ABSTRACT
The international media have always been slow to show much interest in Spain—at least, as regards upbeat news stories. When interest rises, the media attention tends to be drawn to the downbeat. Indeed, the first time a significant number of FCs visited Spain was the relatively brief, three-year duration of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939). The war made the front pages of the main international newspapers and prompted some of the most preeminent journalists of the time to come to Spain: writers such as Ernest Hemingway and Arthur Koestler, and photographers such as Robert Capa and Gerda Taro, among others, came to the country to report to an international audience on a conflict that was to presage World War II (Preston, 2009).
