Create fame and go to sleep
That this is a proverb of oral transmission makes its origin uncertain. They say that it was heard for the first time in an interlude in the 16th century, alluding to a character who had become famous for a trifle… Because fame is like that, as it is clarified in the dictionary of Spanish synonyms of Don Roque de Barcia!:
“It is one thing to create fame, and another to create celebrity. To become famous, it is enough for fame to spread our name. To become famous it is necessary that our name run with public applause”… Well, well, thank you, thank you very much!… The thing is that simple: a thief or a known murderer is famous, because fame heralds his misdeeds; but it is not famous, because public opinion does not celebrate it… Do you want names? Nero is famous, but history abhors him. Socrates is famous, because the world reveres him…
This well-known phrase has been read more than once: “The fame of Don Quixote de la Mancha is universal.” Big mistake. Don Quixote’s is celebrity, not fame. As well as that of its author, Miguel de Cervantes, who without knowing the magnitude of what he had created, fell asleep the dream of the centuries and there is no one to wake him from that glory…
Create fame and go to sleep is a way of saying that once you create a certain reputation, that reputation will precede you and it will take time and effort to change it again, turn it around… So to pray that this reputation does not keep you awake at night…
In his song “The Bad Reputation”, the great Georges Brassens complained: “In my town without pretense, I have a bad reputation, that I moved or that I stayed, they consider me I don’t know what”… “Everyone points the finger at me, except the one-armed… who lost it”…
Never mind, Brassens, you are not famous, you are famous!…
