People drink to quiet thoughts, to dull awareness, to feel they fit in, to connect with others, to become someone else and live other lives. They drink to forget fatigue and uncertainty, to feel brilliant and witty, to dance like no one is watching, to invite events to happen, to endure until a real life arrives. They drink because obedience feels tiring, to forget fear, to pause everything for a moment, to drink in order to be braver, and because, as Marisa Paredes says in La flor de mi secreto, “except for drinking, everything is hard.” These are among the responses gathered by Roberto Enríquez, aka Bob Pop (Madrid, 1971), in Como las grecas, a debate-essay published this Thursday with a subtitle asking, “why do we get drunk like this?” or, in other words, what drives the social, compulsive drinking we share after work, at parties, during Sunday vermuts, or at family dinners.
In Como las grecas the voices of Marguerite Duras, John Fosse, and Dorothy Parker mingle with confessions from friends and the author’s own biography as a journalist, screenwriter, and creator of series like Maricón perdido, and works such as De cuerpo presente, Mansos, and Días simétricos. Coinciding with the essay’s release, Bob Pop is testing a second play, Hablar no sirve de nada, ahead of its premiere on April 14 at the Espai Texas in Barcelona. He notes that he cannot speak alone and needs someone by his side, and that dependence makes a solo monologue impossible. The play looks at power dynamics and who cares for him for money. In caring for those who care for him, Bob Pop also stopped drinking years ago and, on the last page, tells a friend that he remembers how good it was when they drank together: “I don’t drink anymore, but I remember.”
-What motivated this essay, why was the topic of interest?
-I was drawn to it because I used to drink a lot, and now drinking is much harder due to my bladder, mobility, and dependence. I wanted to understand what I start losing or what we seek in alcohol. I didn’t want a therapeutic angle, but a daily-life one from the voices of those who drank too much but never thought they had a problem with alcohol, even though many other issues existed and alcohol served as a relief that eventually led to other problems.
“We’re always thinking about what we have to do next, the three-ring circus we’re carrying, and drinking this way, especially in social settings, is a way of living the present intensely. It’s all about the here and now.”
-How much does the need to drink relate to exhaustion, disenchantment, speed, and the scrolling life?
Everything is linked. It ties to a turbo-capitalist syndrome that keeps us from living in the moment. We’re always planning the next thing, the next show, the next circle of life, and drinking this way, especially socially, becomes a way to live the present fully. The present, in turn, is relatively happy and communal because there is a kind of sorority among drinkers.
-The essay notes a very specific generation, because today’s youths drink and drug far less.
It’s a boomer book, clearly. It seems to reflect a generation, a way of relating, even a certain gay adolescence, and it touches on workplace environments, uncertainties, and all that.
-There is also a subtle class portrait, not explicit, not focusing on the ultra-wealthy but not on extreme poverty either.
That’s true. It speaks to women and men who drift with a bit of luck toward a comfortable life, who rent rather than own, who move through life on the edge. They live in the present because the future is unclear, while not living on the streets. A metaphor my partner uses is walking on hard-boiled eggs versus raw eggs. We constantly tread on fragile ground, managing with whatever comes our way. It isn’t about people who binge-drink or drink alone at home; it’s about a generation that has made alcohol a form of leisure, with plenty of other people who could not afford it.
-How strong is the link between “masculinity through intoxication” and alcohol intoxication?
I discuss several forms of masculinity. There is my own gay masculinity that sought alcohol for audacity and courage, even to quiet a voice that threatened to show itself. There is also the harsh heterosexual masculinity, where alcohol enables cruelty, machismo, and even excuses erectile problems, asserting a male space that feels safe when drunk. But when a woman is drunk, that space is not safe, and she is judged and vulnerable to violence.
“Work. Drink. Have sex. Be a man,” the book notes. Does alcohol also resist that mandate?
Yes, it both resists and accepts it. The culture around alcohol and Western teleology have long insisted that men must drink more to prove their place, but there is also the other side: drinking as a means to shed fear and become fearless. It’s a space you turn into a form of escape, a way not to see things as they are.
-The book also says the author initially did not want to drink to avoid revealing the gay man he was, unrecognized by his peers.
-Yes. Until he realized that heterosexual peers also became a little gay when they drank. It became a space of confusion that benefited him.
“The aunts don’t get violent when you drink; the gay men don’t get violent when we drink. Something is happening here, tied to the permission alcohol gives cis heterosexual men to act freely. It’s a license that has historically justified abuse and machismo, and it’s time to speak plainly about it.”
-The book cites a Pikara article on the relationship between alcohol and gender-based violence, a link that often serves as justification.
Exactly. People may think the impulse is violent, but that’s not accurate. Women don’t become violent when drunk. Gay men don’t suddenly become violent. The permission granted by alcohol to certain men is a license of absolute freedom. For a long time, abuse and domestic violence were excused by drinking problems. It’s a harsh truth, yet it explains a lot. The mandate has been suppressed for a while, and now it seeks to surface because those men feel they deserve vengeance. It’s like they endure every day and now want to fight back.
-Or there are threats to journalists as well.
Exactly, or threats to journalists. There is also a nostalgic idealization of writing when alcohol flows, as if old-style journalism thrived on bars near newspapers, where reporters would drink and dictate to a secretary who would later type frames with the drunk’s words. The reality was unequal, with women reporters bearing the brunt and earning far less than their male counterparts.
-The book notes the author’s use of alcohol as self-sabotage, dispersing good omens and avoiding commitment.
-It is practical and terrifying. It helps avoid real commitment by ensuring one isn’t in good shape to be disappointed.
Now that he no longer drinks, what about fear?
There is no fear. Not because there are no expectations, but because there are none in sight. He publishes a book and prepares a new play, yet he does not plan the future. He focuses on doing his work, reading, researching, and practicing. The future is a mystery, and he has learned not to fear or to become reckless. Perhaps he was always well brought up, and that shapes him still.
-What about the politician who wanted to conquer the skies but ended up opening a bar?
He loves it. A generation of men still dreams of owning a bar. Friends with bars and restaurants know the dream is hellish, and then Pablo Iglesias says he would love to open a bar with friends. What’s next? A rock-and-roll band? He finds it endearing and tender that such a man is following his dreams, and he feels affection for him.
Overall, the interview and the book mix personal experience with social analysis to explore how alcohol intersects with gender, class, sexuality, work, and the search for identity in a modern, fast-paced world. The writing captures a voice that is candid, provocative, and human, inviting readers to reflect on their own relationships with drinking and the pressures of contemporary life.