Today is the 50th anniversary of the death of the maestro Juan Belmonte and it was
he, during a conversation with a group of intellectuals in Madrid in the middle of the
Second World War who said: "Every Englishman - unless the contrary can be proven
beyond doubt - is a spy." This remark, no doubt, sprung from the fact that Belmonte
was a friend of the British diplomat Tom Burns married to Mabel Marañon, daughter
of Dr Gregorio Marañon. I do assure you that the Brit who speaks to you today is not
a spy! Quite simply I had the good fortune that, as a child, my parents moved to live
in Spain - specifically to Madrid.
We lived sufficiently close to the Madrid Bullring that I was able to go there on foot -
something I did with regularity. And even as a child I realised that the "Corrida" was
something rather serious. It was not like going to a football match. Not even like
going to watch a game of cricket (which as I am sure you will all be aware is the most
exciting and serious game in the world!).
No. This was a serious matter. Some instinct prompted me to attend in full prepschool uniform - short trousers, blazer, tie and cap.
Later on, now a grown-up, I married a Spanish girl. Amongst her many virtues two in
particular stand out. As a little girl her nanny, Gabriela Meneses, dressed her and her
sisters in their Sunday best to go and see Manuel Rodriguez "Manolete" in San
Refael and she is a niece of the great Antonio Diaz Cañabate. How right my
brother-in-law Luis Figuerlola-Ferretti was several years later to write "Gabby
Meneses is made of sterling silver". And how right Madrid was to have a street
named after the great taurine critic Antonio Diaz Cañabate.
I feel very honoured and rather intimidated to have been invited to give this Address
today following as I am such distinguished and much admired personalities as
Rafael Moneo, Andrés Amorós, Carlos Fuentes, Fernando Savater and Mario Vargas
Llosa to mention but a few.
For several weeks I was in some doubt as to how to confront the rather intimidating
bull that is the Address that opens the Taurine season here in Seville. As I studied
the animal from the comparative safety of my London home, I decided to approach
my task from a British perspective or, to be more precise, from the perspective of
someone who by happy chance had the good fortune to live with a foot in two
cultures - Anglo Saxon and Hispano-Latin.
Let me begin with Seville. One of those European cities whose history goes all the
way back to its mythological foundation by Hercules, its role in the Roman Empire,
its significance during the Moorish period and, finally, its conquest by King
Ferdinand III in 1248.
Today, any European who wishes to begin to understand the culture of this
continent must stand in awe of the Alameda de Hercules, the Patio de Banderas and
the Giralda.In the modern period Seville breaks into the consciousness of the rest of Europe as
the umbilical cord that linked and then opened up the Americas to Europe. Here in
Seville Velazquez and Murillo were born. Machado, Cernuda and Alexandre. Here in
Seville Bizet, Verdi and Beethoven located some of their great operas. Seville is one
of the cornerstones of what Europe represents culturally today.
I doubt anyone would seriously question this. But then, I hesitate for moment, and
say to myself - Joselito and Juan Belmonte were born here in Seville as were Curro
Romero, Sanchez Mejias, Pepe Luis and Manolo Vazquez. El Caracol and La Niña de
los Peines sung here.
And I ask myself - why is it that the Corrida and all the poetry, the music and the art
that follow in its wake do not feature in the mind of my fellow citizens (and more
widely in the minds of other northern europeans and citizens of the United States)
as part of our common cultural heritage?
I believe that what is happening is that in the 21st century we are walking,
sleepwalking I would suggest, towards a global homogeneous culture spoken in
English and carrying with it Anglo North American values whose rejection of the
Corrida is as visceral as it is mistaken. Let me be clear at once that in no way do I
deny or renounce my Anglo-Saxon culture.
Standing before you is a Brit who tries to read one Shakespeare sonnet every day,
who has revelled in the novels of Jane Austen and Dickens, the poetry of Dylan
Thomas and Walt Whitman, the cinema of the Cohen Brothers and the music of
Elvis Presley, the Beatles and Dolly Parton.
But, Ladies and Gentlemen, I do not want to live in a mono-cultural world. And
Hispano/Latin culture (with the second most widely spoken language in the free
world), is the only one that can provide a realistic counterpoise to the overwhelming
advance of Anglo-Saxonism. And it is the Corrida together with the Spanish
Language that should be the springboard for the counter-attack which should be
launched precisely to counter the total misunderstanding that exists and, more
importantly, to defend the basic values the Corrida enshrines which the
Anglo/American world is in danger of losing sight of.
Let me explain.
The Corrida obliges us to contemplate and to consider two of the most fundamental
things about Life; namely death and the difference between human beings and the
rest of creation. We are all walking towards death "Stir up your mind, awake and
contemplate how life passes by, how death creeps up in its wake" writes the Spanish
poet Jorge Manrique.
In the Anglo Saxon world, as we shall see, they are no longer able to look death in
the face. Indeed they are hardly able to pronounce so much as the word.Whereas those of us who have seen Antonio Ordoñez, haughty in the face of a
fighting bull, know that one of the most fundamental things in life is to be able to
look death in the face and to walk towards it with dignity. As Wittgenstein wrote
during his experience in the trenches in the First World War - "Now I have the
opportunity to a decent person as I am face to face with death. It is only death that
gives life meaning. Fear in the face of death is the clearest symptom of a false, that
is to say, a bad life."
