"Wine is one of the most civilized things in the world and one of the natural things of the world that has been brought to the greatest perfection, and it offers a greater range for enjoyment and appreciation than, possibly, any other purely sensory thing which may be purchased. One can learn about wines and pursue the education of ones palate with great enjoyment all of a lifetime, the palate becoming more educated and capable of appreciation and you having constantly increasing enjoyment and appreciation of wine even though the kidneys may weaken, the big toe become painful, the finger joints stiffen, until finally, just when you love it the most you are finally forbidden wine entirely."

What an odd piece of literature. Hemingway's labour of love dives deeply into the sport of bullfighting. Part history, part travelogue, part guide, and strangely, part narrative. The recurring character of the old woman is particularly interesting. She often gave voice to my thoughts, critiquing the writer for a boring chapter with no dialogue. I don't know what she, or I, were expecting. The book is, after all, non-fiction. Hemingway's genius does shine through, and the best parts of this book come in his musings about food, drink, writing, and life in general.

Hemingway ocupa un lugar especial en la lista de la gente que he leído. Puede decirse que tanto "El viejo y el mar" como "Por quién doblan las campanas" (una de las novelas más bellas y fuertes que he leído) supieron orientar mis primeros pasos en el mundo de la lectura. Desgraciadamente, no siempre todo lo que se muestra a los ojos brilla con la fuerza del oro. En este caso, "Muerte en la tarde" (que, dicho sea, es el primer libro que he leído de él en inglés) me pareció un libro pobre: un relato que no termina de definirse entre diario de corridas, crónica gonzo y folletín de turismo. De hecho, me entristeció bastante leer a este Hemingway: un tipo triste, sin gracia...sin mucho para decir al lector universal (porque, tal vez, al amante de los toros este libro puede llegar a fascinarle. A pesar de su precariedad narrativa).

Si bien soy de los que considera que la literatura debe disfrutarse independientemente de los principios morales que un libro o un autor defiendan (debiendo siempre evaluarse una obra en términos narrativos), si un escritor expone sus argumentos y pretende convencer a alguien de su postura, el texto se convierte en un diálogo en el que el lector debe asumir un rol muchísimo más activo. En este sentido, las premisas de Hemingway para la defensa de las corridas de toros (pobres en términos morales, interesantes en cuanto a datos e información sobre esa forma de asesinato) me enfrentaron a alguien casi tan prejuicioso y provinciano como Jack Kerouac. Con todo y que Kerouac fue a México de vacaciones y creyó conocer toda América bajo la bandera de franjas rojas y blancas y estrellas sobrepuestas al fondo azul.

Ojalá lo que vuelva a leer de Hemingway esté a la par de "El viejo y el mar" o de "Por quién doblan las campanas", libros que siento cada vez más distantes cuando menciono al escritor americano y espero a la primera idea sobre su literatura.

Been so Hemingway pilled since I’ve started reading more that I’m travelling to Spain and doing the Pyrenees and Pamplona.

This book is interesting to read only if you go looking for it. The sun also rises is much better but the technical appreciation over the art of bullfighting in Hemingway prose is enjoyable as well.

Im appreciative that bullfighting culture still exists

he clearly did not know how to write that book nor how he could put it together. I love it.

I am surprised at how deeply I have enjoyed this book. Hemmingway would seek to persuade us that a bullfight is simply a ballet with an exceptionally violent ending, and it is a testament to the quality of his prose that I almost believe him.

It must be noted though that the sections that actually discuss bullfighting are the least interesting part.

Friends will be pleased to learn that I have finished this and will therefore probably stop talking about it soon.

Lest pga. research. Hatet den litt. Den er utdatert og monoton og macho.

La descrizione minuziosa, maniacale e spesso straziante della “fiesta” nasconde (come un buon lavoro di ‘cappa’ e ‘muleta’ nasconde la vista al toro) un meraviglioso inno d’amore alla Spagna.
Mi è piaciuto molto.

La prohibición de las corridas de toros en Catalunya no fue una noticia que me desagradara especialmente. Me parece un acto retrógado, aunque por otra parte siempre he intuido que en ese espectáculo medieval hay una ciencia, una cultura más o menos interesante y, si uno es tan ignoto como yo en la materia, después de leer este libro sin duda mejorará su percepción a ese respecto.

Ahora bien, es cierto que hay partes pintorescas dónde dan ganas de otorgarle mejor valoración, pero también lo es que las páginas aburridas son multitud. Cuando se pone en plan guía turística resulta abominable, sus digresiones infinitas son plomizas y caprichosas, los ajustes de cuentas con otros escritores sobran todos, los juicios de valor a otras personas son de una acritud garbancera exagerada, cuando quiere describir al detalle los movimientos y las figuras que adoptan los toreros resulta anodindo, las reflexiones metafísicas de barra de bar y sus generaliaciones son simplonas y, más en general, en los últimos capítulos uno se siente como un toro (bravo o manos, eso da igual) con cuatro mil banderillas encima.

Y el editor tendría que haberse leído el libro antes de publicarlo. De haberlo ojeado, habría descubierto su imperiosa necesidad de sintentizarse más y reiterar menos. Habría hecho su trabajo, vaya. Obviamente no se gana el Nobel por emitir guías turísticas para americanos pijos y ociosos. Olvidemos que este libro existe.

Chapter 20:
"If I could have made this enough of a book it would have had everything in it. (...) It should make clear the change in the country as you come down out of the mountains and into Valencia in the dusk on the train holding a rooster for a woman who was bringing it to her sister; (...) No. It is not enough of a book, but still there were a few things to be said. There were a few practical things to be said."

n  A live pelican is an interesting, amusing, and sympathetic bird, though if you handle him he will give you lice; but a dead pelican looks very silly.n

Lotz: Hello, everyone. Welcome back to book club. Did everyone finish our book?

