2
The modern style of Spanish bullfighting is credited to Juan Belmonte, generally considered the
greatest matador of all time. Belmonte introduced a daring and revolutionary style, in which he
stayed within a few inches of the bull throughout the fight.”
Although extremely dangerous (Belmonte himself was gored on many occasions), his style is
still seen by most matadors as the ideal to be emulated. Today, bullfighting remains similar to
the way it was in 1726, when Francisco Romero, from Ronda, Spain, used the estoque, a sword,
to kill the bull, and the muleta, a small cape used in the last stage of the fight.
Throughout time, bullfighting prophets have maintained to posses a personal truth about the
commandments and sportsmanship of bullfighting. Some say that “el toreo, ”bullfighting -involves valor and luck which separate those in the profane camp from the true believers.
Indeed, when a player chooses to put his/her life on the line in the bull rink, she has the right to
choose whatever she wants out of life. Bullfighting, thus, involves tempo, dance and song and
how to live or how one must live with those rhythms within your soul.
I now present my bullfighting parlor game called Toreador .
Every bull is unique and so is every bullfight. This is a random element in bullfighting. The
bull – hand-picked and groomed for bullfighting since his calf days – is a living animal who
brings his own personality to the game. A great bullfighter is an individual trained for his craft
who has great valor and respect for the bull because no one can predict how the bull will behave.
For that reason, there’s tremendous unpredictability in the game. And there’s a fervor in
bullfighting which includes randomness, competition, experience, propensity, color, dance and
religion – a religion which borders on superstition going back many centuries.
In my game Toreador, the bullfighter is a woman. I chose a woman torera because bullfighting
involves great drama, so she suffers from all those lost loves and the loneliness experienced by
so many women. She prefers the bull to men and finds empowerment trading skills with a
powerful animal. But in her desire to be a bullfighter, she has an additional component: she’s
an artist with a distinctive defensive and offensive style.
Dramaturg Lope de Vega said: “Si nuestro teatro tuviese el temblor de las fiestas de toros, sería
magnífico. Si hubiese sabido transportar esa violencia estética, sería un teatro heroico como La
Iliada... Una corrida de toros es algo muy hermoso” “If our theater had the earthshaking
emotion of the bullfight, it would be magnificent. If I could have transferred that esthetic
violence to the theater, it would have been a heroic spectacle like the Iliad. A bullfight is the
most beautiful thing.”
“The Bullfight,” is a famous painting by Édouard Manet, 1865–1866 (To be discussed)
“Guernica” is a cubist painting by Picasso – 1937 (To be discussed)