View source for The Story of Ferdinand

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A children's book published in 1936, it is the story of a bull who would rather sit down and smell flowers than fight in a ring like all the other bulls.

Adopted as a cartoon in 1938 by ''[[Walt Disney]]'' animated as ''Ferdinand the Bull'' in a manner similar to the ''[[Silly Symphonies]]'' cartoons.

In a pasture in sunny southern Spain, while all the other young bulls are constantly play-fighting and butting heads with each other, a young bull named Ferdinand would rather sit down and smell flowers all day. When he grew up, although he became very strong and powerful, he would still rather sit and smell flowers all day.

One day, several men came along looking for bulls for the bullring in Madrid. At that very moment, Ferdinand sat on a flower being visited by a foraging bee, which immediately stings him, causing him to go off on a wild rampage of destruction, which leaves an impression on the scouts, who take him away to the Great Bullring in Madrid.

Once there, it seems that everyone in Madrid came to watch the fight between Ferdinand and the matador. Once in the ring Ferdinand finally shows up and everyone acts scared of him, someone in the audience throws down a bouquet of flowers, and he comes charging out everybody runs from him, including the matador, but he stops in the middle of the ring to smell the flowers and nothing the matador could do would provoke Ferdinand into fighting him. He became so furious that he even pulled his hair out. Eventually they had to take Ferdinand back to where he lived, and he could continue to just sit there and smell the flowers.

{{tropelist}}
* [[Gentle Giant]]: Ferdinand
* [[All Deserts Have Cacti]]: Although the story is set in the rather arid regions of Southern Spain, we obviously see prickly pear cacti in the background.
* [[Easter Egg]]: In the Disney adaptation, one of the spectators entering the bullring is [[Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Disney film)|Snow White]]
* [[Face Palm]]: The matador delivers an ''epic'' one when Ferdinand refuses to fight.
* [[Fridge Horror]]: The old way of bullfighting involved the bull eventually being ''killed'', via being stabbed with spears from picadors then finished off by the matador with a sword.
* [[Spexico]] obvious in the dress of the bull scouts, and the architecture of Madrid.
* [[Hitler Ate Sugar]]: Subverted, Hitler was known to detest this story and its morals.

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[[Category:Children's Literature]]
[[Category:The Story of Ferdinand]]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Story of Ferdinand, The}}