All: Yes, yes.

Lotz: Good. Now did anybody like it?

Doctor: I thought it was dreadful the way he talks about the bulls.

Lotz: Ok, you can go then.

Businessman: Really, this whole business sounds crude and wasteful.

Lotz: You are dismissed.

Shopkeeper: I’d never let my children read this sort of thing.

Lotz: Off you go. But did anybody like it? Anyone at all?

Old Lady: I quite liked it.

Lotz: Ok, come with me, then, and we’ll talk about it.

Old Lady: Alright, sir. But tell me. Why are you writing your book review like this? Didn’t Hemingway do this in the book?

Lotz: Yes, Madame, he certainly did. I thought it would be fun to imitate him.

Old Lady: All imitations only serve to show the imitator is a failure. Didn’t Hemingway say that?

Lotz: Something like it. Well, tell me then. What did you like about the book?

Old Lady: It’s hard to say. To be honest, I thought I’d hate it. But there was something really charming about the way Hemingway talks about bullfighting. I can't exactly put my finger on it.

Lotz: That’s how it always is with Hemingway. You think he will be violent, boorish, brutal, vulgar, perhaps even vaguely immoral. But for a certain subset of people, there is nothing at all vulgar in it; only artistry and truth. And you can’t know what kind of person you are until you read him.

Old Lady: Didn’t Hemingway say almost the same exact thing about bullfighting? You’re ripping him off again.

Lotz: Madame, ripping authors off is one of my pastimes. But it is indeed worth pointing out that whenever Hemingway describes hunting or bullfighting or one of his manly pursuits, he is also giving a metaphorical description of his own writing.

Old Woman: Many people have said this before. You’re a poor critic.

Lotz: True enough, Madame. But did you realize this as you read?

Old Woman: I admit I didn’t, but now that you point it out it is all very obvious. I heard it before, years ago.

Lotz: Yes, the way he goes on and on about how the bullfighter must be brave and honest, must be simple and straightforward, must not cheat his crowd, must not use any tricks, must put himself in real danger.

Old Woman: Spare me this analysis.

Lotz: I apologize, Madame. But tell me, are you now curious to see a bullfight?

Old Woman: I suppose so, just to see if I can pick up on any of the things Hemingway talked about. All the artistry and so forth.

Lotz: Perhaps we can go together, Madame.

Old Woman: With you? I’d rather not.

Lotz: I understand, Madame. I’m curious to know, was there anything you didn’t like about the book?

Old Woman: Yes, I admit that I got rather tired of Hemingway’s descriptions of techniques and of the careers of various bullfighters by the end of it. He went on for rather too long about how bulls have to be brave, how men have to be brave, how everybody and everything has to be brave, and he ended up repeating himself pretty often.

Lotz: You’re right about this, Madame.

Old Woman: And I get the creeps when he talks about how killing is an art.

Lotz: For Hemingway, the moment of death was the simplest and the truest of all moments. You see, Hemingway loved things that were simple and true, but he thought that some things were so simple and so true that most people can’t face them and so can’t adequately write about them.

Old Woman: Yes, yes, spare me any more of this dramatic criticism. I am going. I haven’t time for your puerile book reviews. Goodbye.

She is gone. This review is almost over. If I was up to writing a proper review, I would tell you about how it felt to read this book sitting in a café in Madrid, sipping on a vermouth and gnawing on a bocadillo with chorizo, and I would tell you about the motion sickness as I read this book on the bus ride to Manzanares el Real, about looking out the window and seeing a statue of a matador standing in front of a town’s bull ring, and about the hard, rugged landscape that went by the window, with its rocky hills and empty plains, and about the conversations I’ve had with Spaniards here about whether or not the bullfight is ethical, and I would tell you about visiting the bullring at Ronda after seeing the cliffs and the green countryside, and buying the book in the museum’s gift shop. If this was a proper review, I would tell you all of these things.

¿Ensayo novelado o novela ensayada? En esta obra Hemingway despliega todo su conocimiento del mundo del toro para explicar de forma estructurada las diferentes suertes de que consta la fiesta nacional.

Entrevela de cuando en cuando diálogos imaginarios con una señora que hace preguntas al autor con respecto al mundo de los toreros, a la vez que va desgranando los diferentes elementos que entran en juego en la preparación de los toreros, la elección de los toros por parte de los ayundates, para acabar en la corrida de toros, sus fases y como los diferentes toreros de los años 30 las realizaban.

Mención aparte merece el último capitulo del libro en el que describe de forma rápida, y casi sin querer, muchos matices, momentos, gentes y situaciones que a su parecer definen a nuestro país, del cual él era ferviente admirador. Solo por ese último capitulo merece la pena llegar al final de esta interesante obra.

“If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about, he may omit things that he knows and the reader...will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them.”



Death in the Afternoon can be seen as Ernest Hemingway’s attempt to equate the ritualized dance of the matador with that of the writer. Maybe not all writers, but one very specific writer. It’s significant, I think, that unlike his story in The Sun Also Rises, Hemingway is presenting the ritual of bullfighting strictly as nonfiction. In the work, the bullfighter, the bull and spectators all have parts to play in what is essentially an unfolding tragedy. Each contribute to the meaning produced by the spectacle. Hemingway pays a great deal of attention to the style of the matadors, whether they are brave and take risks and what price they are willing to pay for their art.

In Death in the Afternoon, readers can learn quite a lot about bullfighting (the phases of the bullfight as well as the history and pageantry of this violent sport) but, to me, what’s more interesting is what there is to be learned about Hemingway and his views on the writer. 4.25 Stars.