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In the tradition of Hemingway's Death in the Afternoon, Edward Lewine presents an inspired account of bullfighting culture in modern-day Spain. Lewine brilliantly captures the romance and machismo associated with the art of bullfighting, as well as the addictive adrenaline rush that persistently beckons spectators and matadors to the bullring. He spends a season traveling with the celebrated matador Francesco Rivera Ordonez -- the great-grandson of the bullfighter who was the inspiration for Hemingway's Pedro Romero in The Sun Also Rises -- and reveals a Spain few outsiders have seen. Death and the Sun is an illuminating portrayal of a country, its people, and their passion for this beautiful yet deadly spectacle.

Death and the Sun

A Matador's Season in the Heart of Spain

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By Edward Lewine

Houghton Mifflin Company

Copyright © 2007 Edward Lewine
All right reserved.
ISBN: 9780618872305

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1 A Man, a Bull, a Small Town

Pozoblanco, September 26, 1984. They couldn't see more than a few feet
ahead of them. Within the obsessive compass of the headlights the black
road uncoiled, split by the white line, stretching and bending with the land.
The BMW sedan was bone white, built heavy, well suited to drone out the
thousands of miles a top matador must travel from town to town, from
bullfight to bullfight, from February to October, through the eight-month
marathon of the bullfighting season. Sometime early that morning—later
documents would differ on the exact time—the car pulled into a small town
and stopped before a building with the words Hotel Los Godos spelled out
over the doorway. The driver got out, opened one of the rear doors, and
prodded the shoulder of the man who lay asleep in the back seat.
"Paco," the driver said. "We've arrived."
His full name was Francisco Rivera y Pérez, but he was best
known as Paquirri, a variant of Paco, which is a nickname for Francisco. This
Paco, Francisco, Paquirri, whatever you wish to call him, was a bullfighter—
in Spanish, a torero. More precisely he was a matador, the category of
bullfighter who stars in the bullfight, employs a team of five assistant
bullfighters, and finishes each performance by facing the bull alone, playing it
with a red cape, and killing it with a sword. The most successful matadors
are rich and famous entertainers, like professional athletes or movie stars. It
is a hard trade. The elite minority of matadors who work regularly tend to end
up in the hospital for a few weeks each season, but at least they work at
their chosen profession. The rest of Spain's matadors spend their time in
cafés, waiting for their cell phones to chime with an offer of a bullfight
somewhere.
Paquirri never had that problem. He spent many years at the top,
as a sought-after performer who by the end of his career commanded ten
thousand dollars a bullfight, more than any other matador of the time. Paquirri
was also a celebrity to nonbullfighting fans, thanks to two high-profile
marriages: the first to Carmen Ordóñez, daughter of the legendary matador
Antonio Ordóñez; the second to Isabel Pantoja, a curvy pop star. Paquirri
drove the women crazy. He was dark, with ice-blue eyes, high cheekbones,
and dimples. He was also a classic tough guy. He could be private, stern,
quiet, independent, and full of pride, but he also took pleasure in horses and
running and open fields, and was a fierce and loyal friend. He adored each of
his wives in her time and always adored his sons: Francisco and Cayetano
from his first wife, and Francisco José from his second.
Paquirri's life was a constant struggle. He was born poor in a
small town at the southern tip of Spain, near the port city of Cádiz, and was
given his nickname by his father, a failed torero who encouraged his sons to
fulfill his bullfighting dreams. Lacking the natural grace that has been the
basis of so many matadors' careers, Paquirri worked and studied and bled,
literally, until he had forged himself into a technical master of his craft. He
took the alternativa—the ceremony that elevates an apprentice matador to full
rank—on August 11, 1966, and sweated for years to gain and then maintain
the respect of the small cartel of bullring operators, talent agents, and
newspaper critics who control bullfighting, until the mid-1970s when his
career came together and he rose to be Spain's leading matador for six or
seven years.
By 1984, however, Paquirri was slowing down. He would appear in
just forty-six bullfights that season, a full twenty-six fewer than the most
active matador of that year; he was not contracted for a number of the top
bullfighting festivals, and to make matters worse he was starting to look fat.
His own father had told him he was too heavy to be safe in the ring. "Next
year I'm retiring to my ranch," Paquirri had begun to say. "Then I'm going to
invite my friends and cut the pigtail." (Until the 1970s most matadors grew a
small pigtail at the base of their skulls as a professional mark. Today they
wear fake pigtails on bullfight days, but cutting the pigtail is still the final
symbolic act of the matador's career.)
Paquirri had not planned to end the 1984 season in Pozoblanco.
He was supposed to finish up the day before in the city of Logroño. Then in
midsummer the promoter of the Pozoblanco ring called him up and twisted
his arm and Paquirri agreed to appear there. As it turned out, the bullfight in
Logroño on September 25 went well, and Paquirri drove all night to reach
Pozoblanco and tumbled into his hotel bed. He awoke about noon and
wandered down to the lobby, where he invited his assistant bullfighters for
lunch. This was unusual. Paquirri tended to keep to himself before bullfights,
but he was in an uncharacteristically good mood that morning. The work and
worry of the season, and maybe of his career, were about to end. "What a
great season we've had," Paquirri was overheard saying. "Not one injury
among us!"

