Puncturing the "Hemingway Paradigm," part 2

This blog seeks to puncture the "Hemingway paradigm" (see part 1 of this entry). It is part travel guide, steering you to those "pueblos con encanto" that Hemingway never knew, but which locals favor over the Pamplonas or Rondas to which Hemingway-obsessed Americans flock. It is part cultural guide, offering some tips and insights into subtle differences and hiccups that Americans commonly run into here. And part cultural study, placing Spain's dynamic, pluralistic, and very modern culture against the simplistic primitivism or exoticism typical of Hemingway's "lost generation." Along the way, I'll also muse on "our patron saint," to help make sense of why Hemingway saw Spain the way he did, but why we might want to move on and re-see it the way Spaniards today do.

John Sargent's painting, "Jaleo," 1882

Okay, so it's not just Hemingway. Sargent's "Jaleo", Welles's Homage to Catalonia, García Lorca's vivid depictions of southern Spain's gypsy culture (which we all read for high school Spanish lit.), to the Spanish guitar of Paco de Lucía, the images we hold of Spain's culture reflect a particular anglophone experience shaped in the early 20th century by Brits and Americans who passed through the Anglophone colonies of the Iberian peninsula. They are rich, indulgent images. But this is not a blog about them. Spain has moved on, grown up, and modernized.

Or, perhaps it is better to say, there are many Spains and that is only one of them. This blog seeks to introduce its readers to the Spain Hemingway didn't see (or at least didn't write about), and perhaps help them get a deeper and more modern day appreciation of what Spain is, and what it has to offer to the world.

Puncturing the "Hemingway Paradigm," part 1

I'm starting this blog after reading the umptienth American travel writer's article chronicling his or her (usually his) tour of Spanish places where Hemingway once sipped sherry, lauded a "good kill" at a bullfight, or ogled a flamenco dancer. Such is America's fascination with Hemingway's Spain, that a recent study by a Spanish tourism institute on "the image of Spain in the U.S." dubbed this effect the "paradigma Hemingway," or what one writer succinctly summed up in what could be this kind of tourism's slogan: "Blood, Sand, Sherry."

Memo to all Americans: There exists a Spain that Hemingway never visited, and in many ways it is actually better than the one he did see. It is time American tourists move with Spain into the 21st century, to discover how its cultural richness transcends the peculiar outdated macho (dare I say Victorian English) Romanticism that Hemingway marketed. Spain is more than bullfights, flamenco dancers, hot-blooded (European) southerners, and glasses of sherry.

A shop in Pamplona that capitalizes off
the huge Hemingway tourism there.

Don't get me wrong, reliving the footsteps of one of America's more noteworthy expats is one way to get to know the country. But only one way. As an expat who's been living in Spain for a while now, I'm tired of seeing the herds of Americans congregate around the usual suspects: Madrid, Barcelona, Sevilla, Pamplona… I mean, Pamplona, come on! It is a tiny, one-trick city. To walk through it is to tour a city strewn with "Hemingway ate here" signs. One could visit Santiago de Compostela, San Sebastián, Valencia… places barely mentioned by "Don Ernesto," but with plenty more to offer visitors.