Brain Food #761
The ballet of the masses
Thoughts of the day
Since last weekend was the closing weekend of most major football leagues across Europe, today’s post is dedicated to the unlikely topic of football.
Football is the most popular sport in the world, thanks to its relatively easy set of rules, and accessibility in terms of what one needs to play it (goalposts in most neighbourhoods are imaginary, or composed of anything but posts). 265 million people play football globally, and 3.5 million are football fans. And so, football has a scale that no other team sport can provide.
As composer Dmitri Shostakovich said, “Football is the ballet of the masses.”
This weekend, I was also thinking about awe. In some ways, the two topics are strangely connected.
Perhaps football’s near-religious following has to do with the sense of awe being a football fan provides: doing something in unison with others, undergoing a spiritual experience, witnessing something beautiful, making or listening to music, and experiencing a sense of vastness.
So its appeal lies far beyond the concepts of physicality and winning. It is about connecting with others to form something bigger than our individual selves, and to leave our individual lives behind, even for a few hours per week.
“...So please, be tolerant of those who describe a sporting moment as their best ever. We do not lack imagination, nor have we had sad and barren lives; it is just that real life is paler, duller, and contains less potential for unexpected delirium.”
― Nick Hornby, Fever Pitch
Of course, experiencing awe can be accessible to all of us, and it does not necessarily have to involve a ball. More to be explored this week.
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Coolio!