“There are people who
are blind, even though their vision is intact. Others can´t see, but
they´re not blind, “muses the protagonist of Blind Date, the
latest work by playwright Mario Diament, a Miami resident for the
past twelve years. Certainly, the concept of blindness holds profound
metaphors for the weakness of the human soul. In a play recently
nominated for the Carbonell Prize, Diament´s characters cross each
other in episodes that like Chinese boxes contain infinite
possibilities.
It´s no coincidence that
the blind writer Jorge Luis Borges is the central figure who listens
to the actors in Blind Date. “He has been a big influence on my way
of seeing the world”, explain Diament, who is as Argentine as his
idol. “Like him I´m fascinated by chance, time, and seemingly
irrevocable destiny”. Clearly the playwright needed time to
complete that play as well as the intellectual maturity to approach
his obsessions without fear.
On the other hand, moving
and challenging, a play called Esquirlas, attempts to make sense of
the last Argentine military dictatorship (1976-1983). “I´m a
product of that generation”, Diament confesses. “The stories I
tell in the play come from my experience and the experience of my
friends”. Although there are already countless literary and
cinematic treatments of that theme, Diament offers an approach whose
interest lies with the victims and not the victimizers. “It´s
important to ask yourself if you did everything that you could have
done”.
The writer, journalist,
screenwriter, and translator admits that he has no work routine; he
describes the atmosphere where he concocts his fiction as
chaos—especially since he´s a tireless traveler who has lived in
various cities across the United States, Europe, and the Middle East.
For the moment, he´s made a home base as a professor at Florida
International University and contributor to El Nuevo Herald. “The
city is growing more interesting everyday”, he observes, “with
good writers and actors who express the vicissitudes and hopes that
they carry with them from their home countries in their own
language”.
Vera
Interview Mario Diament
(Loft Magazine)