In the Anglo Saxon world we can also observe that anthropomorphism, where
human characteristics and emotions are attributed to animals, is at times ridiculous
and at times almost immoral. Let me be clear form the outset, those of us who
support the Corrida reject outright any vandalism towards nature - animals, trees,
flowers, plants and the environment. As the falmeco song says "curséd the hand
that kills a dog".
All of this will seem obvious to all of you here today, but I want to take a moment to
examine, first, the roots of Saxon incomprehension and, secondly, the extent to
which the sheer strength of the English language and the values that it carries with
it threaten to lead us to a world where the spectacle that awaits us this afternoon in
the Maestranza is a forgotten footnote buried under the weight of the
homogeneous culture that is looming.
So let us examine the roots of this Anglo-Saxon miscomprehension. A few centuries
ago death was ever present in daily life. Families had many children - more than half
died in infancy. Everyone had actually seen a dead body. Thanks to the advances of
science and medicine the sad presence of death in daily life has been reduced. We
no longer have to contemplate death on an almost daily basis. But death has not
disappeared. It is still "hurrying near" as the poet Marvell writes.
In England today a person or an animal does not die. They are "taken from us" "they
are no more' "they have passed away" "gone to meet their maker" "joined the
celestial choir" "no longer with us". In Spain one would simply say "they are dead".
As the Corrida reminds us death is a fact and it has to be faced head-on.
The second root of misunderstanding is semantic. In English the Corrida is
translated as Bulfight which means literally a fight with a bull. In the Anglo Saxon
mind that means a sport and, as a sport, there must be fair play. The bull has to be
able to "win". I have nothing against sport, but how odd it is that just as the Corrida
is reflected in the work of Goya, Garcia Lorca, Bergamin and Picasso and in the
philosophy of Ortega y Gasset and Dr Marañon, artists and intellectuals do not seem
to devote much attention to sport; not even to cricket! It's not that the Corrida is
better than football. Its just that football is a sport and the Corrida is an art form that
poses fundamental questions about life itself.
There were two moments when this Brit came to realise that the childish instinct
that the Corrida was a serious matter was underlined. First, the emotion I felt in my
twenties when, for the first time, I read Garcia Lorca's poem "Tears on the death of Ignacio Sanchez Mejias". And, later, conversations with Manuel Arroyo Stephens on
his magnificent book "Images of death and other texts" where he draws attention to
the parallelism that exists between the Corrida and other cultural trends.
How interesting - Arroyo points out - that when Kandinsky produces his first
abstract paintings, when Schoenberg starts to break with tonality, Joyce publishes
the first edition of Ulyses and TS Eliot publishes the Wasteland - all of them
breaking with the traditional model of music, painting, poetry and literature - along
comes Juan Belmonte and does just that with the Corrida.
How interesting it is to observe that the Corrida which, in olden times, was a
pastime for the aristocracy on horseback and the mounted Lord was the central
figure whilst the serfs brought the animal up to their master. So, in the wider world,
the aristocracy were the dominant force in government and civil society. Then, at
the start of the 19th century the people, through the democratic process, begin to
take up the central role in society through universal sufferage and the Rule of Law.
And what a noteworthy parallel, as Arroyo Stephens points out, that the publication
of the Code Napoleon should coincide with the publication of "Tauromaquia " by
Pepe Hillo in 1801.
Thus, just as in Europe society moves on from aristocratic domination, and the
people emerge as the principal protagonists in society, so the Corrida ceases to be
an aristocratic pastime and the former serf emerges as the central figure of what is
no longer an elitist preserve but now, as the sub-title of Pepe Hillo's book notes " the
Art of Toreo".
And, finally, the incomprehension has its roots in anthropomorphism - the Anglo
Saxon tendency to attribute human sentiments to animals.
And here again we have a semantic clue. The english word "pet" has no exact
translation into Spanish. Into Spanish one would say - a toy animal, a caprice, a part
of the family, a companion. The British have this sentimentalism towards animals
ingrained in their DNA.
From childhood they read books which attribute human sentiments to animals:
Paddington Bear, who came from Peru and was adopted by an english family. He
liked marmalade sandwiches; Ferdinand the bull, who liked playing with his friends
in the fields and smelling the flowers; Bill the Badger; Peter Rabbit. The English all
carry these charming characters in their sub concious.
In the adult world this translates into realities which are, at times, funny and, at
times, profoundly immoral.
Every day the British press carries a string of animal stories.
Some examples -A study (by the University of London, no less) finds evidence the goats adopt the
regional accents of where they live. Interesting!
The American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Vancouver
reveals that the cerebral capacity of dolphins is such that "they are persons - or to be
exact non-human persons and as such deserve the same rights as human beings".
The singer Robbie Williams is having his pets immortalised in paintings based on
famous works of art. His German sheep dog, named Ruby, is being painted based on
the lady seated in the box of Renoir's famous painting of 1874 "La Loge".
