Sports Writers: Our Heros' Poets

I love reading about sports and in particular, about the great historical feats in sports.  Ken Dryden’s description of being a Montreal Canadiens in the 70s is enthralling, while Bill Simmon's argument in favor of Russell as a better player than Chamberlain is insightful and comical (if a little hysterical, but then again, that's partly what makes it comical).

Despite the many books written about sports, few are well written. Despite the fact that I am not an English major, nor a literary critic (and, let’s face it, I’m not particularly eloquent), I will say that for generations of sports fans who did not witness an important sporting event, a storyteller is critical in ensuring that the exploit in question is not forgotten.  And that, in-and-of-itself, is the standard (well, my standard) for a well-written historical sports book: not forgetting the stories and details *because* of the writing.

A great example: Seth Davis' When March Went Mad is a wonderful description of the 1979 National Championship in college basketball that featured Magic Johnson for the Michigan State Spartans versus Larry Bird and the Indiana State Sycamores.  In fact, it's about how Johnson and Bird entered college, about a pivotal turning point in the business of men's collegiate basketball, about race in late 1970s America, about the marketing of athletes, and so on.  I've read that book a while ago, but still the stories within the book, the little anecdotes, persist in my brain.  Davis is just a really great writer.

Other sports books I've read, the stories disappear.  I don't think it's necessarily because the exploits described were less enthralling or less important or less impressive.  Certainly, I could have been in a particular head space when I read Davis' book such that I was particularly receptive to his writing style and subject matter, or that *any* sports book would have left a lasting impression at that moment in time.  Perhaps, but I think that a large measure of its resonance is due to Davis' wonderful writing.  

Eduardo Galeano's Futbol a Sol y Sombra (Soccer in Sun and Shadow) is another great example.  What's interesting about this book is that Galeano retells the important historical moments of soccer in a very personal and romanticized manner.  The line between what actually occurred and what he remembers is blurred and as a reader, it is difficult to decipher where fact ends and fiction, or subjective recollection, begins.  But the truth is, it doesn't matter.  There's a certain texture to his words that leave an impression and helps solidify the stories in your brain.  

And it's not just written stories.  Other forms of story telling can be equally poignant.  Sports documentaries, for example, can have a similar effect.  One of my favorite sports documentary is When We Were Kings by Leon Gast.  It tells the story of the 1974 fight in Zaire between Ali and Foreman and to this day, that fight is probably one of the moments in sports that I wish I could have witnessed.  Songs can also have this type of emotional effect (e.g. "50 Mission Cap" by the Tragically Hip)

All of this reminds me of the following passage from Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling:

The poet cannot do what that other does, he can only admire, love and rejoice in the hero. Yet he too is happy, and not less so, for the hero is as it were his better nature, with which he is in love, rejoicing in the fact that this after all is not himself, that his love can be admiration. He is the genius of recollection, can do nothing except call to mind what has been done, do nothing but admire what has been done; he contributes nothing of his own, but is jealous of the intrusted treasure. He follows the option of his heart, but when he has found what he sought, he wanders before every man’s door with his song and with his oration, that all may admire the hero as he does, be proud of the hero as he is. This is his achievement, his humble work, this is his faithful service in the house of the hero. If he thus remains true to his love, he strives day and night against the cunning of oblivion which would trick him out of his hero, then he has completed his work, then he is gathered to the hero, who has loved him just as faithfully, for the poet is as it were the hero’s better nature, powerless it may be as a memory is, but also transfigured as a memory is. Hence no one shall be forgotten who was great, and though time tarries long, though a cloud of misunderstanding takes the hero away, his lover comes nevertheless, and the longer the time that has passed, the more faithfully will he cling to him.

The sports writer needs the athlete; the athlete needs the sports writer.

Diego