Or I'll dress you in mourning

the long version

El Cordobés, orphaned son of a field hand who fought for the Loyalists, is the most flamboyant, controversial, adored and richly rewarded matador in the long history of the bullring. In Or I'll Dress You in Mournin Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre bring to life a stunning page from the history of our times as, against the political and social flux of modern Spain, they trace the rise of Manuel Benítez from his desperately poor beginnings through the cruel years of struggle "to become somebody" to his final dizzying ascent to fame and adulation as the idolized El Cordobés. -from dust jacket