A chimpanzee called Natasha has been classified as a "genius" by a group of German
scientists.
And on my way here I read a charming little story. Apparently, 30% of the dogs in
Britain are suffering from obesity and finding it difficult to climb the stairs in their
home. But do not worry. A specal doggie lift is being designed to help them
negotiate the stairs in comfort.
There are 3.829 animal charities in the United Kingdom. I, along with about a million
of my fellow citizens, am a member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.
But behind these serious and useful organisations there are others some of which, at
least, might be described as eccentric.
 The Canine Epilepsy Support Group
 Buttercups Sanctuary for Goats
 Essex Guinea Pig and Rat Rescue
 Froglife charity for frogs, toads and newts
 The Ferrett Education and Research Trust
All of this might produce a smile. But I would suggest that smile might vanish when
we learn -
That the American Pet Product Association (APPA) estimates that more than 50
billion US dollars were spent in the United States in 2011.
That a German shepherd dog, named Gunter, inherited £90 million from his owner
the Countess Carlota Lledenstein.
That a chimpanzee called Kalu inherited £40 million from his australian owner
Patricia O'Neill.
That the the english editor Miles Blackwell left £10 million to his hen Gigo.
That a British recluse Ben Ree left £9 million to his cat Blackie (and nothing to his
family).That there is a shop where diamond necklaces can be purchased for dogs at prices
ranging from 150 thousand to 3 million dollars.
And all of this while in some parts of the world children are dying of hunger.
How should we react to such things? On the one hand we can simply shrug our
shoulders and say, as did El Gallo when it was explained to him what Ortega y
Gasset did "It takes all types..."
But that would be a mistake. We should not underestimate the sheer power of the
English Language and the weight of the values it carries with it. Language is in a
very real sense the standard bearer of a culture.
Suffice it to say that the English Language has, according to the Global Language
Monitor, over a million words. I think that number is open to debate. I would guess
the consensus is around 600.000. If we compare this to the Dictionary of the Royal
Academy of Spain with around 88.000 or the French Academy with 60.000 we can
see what an overwhelming advantage those who talk of "Bullfight" and "Bloodsport"
have.
Now is not a moment to discuss the reasons for this linguistic advantage. Just to
observe that - after English - Spanish is the most widely spoken language in the free
world. Those of us who wish to defend the Corrida should, first, support the Spanish
Government and the Istituto Cervantes in their efforts to promote the Spanish
Language and culture.
But the time has come when we need to organise ourselves in defence of the
Taurine world. We need no lectures in morality from people who spend millions on
diamond collars for dogs.
And it can be done if we set our minds firmly to it.
Back in the 90's when we were negotiating the Maastricht Treaty we Northern
Europeans introduced a protocol on animal welfare. The Spanish Government (in
those days the Foreign Minister was Francisco Fernandez Ordoñez) through
Ambassador Elorza introduced an amendment to the text which, after some tough
negotiation was added to the protocol and which reads as follows - "whilst
respecting the legislative or administrative provisions and customs of Member
States relating in particular to religious rights, cultural traditions and regional
heritage".
Today this text now stands as Article 13 of the Lisbon Treaty - thus the animalists of
Northern Europe cannot pray in aid the Treaty of Rome to attack the Corrida.
In my view Ambassador Elorza should be given a lap of honour at the Maestranza.Reading the recent remarks by Minister Wert and his aim to have the Fiesta
declared part of the World Cultural Patrimony I conclude that Spanish Governments
whether they hold the "muleta" with the left hand or the right stand solidly behind
the Fiesta.
Well then, how can we save these Saxons from what Arroyo Stephens describes as
"the trap which language lays out before them and leads to so many
misunderstandings"? What can we do to ensure that anthropomorphism and the
flight from the face of death do not become a part of the global culture? First, as I
say, we should support the Governments of Spain, Latin America and Spanish
speakers in the United States in the defence and promotion of the language and
culture of the Hispanic world.
And, at the same time, those institutions like the Instituto Cervantes, the American
Society for the Spanish Language (ANLE), the Spanish Language Foundation and
others in their work to promote Hispano-Latin culture.
In a word, we need to achieve what some academics describe as Panhispanism.
Secondly, we need to be very aware that nowadays global discussion takes place
through the internet. The detractors of the Fiesta are extremely active in promoting
misleading information about the Corrida seeking to gain acceptance for the view
that it is a cruel bloodsport.
The London Taurine Club - "aficionados" in the truest sense of the word - are very
aware of this danger. A group of members are planning to launch a web site whose
aim would be to respond one by one to the falsehoods that are put about on the
internet and to explain the true reality of the Fiesta.
They have two great advantages. They are proper and well informed "aficionados"
and, at the same time, entirely at home with the English language. Any help and
support they can be given from Seville, from Spain or other taurine countries would
be most useful.
The task that lies before them is pretty daunting. They are seeking to achieve on a
global scale what Ambassador Elorza achieved in the Treaty of Rome - to defend the
Fiesta and its values against the overwhelming wave of Saxonism that looms over it.
Ladies and Gentlemen. The motto of this great city of Seville is "Not Abandoned".
Well, let us ensure that the Fiesta is not abandoned. Let us no