Books: In praise of pickled gods

Simon Barnes's The Meaning of Sport may not find an answer to its inherent question, but it certainly is entertaining. Refuting the theory that sport is for morons, the writer argues that it is in fact an essential part of our animal nature. Review by Ken Early

Early in his new book The Meaning of Sport, the British Times's chief sportswriter Simon Barnes writes that the difference between sport and sex is that “sex is intellectually respectable, while sport is not”. Barnes, a sensitive, rather literary journalist who has written three novels (two of which are not bad, he reckons), and two books about birdwatching, is tired of people thinking he must be thick because he makes a living writing about sport.

In this book – an account of two years covering sporting events around the world from 2004-2006 – Barnes tries to dispel the (apparently widely held) notion that sport is for morons. Acknowledging that someone as clever as Marshall McLuhan scorned the sports pages with their “pickled gods and artefacts”, Barnes argues that since ancient times people have needed pickled gods, and these days the sports pages are where you find all the best stories. Politicians and businessmen can hide behind lies and cover-ups, but in sport nobody can hide from the truth. “We have politicians out of necessity: we have sports stars out of love.” He thinks that “sport has far more effect on the way we see and understand other nations than trade or cultural exchange or tourism” – in most countries, the Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo is far more famous than the prime minister of Portugal. He sees sport as an essential part of our animal nature, pointing out that all young mammals play, while young reptiles, fish and amphibians don't. And still smart people are not giving sport the respect it deserves. At least, not according to Barnes.

“ I like sport... therefore [other people believe] I am stupid; or at best not terribly clever, and will only look silly if I pretend to be clever.” But do most people really see an interest in sport as a sign of stupidity? Barnes is too busy tilting at windmills to provide any evidence: “I do things like reading books. Obviously, I can't do this because I understand them, still less because I enjoy them. I can only be doing it for the sake of showing off... [nevertheless] I will continue to write as if sport, like sex, were worth the time of an intelligent person.”

Barnes continues, “Like most people, I have a wide range of cultural references. When I write about sport, I sweep them up without apology... references to ‘Allo ‘Allo, references to... The Waste Land.” In practice, his references tend more towards The Waste Land end of the range. Eliot's epic crops up repeatedly (“so many... I had not thought sport had undone so many”, writes Barnes of the crowds at England's Rugby World Cup parade). Also Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, Flaubert, Clausewitz, Whitman, Kipling, Proust, Waugh, Camus, Joyce, Joyce, Joyce. For some reason there is a mention of Ulysses every few pages.

He rails against the “sneerers” who find this sort of thing pretentious. Of course, elevated references are only pretentious when they have no apparent relevance to the subject under discussion, as is frequently the case here. Sometimes Barnes's allusions work, as when he uses Bob Dylan's thoughts on creativity (“you've got to programme your brain not to think too much”) to describe the mentality of a great sportsman, or in the discussions of animal behaviour, with which he constructs a theory of dominance in sporting contests. Sometimes they clang, as when he pointlessly inserts a lengthy quote from Ulysses (“Time has branded them and fettered they are lodged in the room of the infinite possibilities they have ousted”) into a section on how his life might have turned out if he'd emigrated to Australia.
The sneerers will enjoy occasional purple passages like: “At the Olympic Games, the cube turns again and again: two, four, eight, sixteen. Every final takes us to 64 and then beyond, as if the stakes were determined by a phantasmagorical cube with an endless number of faces, which turns at the very essence of it all to show the face that reads infinity.” And it would take a heart of stone not to snigger at scenes of Barnes in his Athens hotel room poring over obscure Greek poetry to the strains of the Goldberg variations, “seeking each day to write a brief and unforgettable” – what else, Ulysses.

Yet for all that, Barnes's near-total lack of cynicism and unmistakable passion for his subject make him an engaging author. His indignation at the sneerers is more comic than shrill. “I am not entirely balanced about my regular appearances in Private Eye's ‘Pseud's Corner',” he admits sadly, “My feeling is that this magazine consistently confuses pseudo-intellectual with intellectual.”

There is something here for lovers of all sports: meditations on Steve Redgrave, Ellen MacArthur, Pete Sampras, Ben Johnson, Martin Johnson, Shane Warne, George Best and Wayne Rooney. There are thoughtful chapters on what makes the Olympics so intense; why Barnes believes boxing should be banned; the nature of sporting greatness; and the stupid habit of holding up sportsmen as role models (Charles Barkley: “Just because I dunk a basketball doesn't mean I should raise your kids.”

Journalist: “But you're paid to be a professional!”

Barkley: “I'm paid to kick ass on a basketball court.”)

Ultimately Barnes gets nowhere near defining “the meaning of sport”; variously sport is said to be “a juggernaut”, “a metaphor”; “a theatre of cruelty”; “a living breathing mythology”; “everything”; “nothing”. As he contemplates his failure to arrive at any definitive theory, Barnes muses, “Perhaps there is something inherently life-denying about consistency, about forcing everything into a coherent body of thought. In saying so... I subvert the very foundation of this book. But this book...  represents the thoughts of a human in all his mental chaos and contradiction.” And so the book is perhaps not especially enlightening, but multifaceted, reflective and diverting. With plenty of cheap sniggers along the way.