Ep 50 / Chatting with Miki Naranja about poetry and its benefits for the world
The second podcast of this new season of “Charlando con zubi” is a very special podcast for us and one that we have been trying to do for a long time. The protagonist is Miguel Herranz, better known to everyone as Miki Naranja. Poet and public official, Miki expresses his love for poetry and infects us with it through his Instagram account @mikiorange . A humble, calm guy who transmits peace just by looking at him. We really wanted to have a little time to chat with him, and that he would tell us where his love for poetry comes from and what role it plays in his life.
Miki studied law and began to combine his studies with writing. He wrote in the traditional press, social networks, he had a poetry blog, which he began to write thanks to the songs of Aute and Silvio Rodriguez, and he opened his own account on Instagram. He decided to become a Penitentiary Institution official by vocation, but for him being a poet trumps any other activity. A lover of reading above all, he says that his poems emerge as a consequence of this, trying to replicate in some way what others have transmitted to him. For him, being a poet is his way of being in the world and he says – with great confidence – that he will be until they put him in a box. Find poetry anywhere, even in those that at first glance might seem devoid of beauty. “In those places, if you apply a little detail and look at reality from another perspective, that is where there is the most beauty,” he says. In his poems he tells a lot about daily life and his work. He thinks that one of the values that we are losing the most today is that of putting ourselves in the shoes of our neighbors and he fervently believes that poetry opens these channels of empathy almost instantly, an immediate connection with the writer.
He told us how he began writing poems through his Instagram account, and sharing those that “hit him” from other authors, generally very young and current voices. We have talked about the three books he has written, among which there is one of poetry for children, Once upon a fish. A book that he really enjoyed, because speaking to children seemed precious to him, but it also took a lot of work, since he was diagnosed with cancer during the process. Also, we have talked about the positioning of poetry currently in Spain and he has given us an “author itinerary for beginners.” He thinks it is essential to make people passionate about reading and learn about the literary culture of our country. Her next challenge will be to make a book of haikus and we are looking forward to her completing it so we can read more about her beautiful poetry.
A podcast privilege, in every sense, and with which we have learned to value poetry from the eyes of a person completely in love with it. We leave you with him.
Recommendations and mentions of Miki Naranja:
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