Gentle readers, this review is rated R for violent and ick-inducing discussion topics!

'Death in the Afternoon' by Ernest Hemingway is a complete dissertation on bullfighting. It covers every aspect: the bullfighters, the killing, the clothes, the instruments, the meaning of bullfighting rituals and words, and of course, the bulls and their upbringing. The edition I read had hundreds of blurry photos (I could not find the edition I checked out from the library on GR, so I selected the edition closest to it). The book also has a large glossary, which I found to be extremely helpful.

There is a section where EH included reactions from various people he had invited to come with him to a bullfight. He was not oblivious to how people were repulsed or hated it. Frankly, I went into this book expecting to be repulsed and disgusted. I love kitties and puppies, and I hate Chinese meat market methods, as well as American ones, and I want the whales and seals to be left alone. I'm a city kid. One of my parents grew up on a farm and the other on a primitive island, so I heard hunting and butchery stories, as well.

Ernest Hemingway was drawn to the sport of bullfighting by the ritual in killing bulls, I think, emphasize on 'ritual'. Ritual DOES lend some dignity and definitely a lot of control and ceremony. The last half of Chapter twelve in the book is a discussion with an old lady about EH's knowledge of dead, and rotting, soldiers killed, no rituals involved, on the battlefield: "A Natural History of the Dead." After a vivid and accurate and satiric rendition of wartime mules, injuries, mutilated soldiers, and tired doctors, EH ends the chapter with these words, "Madame, it is always a mistake to know an author."

Disturbing as death is to contemplate, even worse is how Humanity reacts to it when face to face with Death. I think ritualized death may be a way to make death less horrific and to make us vulnerable humans feel safer. Death is definitely the destiny of every man, woman and child. Have you ever seen a dead body? I have. Ever see a car wreck, a plane or train crash, a bombing attack, or a war battle? If you dare, most events are on video somewhere on the Internet, if you've never personally been involved. The random executions of innocent people make the ritualizing of it attractive (religion and video games are obvious offshoots). It feels like Death can be controlled, beautified, made emotionally acceptable through cultural sharing and distancing. Men can be shown as heroic, brave, talented and expert instead of as brutal uncontrolled butchers and victims of happenstance and chance.

Animals are unaware of the possibility of their Death; but humans know, and supposedly, humans should know better because we know...instead, if we aren't shoving it under the rug, we are moralizing and making philosophy on beautified imagery in obfuscated conversations. How inadequate this actually satisfies many people can be measured by how many young men volunteer for military service to find out: 1. What death is, and; 2. How they will react to it.

In my opinion, most women are fools in discussing actual death. Many women can provide a comforting bosom to cry on, but nothing substantial as far as 'getting it'. I've been part of female coffee klatches where I have heard the most inane, brain dead and clueless pap about Death.

People are all over the map in contemplation of Death, but despite the variety of reactions and thought, it is damn predictable on the surface. There are those who are 'been there, done that' and while they are not thinking alike on how they respond to their experience, we should give them the respect of knowledge which most of us do not have.

Death is often discussed by innocents who've never seen it, but who think they know enough about it to be knowledgeable - they are wrong. There is a definite 'before' and 'after' experience of death. Before seeing death, all is imagination and guesswork only; afterwords, surprising and weird emotions rise to the surface of consciousness which many hesitate to reveal.

Real Death has a way of smashing every cultural shaping of it. From my own personal experience, Death is both an individual and cultural event, and it changes you. One can share the cultural recognition of how you are changed; but only authors appear to have the courage to reveal the personal intellectual traumas. EH saw hundreds of bloated bodies in different stages of decomposition He drove mangled but still living soldiers to Hospital, and he saw mules and animals, innocent of course by nature, murdered and mauled. Bullfighting must have been a relief and a safe way to experience the 'rush' of death.

