema, culture, sport or music- without losing an iota of sharpness and use of the perfect words and expressions and with a agility overwhelming. In addition, we shared rock music tastes, soccer team and little fondness for pedantry and politically correct speech in politics or wherever.
An agility that, more than envy, amazed me and that's why I admired him so much. And for that character without artifice that also showed with his strong physique, also of my most personal taste, that I am not a doll with a suit and tie. Also, he was from my class, of my 70s generation. So when a brilliant companion, the kind you learn fromEven if you did not know him, you always have to highlight him. And Gistau has excelled. But he still had a lot ...
Their books
Because you see that some columns in the newspaper were too small for such a neat and refined verb, who did not marry anyone, whatever they say. He had stories to tell relentlessly, and what he liked, as all writers draw from ourselves when we are passionate about something. Gistau's thing was boxing. Also Real Madrid, John Ford, the Harley Davidson or the Mafia in all its aspects. Boxing, and some aftermath of a previous motorcycle accident in Argentina, the homeland of his wife, has ended up knocking him out fatally and unfairly.
And to boxing he dedicated his Low blows, where he gathered in a gym a coach already back from almost everything, with a television presenter who seeks to return to the present time and a gangster from the underworld who controls everything and everyone.
Su debut was Because there are no eggs, about their experiences as reporter rookie in war Afghanistan. Continued with What are you doing to us, ZP?, where he criticized the most controversial aspects of the government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. Y it hasn't been a year who got the last one, People who left.
Articles
They are all worth reading, but are to highlight the last one signed on The Irish, Martin Scorsese's movie about those gangsters he loved so much; Y a today as shocking as it is moving From Martini to Meconium, written 10 years ago after becoming a father for the first time.
Pity and deep pain in the heart.
First, and many years ago, he conquered me with his pen and then I followed him through each place that he has passed, leaving in them his bonhomie and well-doing. Little by little, I began to feel very close to him, as something mine, as if he were from my family, as my best friend. Today a friend left me. May God have you in his glory, if God exists and his glory too.
I share the grief with the same emotion. I already tell it in the article. And it's true. I think David Gistau had all his readers and listeners as friends of us. We will miss it very much.