Death in the Afternoon: Hemingway’s Passionate Exploration of Bullfighting

In Death in the Afternoon, Ernest Hemingway delivers a mesmerizing and unflinching portrait of bullfighting, a spectacle that fascinated him both as a sport and as an art form. More than just a chronicle of its pageantry, traditions, and technicalities, this book is a meditation on courage, honor, and the nature of death itself.

With Hemingway’s signature spare yet evocative prose, the reader is transported to the hot, sun-drenched arenas of Spain, where the matadors face both triumph and mortality with unwavering grace. As he delves into the ritual, philosophy, and psychology behind the corrida, he also offers keen insights into Spanish culture, human nature, and the raw power of life’s most fundamental struggle—the battle between man and beast, between life and death.

Part travelogue, part cultural study, and part personal reflection, Death in the Afternoon is more than just a book about bullfighting—it is a powerful examination of Hemingway’s lifelong themes: bravery, artistry, and the thin line between life and death.

"Hemingway’s style, at its best, is a superb vehicle for revealing tenderness of feeling beneath descriptions of brutality." — The Guardian