I can reveal one of near-Death's effects is that of a HUGE, overwhelming 'rush'. In one of my experiences, I was walking around during night where there were no lights. Suddenly out of the blackness a big heavy train was speeding by 6 inches from my nose. I hadn't heard it or known it was coming. I didn't know I was near train tracks. It must have been going 60 miles per hour as it was a blur, and a wind sucking at my clothes and hair. Instead of fear, I felt an elation beyond description, a huge excitement at having almost been killed but having been lucky to not have taken that extra step onto the tracks a moment before. Instead, I had paused, noticing the crickets had gone silent.

https://youtu.be/B17vGoOWI5A

The above link should lead you to a YouTube video showing a bull fight. I watched this with renewed interest, sparked by Ernest Hemingway's book 'Death in the Afternoon'. While I still think it is barbaric, I no longer think it is obscene.


Ok, WARNING WARNING WARNING! The link below is to a truly obscene video, full of animal cruelty. WARNInG! This video is truly horrific, but it is not the worst I've seen. Seriously. This YouTube video is a look at the first steps about making hamburger - getting old and sick cows to rendering plants. There are other videos which I could not watch beyond a few seconds. Lots and lots of videos exist of living cows being tortured at rendering plants everywhere on the internet. There are also videos of cows in Europe being horribly abused in transport - ship, truck, etc. - on being pushed off or on ships, trucks.

http://youtu.be/CrxvxewC-gA


The bullfight kills the Bos primigenius species with some dignity. It appears we kill our meat with cruel depravity and sneering laughter. I now find the moralizing over bullfights disingenuous.


The link below is everything about cattle you ever wanted to know.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cattle


I changed my opinion about bullfighting after doing some thinking and research. Yes, it's a gratuitous and unnecessary display of animal death - but it is a surprisingly respectful killing. I'm sure many of the spectators are not completely aware of the meanings meant by the rituals (how many of us utilize the internet or non-fiction books to research topics regularly - religious Americans, for example, in tests about Christianity, average a score at 30% knowledgeable about their own faith). But in my opinion, given how brutal many deaths are, how sanctimonious we are about some deaths and yet we completely tolerate or look the other way on other unjust or horrific deaths, and the fact most cattle end up dead before we eat them as steaks and hamburger, I've decided I'm ok with bullfighting, if not the obscene avidity of fans. I watched the YouTube videos, and IMHO, given current butchery methods in regular cattle-killing factories (also see the videos of how developed nations kill pigs, chickens, rabbits, etc., bullfighting is low on the scale of animal cruelty.

Most cattle are destined for butchery. Most cattle die in undignified and drawn-out painful deaths, cruel and unnecessary. In comparison, bullfighting seems to me to allow some cattle more dignity, exploitive or not. I don't know if there are educational classes available to bullfighting aficionados so that it isn't only about sick emotional satisfaction, but the rituals, if adhered to, guarantee a respectful dance of death between the matador and the bull. EH gives a clear, reasoned description of the emotional reasons for bullfighting and also makes clear the intellectualized rituals which elevate this particular blood sport beyond, say, deer hunting or wild horse round-ups, or wolf/wild animal-by-helicopter killing or tying down a tiger to a stake so the 'brave' hunter can walk up to it and put a bullet in its body (not the head -that's needed for hanging on the wall).

Still, I'll never ever go see a bullfight for real. City kid, me. I can trap rats and step on insects and bury household pets, but not without squeamishness.

P.s. Hemingway also displays his usual bigoted inner voice, i.e, homophobic and woman hating.

Winter 2020
College reads (I can't believe I had to read a passionate text about bullfighting. F*ing college, amirite? I've hated touradas since I was a child, they are an example of traditions that should end, that not all rituals are worthwhile or positive)

There is an honesty to Hemingway's writing that I love. The countless iterations on similar themes and descriptions, such as, the technical use of the muleta or cape were in themselves a ritual that matched the ritual of the bullfight, which in turn reflected religious rituals. We do rituals because not everything can be absorbed or encapsulated in one go. By the end, you are left so familiar with the mechanics, artistry, bravery and more that you want to see it in action, as least I did. I felt I knew it as intimately by the the conclusion as if I had been to bullfighting for years. The understanding of bulls behaviour was very deep. Death is part of life and I felt that protesting against the cruelty misses a deeper truth and is a denial of the truth that animals are simply not human beings; we must see the bull as a mortal bull, not as a projection of our own fears of the reality and finality if death. The line about how sad it was that one day the spectator would die and never be able to see a bullfight is poignant about all those things we love in life that we one day will no longer be able to do.

