The following text is excerpted from the growing collection of sheets and pages that I have been trying to put together for several years now. It is an idea I conceived quite some time ago: “bringing together in one place” a set of etiquette rules and a series of personal experiences. I hope you will be as fascinated as I am by this extraordinary character: The Martiniano.
Antonio
I felt it appropriate to share a few lines written by one of the legendary figures of bar culture, not just in Italy, Mauro Lotti. These few lines, which serve as an introduction to the menu of the Gran Bar inside the Grand Hotel in Rome, refer to the kind of customer I always wished I could serve over the years in the various venues where I worked. Perhaps I met him, or perhaps I didn’t. It is nicer to think I was fortunate enough to know people who embodied certain aspects of this figure. I like the idea of sharing the description of this person with you because, in some ways, it reflects how I feel on those very rare occasions when I walk into a bar. I admit modesty has never been my strong suit, but since we are among a few, highly select close friends, I can afford this and, as you will read, much more.
Yes, after so many years spent among freezing ice, smoky atmospheres, and sparkling glasses filled with gin and lemon (I could have written champagne, which would have certainly sounded more… but the truth is that most of the patrons in the venues where I worked lacked the nobility, both in their wallets and their palates, to appreciate such products) or Cuba Libres, I realized that it is no longer my world, and so I like to savor my occasional appearances. But let us not wander off and instead return to the Martiniano: my dear female friends, how easy it would be to fall for someone like him, and my dear male friends, how happy we would be to resemble him, even just a little.
What did I learn from the Martiniano? Discretion, an unforced smile, a calm tone of voice, and the determination to always seek what fully satisfies my needs—otherwise… water, always ice-cold, of course.
The Martini established itself between the 1920s and the euphoria of the post-WWII era. Gin and dry vermouth, growing progressively drier over time, laid down the law and made history. A history that reached its golden age in the 1960s: great jazz and Latin American rhythms danced to until dawn. I remember the bars of Manhattan—as spectacular as they were discreet.
The Martini was served to the insinuating notes of Gerry Mulligan’s sax or the 5/4 time signature of Dave Brubeck. I remember the Nouvelle Vague making cinema more irreverent with the blessing of Jean-Paul Belmondo, and the suggestions of Humphrey Bogart, Somerset Maugham, Rita Hayworth, and Tennessee Williams. Above all, Hemingway, from Harry’s Bar in Venice and Torcello to El Floridita in Havana. In this last bar, a stool is still reserved for Papa Ernest, as if the writer might walk in at any moment to drink his Daiquiris and El Presidente.
It is under the influence of these exceptional personalities that a new breed was born: that of the Martiniani.
You can recognize a Martiniano instantly. By the way he walks and makes his entrance into a bar—and never just any bar, or one with an anonymous atmosphere. Even the shoes he wears are soberly appropriate and, above all, comfortable, just like his jacket.
He wears the colors of nature, with shirts that are never starched. His tie makes an appearance, but subtly. When he speaks, he always looks you in the eye… a man of class, then, but neither superficial nor vain; a true man.
When he senses that the bartender might not be up to his demanding drinking standards, he does not risk his own or anyone else’s embarrassment; instead, he prefers to elegantly ask for a glass of water… ice-cold, of course.
Whatever the glass may be, he holds it by the stem with nonchalance. The Martiniano knows the secret of smiling and making others smile without resorting to the latest joke, gossip, or flattery…
And his female companion belongs to that select, rather exclusive group of ladies who know how to seduce with elegance, rather than being merely decorative. Were it otherwise, he would not have chosen her.
Mauro Lotti