My Private Ibiza

“I migrated to the island in 1970 and hardly moved from there until 1984, when an alliance of thugs and police suggested I beat a retreat. Since I made it through that, I have spent years passing much of September in a pleasant hotel in Salinas, which keeps me from losing too much contact with my adoptive homeland.

“It goes without saying that writing about oneself means conflating subject and object, and if it avoids the risk of indiscretion, it does so by skirting emptiness. But the metamorphosis of Ibiza may permit one to sidestep the autobiographical genre and portray reality as such in a number of different facets; and to describe them, I will need a few memories and dates as a compass to orient me…”