The bulls used in bullfights are descended from an ancient strain of wild bull
that roamed Spain in prehistoric times. They are bred for beauty, size,
strength, speed, and ferocity, and raised semiwild on special ranches whose
names and reputations are well known to bullfighting fans. The six bulls used
in Paquirri's bullfight in Pozoblanco came from the respected Sayalero y
Bandrés ranch, but they were a scrawny group, the end-of-season dregs of
the herd. One of them in particular looked awful. This bull's name was
Avispado, and twice that season it had been shipped to a bullfight
somewhere, only to be rejected by local bullring veterinarians for being too
small and too ugly to appear in a professional bullfight.
Like most bulls who fail to make it into a bullfight during their
fourth year of life, Avispado was headed for the slaughterhouse. Until Paquirri
called looking for some animals for a last-minute gig he'd accepted in
Pozoblanco. Normally the bullring promoter selects the bulls. But when there
is a star matador involved, he also has a say, and Paquirri liked Sayalero y
Bandrés bulls because he'd performed well with them in the past. So
Avispado and five others were set aside. Then, a few weeks before the
bullfight, the Pozoblanco mayor's office intervened. Pozoblanco's bullring was
city-owned, and town officials had to approve all bulls presented there. But
when the officials visited the Sayalero y Bandrés pasture they were
displeased by the look of the bulls, declined them, and reserved animals from
a different breeder.
There were many ways that Paquirri and Avispado might have
avoided each other. Paquirri might have refused the Pozoblanco contract, or
chosen other bulls, or allowed the officials to turn down the bulls he had
chosen. Avispado might have been killed in an earlier bull- fight or sent to the
slaughterhouse. Instead Paquirri said that either he got the bulls he wanted
or he wasn't going to perform. So little Avispado and his fellow Sayalero y
Bandrés bulls were shipped to Pozoblanco. The morning of the bullfight,
representatives of the three matadors performing that day met at the corrals
to divide the bulls. Each bull had a number branded on its side, and the men
wrote these numbers on slips of paper, balled the papers up, and tossed
them into a hat. This was when the last piece of luck fell into place. Paquirri's
assistant reached in and pulled out the piece of paper with the number 9 on
it, Avispado's number.

