El Cordobés
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Manuel Benítez Pérez, born 4th May 1936 (probable date) in Palma del Río near Córdoba is known as El Cordobés ("The Cordobese"), the famous matador of the 1960s, who brought to the bullring an unorthodox acrobatic and theatrical style, totally indifferent to his own safety. Born into abject poverty in a village near Córdoba, all but illiterate, a teenager who had some minor brushes with the law, a construction-worker who was still dreaming at 23 of being a bullfighter, an age when many great matadors were at their peak, he became from espontáneo (a spectator that illegally jumped into the ring to throw some passes before the bull) to a national idol. By the time he retired in 1971, he had become the highest-paid matador in history.
A well-paced hagiography by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre Or I'll Dress You in Mourning : The Story of El Cordobes and the New Spain He Stands For (1968) gives a sense of the adulation he inspired.
El Cordobés lives in seclusion near Córdoba.
The story of El Cordobés is the basis for the musical Matador (1987) by Mike Leander and Edward Seago.
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