Sangre y Arena/ – Paperback

Description

Author(s): –
Publisher: China National Publications Import & Export C
Publisher Imprint: China National Publications Import & Export C
BISAC: Classics

A Newly Edited and Translated Edition of a Major Representative Work by Vicente Blasco Ibez, a Key Writer of Spain’s ‘Generation of ’98’ “” Blood and Sand depicts the life of a bullfighter. Gallardo is the son of a drunken shoemaker, and his mother, Seora Angustias (a name meaning “anguish” or “sorrow”), works as a servant to earn a little extra money for the family. It is a household plagued by poverty. The father dies young. To make a living, the mother finds her son a good shoemaker to apprentice under, but he is stubborn and unyielding by nature. His sole ambition is to become a bullfighter, and he is obsessed with bullfighting to the point of madness, refusing to obey even under his mother’s harsh beatings. Later, after enduring countless hardships and risking his life in the ring, he finally rises to become a bullfighter renowned throughout the entire Iberian Peninsula. Contracts come flooding in for him every bullfighting season; wealth rolls in. He acquires property and an estate, ascends to high society, and even the niece of a marquis willingly becomes his lover. The bullring becomes an ocean of cheers and applause for him. People from all walks of life look up to him with admiration. He is generous with his charity to the poor, acting as if he were their savior. His agent proudly calls him the “Bullfighter of the World” or the “Bullfighter Supreme.” However, the law that “things reverse when they reach their extremes, and decline follows prosperity” does not spare him. This period of boundless glory does not last long. Suddenly, one afternoon, he fails in the bullring. From then on, he is unable to recover; his situation goes from bad to worse. The “Bullfighter of the World” in the ring becomes a coward who dare not look a bull in the eye. The cheers and applause turn into mockery and jeers. His aristocratic mistress cruelly abandons him. He falls into debt, suffers mental and spiritual collapse, and finally, after recovering from a serious injury, he attempts to regain his former glory but dies a miserable, pathetic death. Beyond its bullfighting theme, Blood and Sand also vividly describes Spanish religious rituals. In addition to conventional church prayers and activities, it offers an especially complete and detailed depiction of the Holy Week processions during Easter. In these processions, devout believers from various religious brotherhoods form massive, imposing parades, carrying statues of the Virgin Mary and Jesus through all the streets and alleys of the city, continuing from late at night until the first light of dawn. Nominally, this is a grand religious event held annually in Spain. Yet, under Ibez’s pen, it is transformed into a farce of absurdity, ignorance, and hatred performed by a mob. “”””