Hemingway's masterpiece on Spain's bull runs turns 100 years old with its allure intact

Bill Hillmann has been gored three times while running with the bulls in Spain but he wouldnt miss this years San Fermin festival for anythingIt marks the 100th anniversary of the publication of Ernest Hemingways book The Sun Also Rises that launched the future Nobel Laureate to literary fame and put Pamplona on the map for millions of people around the worldOn Monday the festival kicked off with a firework blast over a jampacked plaza The first of eight bull runs is on TuesdayHemingways 1926 novel captivated generations of readers with its sexy Jazz Age tale of American and British bohemians trying to fill some inner void with the distractions of exotic travel vast quantities of alcohol and the anguishing pursuit of impossible loveIts success established The Sun Also Rises as a cornerstone of the American literary canon right up there with F Scott Fitzgeralds The Great Gatsby It also popularised the term lost generation to describe the tightknit group of early 20thcentury writers expatriated in Paris Hemingways terse style forever changed American literature In Spanish its title is translated as FiestaHillmann who hails from Chicago was 19 when Hemingways vivid depiction of the bull running festival first enthralled him especially descriptions of average Spaniards risking their lives sprinting through the streets to guide the bulls to the bull ring during the nineday festivalI sat there for about six hours well past midnight reading the book Hillmann told The Associated Press in Pamplona as he looked down on the pen where the bulls are held before being set free on the cobblestoned route And by the time I was done with that book I was going to be a writer and I was going to be a bull runnerSince that literary encounter the 44yearold Hillmann has run with the bulls in Spain hundreds of times counting both his trips to Pamplona and his participation in dozens more bull runs in other Spanish towns His infatuation with Hemingway and Pamplona has never waned even though he nearly died one time that he was gored by a bull hornHillmanns appreciation led him to earn a doctorate in English and now it is his turn to teach The Sun Also Rises at EastWest University in Chicago and write about bull runningAmericans are the biggest group of foreign bull runnersHillmann is just one of many Americans inspired to travel to Spain to see the festival firsthand While running with bulls is a cherished local custom for Spanish daredevils Americans are still the leading group of foreigners who run at the San Fermin festivalIn 2022 16 per cent of the bull runners were Americans the largest percentage among foreigners and four times more than those from neighbouring France according to Pamplonas City HallDallasbased tour operator Bruce Anderson whose company Running Of The Bulls has helped thousands of Americans attend San Fermin over the years says that Hemingways work made the festival a bucketlist destinationThis year his company is bringing 1400 people to the festival with over twothirds from the United StatesTheres a lot of energy a lot of excitement around just remembering that book and the impact that its had said Anderson himself a lifelong Hemingway fan He spoke in Pamplonas art deco Cafe Iruna which features heavily as a drinking spot in The Sun Also Rises and today houses a lifesize statue of Hemingway bellying up to the barAnd Anderson with his thick white beard is something of a Hemingway lookalike Local Spaniards often call out to him Papa ndash a nickname for their adopted heroIt is impossible to avoid Hemingway in PamplonaHemingway is etched into the landscape of Pamplona Hotels and bars have busts of him or signs up that he was once there Outside the Pamplona bull ring which also has a statue of the writer a huge banner hangs in honour of the novel including a quote that shows how the festival left the writer speechless At noon of Sunday the 6th of July the fiesta exploded There is no other way to describe itWhen Hemingway made his last visits to Pamplona he would frequent the Perla Hotel his suite still has furniture from the 1950s when he stayed there The room which overlooks the bull run route also has two glass bookcases holding dozens of copies of The Sun Also RisesHemingway did a lot for Pamplona because he made it known around the world said Fernando Hualde who worked for four decades as a receptionist in the hotelHemingways legacy has become complicated over timeHemingways local legacy however is mixedBeside a feminist critique of his hyper masculine public persona Hemingway has drawn criticism from the animal rights movement for his praise of bullfighters In The Sun Also Rises he spills far more ink on descriptions of their bravery than on the bull runsAnimal welfare activist Brook Spurling said during a protest against the San Fermin bullfights that Hemingway wrote about many many themes that today would not be accepted into society He writes about hunting about war and we dont want to be appreciating these themes todayHualde says that some Pamplona residents rue his early promotion of the festival due to the ills of overtourism the sleepy provincial city is now experiencingPamplona has 200000 residents and receives over a million more people for the festival While most are Spaniards around 15 per cent of the revellers are from abroad And many especially the younger visitors follow Hemingways example of drinking to excessSome locals take pride in spots that werent touched by Hemingway Local literature professor Gabriel Insausti of Pamplonas University of Navarra recalls being in a bar with a sign that read Hemingway was not hereIn general Hemingway has become a product of a franchise associated with San Fermin festival that has obscured his novel Insausti said People know who Hemingway is but they havent read his novelThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability 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