It's almost impossible to imagine bullfighting abolished from Spain entirely. Values do change, though.

You kill, it's part of your world as a bullfighter, it's a natural part of your world, and then you leave that world and it becomes unnatural.

One of the things I've been thinking about lately is how the change in values makes the survival of the old values, where they do survive, all the more striking. There are pockets of the old bullfighting world that exist more or less intact, both in Spain and elsewhere.

Acting requires focus, too, but acting doesn't, you might say, demand focus. When you're in the ring you don't even have to think about focus because the danger is so imminent. Imminent. You train and you prepare and then the adrenaline kicks in and drives you into focusing intensely. You'd better focus, right? Or else you'll make your exit on a stretcher.

In one era the majority puts its faith and sympathy with the bullfighter, in another with the bull.

Animals are complicated and so is the animal-rights opposition. It's hard to read motives in animals, and hard to read motives in politics.

I never took pleasure in seeing a bull die. Relief, but certainly not pleasure.