Pozoblanco begins all of a sudden out of the rolling plain at the center of a
valley called Los Pedroches. The twisted medieval alleyways of the older part
of Pozoblanco are lined with the one- and two-story whitewashed dwellings
that are typical of southern Spain. Up a hill is the newer section of town,
which has wider and straighter streets and modern buildings. The main
highway runs through here, heading south across the Los Pedroches plain
and down out of the mountains into the big city of Córdoba, about fifty-five
miles away as the crow flies. In recent years the government has spent
millions to make this route easier to drive; in Paquirri's time it was a hellish
mountain road of hairpin turns, unnerving to traverse by day, terrifying by
night.
There is now a hospital in Pozoblanco, but in Paquirri's day the
only medical facility was the bullring infirmary, a rough room with two tables,
a sink, and a shrine to the Virgin Mary. It may seem odd that Pozoblanco
should have its own bullring, but many small Spanish towns and even some
villages do, and those that don't can rent a portable ring or close off a public
square for bullfights. One way or the other, many places in Spain of any size
or importance will hold at least one bullfight or bull event a year, usually
during the local feria. A feria is like a civic festival or celebration. The Spanish
are mad for local traditions of this sort and maintain them with a fervor that is
unmatched in Europe, and there is a feria somewhere in Spain most days of
the year. Ferias differ from region to region, but most are dedicated to a local
patron saint, and most include religious processions, an outdoor market, and
some kind of bullfight or bull-related event.
By the time Paquirri arrived in Pozoblanco, the town was well into
its feria. The municipal fairground on the outskirts of town was full of people
eating, drinking, dancing, shrieking on amusement park rides, and riding
horses. As afternoon became evening a crowd began to assemble at the
town bullring, and by six P.M. the ring was packed under a strong evening
sun. A trumpet sounded, the bullfighters marched in, and the festivities
began. The first half of the bullfight went smoothly and each of the three
matadors killed his bull with minimum fuss. Then it was time for Paquirri to
face his second and final bull of the day. The gate opened and Avispado
spilled into the ring. Paquirri came out, planted his feet, and swung his cape,
using the cloth to lure the bull into charging back and forth across his body,
and each time the bull chugged safely past Paquirri's legs, the crowd
chanted "Olé!" in approval.
It was after the first series of passes that something went wrong.
It might have been a miscalculation on Paquirri's part, or it might have been
the bull that tripped or swerved unexpectedly. But as Avispado charged past
Paquirri one more time, it bumped into him, spinning him around, sending his
hands, still holding the cape, into the air. As long as Paquirri had the cape
between himself and the bull he was relatively safe. Suddenly he found
himself unprotected and with his back to the bull. He staggered around to
face the bull again and yanked the cape out of the air, sliding it over to get it
in front of his legs. Had he been a beat quicker he might have gotten the
cape down before the bull had a chance to react to it. But Avispado was
following the cape, and as Paquirri swung it over, the bull pursued the cloth
straight into the matador's right thigh, sinking the horn deep into the flesh.
Somewhere in the audience a woman shrieked. Avispado thrust
its head upward, flipping Paquirri feet-first into the air, the horn still in the leg.
Four bullfighters ran up to Avispado, but the little bull was too fast and too
strong and all they could do was watch. Avispado rushed forward. In a
desperate attempt to extricate himself, Paquirri swung himself upright, which
only made matters worse, causing his full weight to bounce up and down on
the horn, producing more damage. After nine full seconds, Avispado wheeled,
lowered its head, and Paquirri fell away. He stood for a moment, then
collapsed. Several bullfighters picked him up and ran him from the ring. A
matador named José Cubero, El Yiyo, stepped onto the sand. By law it was
now his responsibility to kill Avispado.

As soon as Paquirri was tossed, Dr. Elíseo Morán left his place in the
callejón and rushed to the bullring infirmary. Dr. Morán had a thriving surgical
practice in Córdoba, but he spent summer weekends as the chief of the
medical team in small bullrings around the province. By the day of Paquirri's
goring, Morán had treated dozens of horn injuries, and was confident he
could open and clean Paquirri's wound, stop the blood flow, and stabilize
Paquirri so he could be taken to the hospital in Córdoba, where the proper
facilities existed to help doctors reattach any severed blood vessels and
close the wound. "Let's go," Dr.Morán told his fellow surgeons when he saw
Paquirri in the air. "We've got a big one."
The infirmary was silent as the doctors scrubbed up, laid out
needle, thread, anesthesia, and bags of blood. "Where are the toreros?" they
asked themselves. "Why haven't they arrived yet?" No one spoke, and their
eyes flicked to the room's glass doors. Then the doors flew open, shattering
the glass. In came Paquirri, borne on a litter of hands and arms, and in his
wake a small crowd of bullfighters, entourage members, and gawkers. They
laid Paquirri out on the operating table. His thigh was sliced open like a
Sunday roast and blood pooled on the table beneath it. The doctors trained
their strong surgical lights on the wound and cut Paquirri's pant leg off,
exposing his leg to the hairy genitals.
Among the people at the periphery of these events was a video
cameraman from TVE, Spain's national network. Shooting under the surgical
lights, he was able to capture a few minutes of Paquirri's agony. This footage
would be shown again and again around the country in the weeks, months,
and years that followed. As one writer described it, this video footage would
become the Spanish equivalent of the Zapruder film, which captured the
second when the bullet struck John F. Kennedy. The film begins with the
camera at Paquirri's feet. Then the camera pans up his ruined thigh, his
torso, to his face. Paquirri flinches now and then, but he is calm. His voice is
firm, his face impassive. He takes control of the room, making sure
everything is done right. This is his ninth serious goring.
"A moment please, Doctor, I would like to talk with you," Paquirri
says. "The goring is a deep one. It has two trajectories. One through here
and one through there." Paquirri gestures up and down, showing the paths of
the horn inside his body. "Open me where you need to open me," he
continues. "I place my life in your hands." The din in the room
increases. "Quiet, please," the matador says. "Please wet my mouth with
water." He drinks and then spits. The tape ends.