Like anything by Hemingway, it’s very well written, but holy cow do I now know more about bullfighting than I ever could have desired! This book should have been an article.

This is a work of non-fiction,which is all about Hemingway's obsession with bullfighting and he goes into considerable detail about its various aspects.

For me,personally,it was a difficult book to read as I consider bullfighting something very cruel.The sight of death to please the crowd ! I skimmed through the book.

Hemingway goes into a lot of technicalities of what the bullfighter needs to do.At times he refers to him bluntly as "the killer" and a great killer must love death.Bullfighting in Hemingway's view can only go on in a country which loves death.

He is disappointed that there are few killers in his day who can kill cleanly and can be called great.He talks about the famous bullfighters of the day including some who died.

Hemingway is not too concerned with what happens to the bull or the bullfighter,but he seems much more concerned about the horses used in bullfights which could get killed by the bull.

During that era,the bullfighters even had to travel from one bullfight to the next by road.And even before they could rest properly,had to fight again !

Then he offers advice on when to go to Spain to watch a bullfight and what to drink.He even talks about Spanish whores whom he doesn't find beautiful.

There is plenty more but I couldn't read each and every word of this book.Maybe it's great for afficionados of bullfighting,but I'm not of them.Hence the two star rating.

Reading it,I was reminded of a movie on bullfighting I watched some years ago.Titled Blood and Sand,it captures the cruelty and senselessness of bullfighting really well.A skilled matador,after defeating several bulls,meets his own sad end while still very young.

I was thinking of bullfighting and of the bull cults that have existed since ancient times. It started with the Egyptian cult of Apis, of which the Golden Calf at the giving of the Ten Commandments was part. Then there was the Minotaur, Nandi the mount of Shiva, the various Celtic bull cults and others widespread through the world up to medieval times. In the present day, the baptismal font of the Mormons stands upon 12 bulls (derived from Solomon's bronze basin no doubt). Perhaps bullfighting, man against what is arguably the primal male animal figure, Theseus against the Minotaur, is a survival of those cults, a ceremony of worship or sacrifice where the bull must die for man to reign supreme. But this isn't mentioned in this or any other book I've read on bullfighting.

The best thing about this book is the wonderfully evocative title. The content doesn't live up to it. Hemingway obviously loved bullfighting and if he'd hadn't been so old and out of shape when he discovered it, would certainly have tried to be a matador himself. As it was, he couldn't so he immersed himself in the culture and wrote about it in this book.

The book has three distinct sections, which although distinct he does jump back and forth to information already imparted. The first section is about the horses and bullfighting. He repeats a lot of crap that he has heard. Things like all the horses are killed. That injured horses have their bellies stuffed with straw and sawdust and then sewn up so they can continue to fight on. So they are not blinkered but blindfoled, made deaf, have their vocal cords cut out and their nostrils glued up but are still in fighting condition! I did some research on this and it does seem that an awful lot of horses died in the corrida back then, still now but not so much. However there is trade in buying ex-bullfighting picador horses and retraining them for dressage which they apparently excel at.

Since the matador is responsible for all expenses for his team, human and equine, it is hardly likely they would be keen to sacrifice highly-trained animals and would obviously have done what they could to preserve life and reuse them.

The second and longest section is the retelling and explanation of a bullfight in an extremely patronising way to an old woman who sits in a cafe and lusts after the matadors. This device is thoroughly annoying and eventually irritates Hemingway enough to just dismiss it, not even really 'her'. The most interesting part of this section is about the bulls, their breeding and their selection. What was particularly interesting is how bulls are bred to be small and weak although brave so that the bullfighters can handle them. Or at least handle them after the picadors have thrust their lances into the neck muscles to weaken the animal, stop him being able to fully raise his head and to enrage him with pain. Doesn't seem like a fair fight does it?

The last section which can easily be skipped and I wish I had, was a long list of the matadors extant in Heminway's day along with a description of their virtues or otherwise.

