Pamplona is especially grateful to the American writer, Ernest Hemingway, for making the town world-famous. In 1926, his novel The Sun Also Rises was published. The major characters are American and British ex-patriots who travel from Paris to Pamplona for the Festival of San Fermin. They watch the “running of the bulls” and the bull fights that follow. Hemingway really enjoyed and valued the whole bullfighting mystique with its hero worship of the successful matadors. Although other Spanish towns have bullfights and also run the bulls, most of the world thinks of it as unique to Pamplona.
Hemingway loved Pamplona, and Pamplona clearly loves Hemingway. The Café Iruna (Iruna is the Basque language name for the town) was his favorite cafe. It’s referred to in some material as “The Hemingway Café.” Inside the café is the “Hemingway Room” complete with a life-sized statue of the writer, and a wall of pictures showing the young writer, the honored man of letters, and finally the graying “Papa Hemingway.” Outside the Bull Fighting Arena is another monument to the American writer.