Out in the arena, El Yiyo killed Avispado. Then bullring servants attached
chains to the bull's horns and a mule team dragged Avispado's carcass from
the ring and into the bullring butchery, across an alley from the infirmary
where Paquirri was being treated. A short time after the butchers had turned
Avispado into cuts of meat for local markets, about eight o'clock, Paquirri
was carried to a waiting ambulance, and the big white Citroën pulled out of
town, siren yowling, and flew down the highway, careening along the twisting
mountain roads. Around fifteen miles from the gates of Córdoba, Paquirri
cried out, "Help me, I can't breathe." The ambulance screeched to a stop and
a doctor worked on him by the side of the road. When Paquirri looked a little
calmer, he was put back in the ambulance, which reached the hospital
shortly after nine o'clock. It had taken less than an hour to get to Córdoba,
but Paquirri was all but dead on arrival. He was thirty-six years old.
In the weeks that followed, Paquirri's death would remind many
writers and commentators of some lines in "The Song of the Rider," a short
poem written in the 1920s by Spain's best-known poet, Federico García
Lorca, who was himself a bullfighting aficionado.

Through the plain, through the wind,
Black pony, red moon.
Death is watching me,
from the towers of Córdoba.

Oh what a long road!
Oh my brave pony!
Oh that death awaits me,
before I arrive in Córdoba!

Spain plunged into frenzied mourning for Paquirri. Newspapers
picked over the grisly details of the goring and the race to Córdoba until the
entire story took on the quality of legend. Many people second-guessed the
doctors, wondering whether they had handled the wound in the right way.
Strangely, amid all the fuss, it was never made clear just what had killed
Paquirri, shock, loss of blood, or something else. The funeral took place in
Sevilla. The prime minister was unable to attend, but sent his wife. The crowd
that assembled in front of the apartment building where the body was laid out
stretched for five miles. When the coffin was brought out, the massive throng
wouldn't let it be placed in the hearse. Instead Paquirri was carried to
Sevilla's bullring, where it was marched around and around to chants of a
single word, "Torero." In certain parts of Spain there is no greater compliment.
Paquirri was buried in the cemetery of San Fernando, where his
tomb faces the mausoleum of José Gómez Ortega, Joselito, perhaps the
best bullfighter of all time, who was killed by a bull on May 16, 1920. Buried
with Joselito is his brother-in-law, the matador Ignacio Sánchez Mejías, who
killed the bull that killed Joselito. Fourteen years later, another bull killed
Sánchez Mejías. Killing a murderous bull had brought bad luck to Sánchez
Mejías (or so it was said), and this same misfortune pursued those who
performed with Paquirri in Pozoblanco. In 1985, a bull gored El Yiyo in the
heart, killing him instantly. He was twenty-one. In 1985, a gunman marched
into the office of Avispado's breeder, Juan Luis Bandrés, and shot him to
death. That case was never solved. In 1994, third matador on the card that
day, Vicente Ruiz, El Soro, injured his right knee. It ended his career, leaving
him with a deformed leg.
Though it might have been bad for his fellow performers, Paquirri's
death was a good thing for bullfighting. By the mid-1980s the bullfight had
been losing ground as a popular spectacle for years, to soccer, television,
and movies, in part because people believed bullfighting was fixed, that the
matadors weren't really risking their lives. Paquirri's death changed that. Not
only did it legitimize bullfighting as a serious thing, but it brought newfound
admiration for matadors. Paquirri wasn't the first prominent matador killed by
a bull. But he was the first one killed during the television age, and what was
seared into the Spanish consciousness was not so much his death as the
composure and humble bravery he showed in the infirmary video.
In the 1990s bullfighting would undergo a strong revival, driven in
part by a new generation of young matadors who remembered Paquirri's
death as a formative event. One of these was his own son, a ten-year-old
named Fran, who went to bed that night thinking he had a father and was fast
asleep when his mother came in to tell him he no longer did. Fran says he
can't recall how he responded to this news. His mother remembered,
however, and so did another person who was in the house that night.
Apparently, when Fran heard what had happened, he looked up at his mother
and said, "I am going to be a bullfighter."

Copyright © 2005 by Edward Lewine. Reprinted by permission of Houghton
Mifflin Company.



Continues...

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Excerpted from Death and the Sun by Edward Lewine Copyright © 2007 by Edward Lewine. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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EDWARD LEWINE is a frequent contributor to the New York Times. This is his first book. Formerly an expert in old master drawings at Christie’s, he graduated from the Columbia School of Journalism. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.