Although this is, in many ways, the best written of the books about bullfighting I've read, Death and the Sun: A Matador's Season in the Heart of Spain is very informative and quite beautiful.

I am no more pro or anti-bullfighting than I was before I read the book. The weakening of the bull has always upset me, far more than the idea of a ballet drawn around death. I don't know if I would go and see a fight given the opportunity, but I might. If only for the marvellous suits of light, Ora Plata: Embroidered Costumes of the Bullfight.

This spoiler and the next were written when I was reading the book.

A customer came into the bookshop who actually went to a bullfight at Aranjuez Corrida outside Madrid (in 1947. He's 86, very old, still travelling). He was describing it to me and it sounds a lot less bloody and a lot more exciting than the articles I have read. When I say 'less bloody' I don't mean it wasn't cruel but that the horses were not gored, there were no entrails like ribbons, and the bull could lift his head and charge. He had also seen cows, which are used for training and considerably more dangerous than bulls because of their different horns and different ways of charging, but apparently you can't really 'play' with cows. They just want to hit the person, not necessarily gore them so they are head-up, rather than the bulls going for the blood head-down.

Other books on bullfighting I've read are
Ora Plata: Embroidered Costumes of the Bullfight
Running with the Bulls: Fiestas, Corridas, Toreros, and An American's Adventure in Pamplona,
and the fantastic Death and the Sun: A Matador's Season in the Heart of Spain which I didn't review (as yet). A 5-star book about the business of bullfighting, from the breeding of the bulls through to what happens to matadors that live long enough to retire. It was a book of depth, introspection, that made me think way outside the usual knee-jerk, 'but it's so cruel' box.

Hemingway at his dullest. Glad I listened to it instead of read it. Still kinda interesting though

Really !
This is not enjoyable and I don’t see the point a ramble
Hemingway get a grip
Oh no you can’t - and you didn’t
Blood

This is the fourth of Hemingway's books and the one that shows the most passion and knowledge. It reads more like a documentary than a novel although the grammar is sometimes pretty bad. One sentence lasting four pages? His occasional off topic forays I do not understand their place. It might be my ignorance and if it is I apologise.

More non-fiction than a novel, I found reading Death in the Afternoon to be tedious and a somewhat unpleasant experience. Perhaps my expectations were too high. While I knew the content would explore bullfighting, I made an uninformed assumption that there would actually be a storyline here instead of an in-depth technical orientation to bullfighting. Other Hemingway works have been much more enjoyable for me.

I am a long-time fan of Hemingway, and this book has probably been on my shelf for nearly forty years. It came down during the virus. His prose is always good, and there are passages about writing that are brilliant. But I find much of the book tedious.

This book is better in what it intends to do rather than what it achieves.
One should think that of all writers, Hemingway would be the ideal person to delve into the beauty and majesty of bull-fighting, and he certainly was knowledgible. The issue for me comes for several angles.

First, the book is in desperate need of structuring, and the aid of a skillful editor to help guide Hemingway. Also, there is a lot of critiquing of specific fighters that are repetative and mean nothing to those nowadays. In fact this is an issue for any contemporary reader: much of the book is designed as a travel guide for Americans or ex-patriots at the time of its publication. The book would have been better and have had longevity if it was instead a poetic and heroic study of those who fight (human and animal) and the themes of why these acts are important. There are brief moments of such discussion but they come across as broad statements that are not investigated. As detailed as he gets about the elements of the fights, what he somehow misses is the feeling of the movements and (this is a big one) what it is about the fights that are so entrancing. He writes from that point of view that you must agree with him and if you don't than you aren't worth his time. In fact, he should be able to convert those who wouldn't expect to like the subject. He very briefly touches on such connections as how bull-fighting is a metaphor for art and Spain itself, though I wish he worked this more thoroughly

In addition to all the above there is the big issue of the narrator's voice, i.e. Hemingway himself. His voice is pompous, holier than thou, and extremely sexist. There were many times while reading it I felt certain I was reading a parody of Hemingway rather than the true article.

All this being said, the book did make me interested in seeing a bull fight, which is much of the point of it. The problem was that this interest started early and unfortunately started to dwindle as the book went along.