«July seventh. Eight o’clock in the morning. Tens of thousands of people, defying the weariness and the lack of sleep endemic to the exhausting Fiesta de San Fermín, crowd into the bullring, behind the barricades erected at side streets and on the balconies of the tall, old facades of three streets and one square. Suddenly, the bust of a rocket shatters the murmuring in the streets of the medieval Old City; all eyes turn in unison. All crane their necks to scrutinize a horizon of bobbing heads of bobbing young people. In the distance, the sea of heads begins to move with increasing rapidity. Little by little the compact mass reaches progressively higher speeds and the blur of the first horns begins to materialize from among the black shadows making their way through the homogeneous mob dressed almost entirely in red and white.

An instant later, a herd of six fighting bulls and eight steers, which from the balconies appears to form an arrowhead, “flies” over the ancient cobblestones, the animals completely surrounded by swift runners who place themselves within inches of the bulls. The run is rapid. At times it is violent, but there are also moments of ballet-like harmony between man and beast. Seconds later, bulls and runners once again fade into the distance, and the intense emotion and the pent-up sensations dissipate again in the sea of bobbing heads. The distant thud of a rocket marks the end of the ephemeral spectacle. The running of the bulls has finished; the bulls are no longer in the street; the specter of tragedy departs until the next day at the same hour, but the intensity of those brief moments, the emotion that brings forth screams, the risk of playing with death along with the explosion of sound, imagery and color experienced by spectators and runners alike will forever remain. There are seven more encierros to follow in the fiesta.

The visual impact for the spectator, who witnesses the encierro, above all for the first time, is beyond compare. But the other ingredient of the run is the profound fear, human and understandable, alghough controllable, of those who participate freely as runners in the encierro, who, instead of running blindly forward in a panic-stricken, every-man-for-himself attempt to escape danger and death, strive to approach the bulls as closely as possible, scorning danger and freely risking their lives by challenging an animal immensely more powerful than themselves. It is not surprising then that this primitive irrationality, this collective madness, this extolling of courage, this magical spirit, this ineffable uniqueness that sets it apart from mere sporting events, has bewitched a world-wide audience and has captured the imagination of writers such as Ernest Hemingway, all of whom are drawn to its beauty and the organized anarchy of fleeting life called the encierro.»

“July seventh. Eight o’clock in the morning. Tens of thousands of people, defying the weariness and the lack of sleep endemic to the exhausting Fiesta de San Fermín, crowd into the bullring, behind the barricades erected at side streets and on the balconies of the tall, old facades of three streets and one square. Suddenly, the bust of a rocket shatters the murmuring in the streets of the medieval Old City; all eyes turn in unison. All crane their necks to scrutinize a horizon of bobbing heads of bobbing young people. In the distance, the sea of heads begins to move with increasing rapidity. Little by little the compact mass reaches progressively higher speeds and the blur of the first horns begins to materialize from among the black shadows making their way through the homogeneous mob dressed almost entirely in red and white.

An instant later, a herd of six fighting bulls and eight steers, which from the balconies appears to form an arrowhead, “flies” over the ancient cobblestones, the animals completely surrounded by swift runners who place themselves within inches of the bulls. The run is rapid. At times it is violent, but there are also moments of ballet-like harmony between man and beast. Seconds later, bulls and runners once again fade into the distance, and the intense emotion and the pent-up sensations dissipate again in the sea of bobbing heads. The distant thud of a rocket marks the end of the ephemeral spectacle. The running of the bulls has finished; the bulls are no longer in the street; the specter of tragedy departs until the next day at the same hour, but the intensity of those brief moments, the emotion that brings forth screams, the risk of playing with death along with the explosion of sound, imagery and color experienced by spectators and runners alike will forever remain. There are seven more encierros to follow in the fiesta.

The visual impact for the spectator, who witnesses the encierro, above all for the first time, is beyond compare. But the other ingredient of the run is the profound fear, human and understandable, alghough controllable, of those who participate freely as runners in the encierro, who, instead of running blindly forward in a panic-stricken, every-man-for-himself attempt to escape danger and death, strive to approach the bulls as closely as possible, scorning danger and freely risking their lives by challenging an animal immensely more powerful than themselves. It is not surprising then that this primitive irrationality, this collective madness, this extolling of courage, this magical spirit, this ineffable uniqueness that sets it apart from mere sporting events, has bewitched a world-wide audience and has captured the imagination of writers such as Ernest Hemingway, all of whom are drawn to its beauty and the organized anarchy of fleeting life called the encierro.”