Nonetheless anti-Americanism merely picked up steam, claiming at first that the Founding Father's notion of universal rights would lead to weak government, that American entrepreneurship would lead to bacchanal and that commerce made people stupid. Today, a review of the constituent elements of the anti-American rant reveals it as nothing more than a sour mixture of jealousy, stupidity and fear of tomorrow. Here in Spain, I have encountered little of it.
Yet, as I say, I have been with normal everyday Spaniards. They are a dignified people. Their language is elegant. They are honest and have a famous code of honor. Frankly, I, as an admirer of Italy, do not know why I did not come upon Spain sooner. The Costa del Sol, Spain's southwest Mediterranean coast, certainly puts me in mind of Italy's sunny coasts, and if the food is not quite up to Italian standards, it is good enough. Yes, the Spaniard is more restrained than the Italian, but given the Italian's incomparable exuberance, what else could one expect? The Spanish character is sufficiently lively for me. The artifacts seen throughout Spain testify to its grandeur and momentous history.
As I said in the vestibule of this column, I have been pursuing the perfect bullfight. Actually that was a flight of rhetoric, for I would not recognize a perfect bullfight anymore than I would recognize a perfect matzo ball, and I have read Papa Hemingway's "Death in the Afternoon" twice. It is a study of Spanish bullfighting, but sitting here in the bullrings of Spain I am still not really sure what makes the crowds applaud. The applause is not rowdy or bloodthirsty. In fact, compared to the crowds at a New York City baseball game, the Spanish bullfight aficionados are downright demure.
Many Americans are in attendance at these bullfights, a surprisingly large number of them young women. At least three of the types of participants in the fight are very gifted athletes, the banderilleros, the cuadrillas and of course the matadors. The fat picadores sitting on their embattled horses and poking lances into the bull are, to my mind, repulsive, and Hemingway felt that of all the participants, the ones most deserving of pity were the horses. The bulls are very handsome, have enormous strength and accelerate like huge Mercedes sedans across the ring. I would not want to be in one's path. Most end up on someone's dinner table -- often, I am told, at a shelter for the homeless.
Possibly this is just public relations fluff, provided by aficionados of the bullring, but I have fallen for it. Now I, too, am an aficionado, and I am returning to America to begin the Humanitarian Association for the Advancement of Bullfighting in Beverly Hills, Calif. It is time the Hollywood stars do something more for the homeless than merely harass Republican presidents.