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SPAIN
- BULLFIGHTS |
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Bullfights are an integral
part of many fiestas. In the
south, especially, any
village that can afford it
will put on a corrida for an
afternoon, while in big
cities like Madrid or
Sevilla, the main festival
times are accompanied by a
week-long (or more) season
of prestige fights.
Los Toros , as
Spaniards refer to
bullfighting, is big
business. It is said that
150,000 people are involved,
in some way, in the
industry, and the top
performers, the matadores
, are major earners, on a
par with the country's
biggest pop stars. There is
some opposition to
the activity from animal
welfare groups but it is not
widespread: if Spaniards
tell you that bullfighting
is controversial, they are
likely to be referring to
practices in the trade. In
recent years, bullfighting
critics (who you will find
on the arts and not the
sports pages of the
newspapers) have been
expressing their perennial
outrage at the widespread
but illegal shaving of
bulls' horns prior to the corrida
. Bulls' horns are as
sensitive as fingernails,
and filing them a few
millimetres deters the
animal from charging; they
affect the bull's balance,
too, further reducing the
danger for the matador
.
Notwithstanding such
abuse (and there is plenty
more), Los Toros
remain popular throughout
the country. To aficionados
(a word that implies more
knowledge and appreciation
than "fan"), the
bulls are a culture and a
ritual - one in which the
emphasis is on the way man
and bull "perform"
together - in which the arte
is at issue rather than
the cruelty. If pressed on
the issue of the slaughter
of an animal, they generally
fail to understand. Fighting
bulls are, they will tell
you, bred for the industry;
they live a reasonable life
before they are killed, and,
if the bullfight went, so
too would the bulls.
If you spend any time at
all in Spain during the season
(which runs from March to
October), you will encounter
Los Toros on a bar TV
- and that will probably
make up your mind whether to
attend a corrida . If
you decide to go, try to see
a big, prestigious event,
where star performers are
likely to despatch the bulls
with "art" and a
successful,
"clean" kill.
There are few sights worse
than a matador making
a prolonged and messy kill,
while the audience whistles
and chucks cushions over the
barrera . If you have
the chance to see one, the
most exciting and skilful
events are those featuring mounted
matadores , or rejoneadores
; this is the oldest form of
corrida , developed
in Andalucía in the
seventeenth century.
Established and popular
matadores include the
veteran Enrique Ponce, César
Rincón, Victor Mendes,
Joselito, Litri, David
"El Rey" Silveti
and José María Manzanares.
Two newer stars are
Sevilla's golden boy,
Antonio Bareas, and the
18-year-old prodigy Julián
"El Juli" López.
Cristina Sánchez, the first
woman to make it into the
top flight for many decades,
retired in 1999, blaming
sexist organizers, crowds
and fellow matadores -
many of whom refused to
appear on the same bill as a
woman. A complete guide to
bullfighting with exhaustive
links can be found at www.mundo-taurino.org
.
The corrida
The corrida begins
with a procession ,
to the accompaniment of a paso
doble by the band.
Leading the procession are
two algauziles or
"constables", on
horseback and in
traditional costume,
followed by the three matadores
, who will each fight two
bulls, and their cuadrillas
, their personal
"team", each
comprising two mounted picadores
and three banderilleros
. At the back are the mule
teams who will drag off
the dead bulls.
Once the ring is empty,
the algauzil opens
the toril (the
bulls' enclosure) and the
first bull appears - a
moment of great physical
beauty - to be
"tested" by the matador
or his banderilleros
using pink and gold capes.
These preliminaries
conducted (and they can be
short, if the bull is
ferocious), the suerte
de picar ensues, in
which the picadores
ride out and take up
position at opposite sides
of the ring, while the
bull is distracted by
other toreros .
Once they are in place,
the bull is made to charge
one of the horses; the picador
drives his short-pointed
lance into the bull's
neck, while it tries to
toss his padded,
blindfolded horse, thus
tiring the bull's powerful
neck and back muscles.
This is repeated up to
three times, until the
horn sounds for the picadores
to leave. Cries of " fuera!
" (out) often greet
the overzealous use of the
lance, for by weakening
the bull too much they
fear the beast will not be
able to put up a decent
fight. For many, this is
the least acceptable stage
of the corrida, and it is
clearly not a pleasant
experience for the horses,
who have their ears
stuffed with oil-soaked
rags to shut out the
noise, and their vocal
cords cut out to render
them mute.
The next stage, the suerte
de banderillas ,
involves the placing of
three sets of banderillas
(coloured sticks with
barbed ends) into the
bull's shoulders. Each of
the three banderilleros
delivers these in turn,
attracting the bull's
attention with the
movement of his own body
rather than a cape, and
placing the banderillas
whilst both he and the
bull are running towards
each other. He then runs
to safety out of the
bull's vision, sometimes
with the assistance of his
colleagues.
Once the banderillas
have been placed, the suerte
de matar begins, and
the matador enters
the ring alone, having
exchanged his pink and
gold cape for the red one.
He (or she) salutes the
president and then
dedicates the bull either
to an individual, to whom
he gives his hat, or to
the audience by placing
his hat in the centre of
the ring. It is in this
part of the corrida
that judgements are made
and the performance is
focused, as the matador
displays his skills on the
(by now exhausted) bull.
He uses the movements of
the cape to attract the
bull, while his body
remains still. If he does
well, the band will start
to play, while the crowd olé
each pass. This stage
lasts around ten minutes
and ends with the kill.
The matador
attempts to get the bull
into a position where he
can drive a sword between
its shoulders and through
to the heart for a coup
de grâce . In
practice, they rarely
succeed in this, instead
taking a second sword,
crossed at the end, to cut
the bull's spinal cord;
this causes instant death.
If the audience are
impressed by the matador
's performance, they will
wave their handkerchiefs
and shout for an award to
be made by the president.
He can award one or both
ears, and a tail - the
better the display, the
more pieces he gets -
while if the matador
has excelled himself, he
will be carried out of the
ring by the crowd, through
the puerta grande ,
the main door, which is
normally kept locked. The
bull, too, may be
applauded for its
performance, as it is
dragged out by the mule
team.
Tickets for corridas
are ?18 and up - much more
for the prime seats and
prestigious fights. The
cheapest seats are gradas
, the highest rows at the
back, from where you can
see everything that
happens without too much
of the detail; the front
rows are known as the barreras
. Seats are also divided
into sol (sun), sombra
(shade), and sol y
sombra (shaded after a
while), though these
distinctions have become
less crucial as more and
more bullfights start
later in the day, at 6 or
7pm, rather than the
traditional 5pm. The sombra
seats are more expensive,
not so much for the
spectators' personal
comfort as the fact that
most of the action takes
place in the shade. On the
way in, you can rent cushions
- two hours sitting on
concrete is not much fun.
Beer and soft drinks are
sold inside.
Anti-bullfight
organizations
Spain's main opposition to
bullfighting is organized
by ADDA (Asociación para
la defensa del animal).
They co-ordinate the
Anti-Bullfight Campaign
(ABC) International and
also produce a quarterly
newsletter in Spanish and
English. Their bilingual
website - intercom.es/adda/
- has information about
international campaigns
and current actions.
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