EAt the end of the year, the Spanish gossip magazine “Hola!” reported that the Spanish-Filipino society lady Isabel Preysler, 71 years old, had split from the famous Peruvian writer and Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa (86). “Oh,” one thought, “what a pity! But somehow it wasn’t the right thing either.” That it wasn’t the right thing was just a guess; and for whom of the two it was not the right thing, in what way it was not the right thing and with what consequences it was not the right thing – at first no thoughts came to mind at all. Then the look fell on “Hola!” again. Covering those considered to be high society, the royal family, nobility, dapper bullfighters, and talk show and media celebrities, the weekly magazine featured Isabel Preysler’s words in large letters on the front page: “Mario and I, we have decided to end our relationship for good.”
“Mario and I” were Mario and Isabel – at gala events, opera premieres or acts of the Royal Spanish Academy, of which he is a member. At photo ops for the colorful leaves. At high society parties. He in a suit or tails, she in stunning clothes. He with the crumbling remnants of a certain Playboy beauty of yesteryear, she elegant, lithe, adept at the art of self-representation, mother of Latino pop singer Enrique Iglesias and a daughter who has also achieved lasting presence in the gossip media. For almost eight years, these two elderly celebrities reigned as the second most famous lovers in Spain, behind King Felipe and Letizia. And now: “Mario and I, we have decided . . .”
