The Wisden of crowds

[cosmolinguist]

There's something lovely about walking somewhere, in the dark and cold that seems especially biting after a sunny day, and hearing about an Ashes seres from 33 years ago, vividly enough retold that I got caught up in the story of it all. The scores and dialogue may. possibly not have been remembered perfectly but there was more than enough detail for me to marvel at it -- I can't talk about cricket that comprehensively, even if I've just seen it -- and for me to be surprised, a bit, when the story ends and I find myself not in an English summer afternoon surrounded by people similarly marveling at something that's just happened, but walking along in chilly darkness, many years later, maveling at something that is new only to me but no less marvelous for that.

Comments

[magister]

Glad you enjoyed it. <3

[cosmolinguist]

I really liked that the story was so tenacious, it could be told in all kinds of ways to all kinds of people, including us when we were so tired we'd hardly been talking at all, and still have this effect.

[quuf.livejournal.com]

I don't understand the references, but I love the words.

[cosmolinguist]

I bet you'd like cricket. I could recommend a book or two if you'd ever like to understand the references. :)

[quuf.livejournal.com]

I recall watching a test match on the telly with Uncle Alan, who did his best to explain the game, but I think I fell asleep at hour four -- or was it day four? I forget. :)

And I played cricket once! (Well, in a manner of speaking). I bought a bat at Redgates in downtown Sheffield, and cousin Phil and I went to Hillsborough Park to try it out. Talk about a fools' errand: He bowled . . . and mistook my ankle for the wicket. I writhed on the grass for a couple minutes, serenaded by Phil's laughter-inflected apologies, then limped around the rest of the day.

Would love to see your book recommendations, if you don't mind. And I still have the bat stored away somewhere! Haven't set eyes on it in years, but I think it has the name of an Indian player on it.

[cosmolinguist]

Ah, but you can fall asleep! And wake up again, and go for walks and do the dishes and make dinner and drink beer, and the cricket is still there for you. You can wander away from it, or have a nap, and come back and catch up. It's one of the things I love about it.

The book I'd recommend starting with is Anyone But England by Mike Marquese. He's an American and a Marxist and as the title might imply he's something of an outsider to cricket. I really like that perspective; not waxing lyrical or reactionary or establishment like so much English writing. And it helps that he understands how fundamentally weird cricket is, even though he loves it.

I'm wondering now which Indian cricketer your bat has on it. :)

[quuf.livejournal.com]

All right, you've sold me in a matter of a few sentences. :)

I see Marquese's book's subtitle is Cricket and the National Malaise. Now I'm really intrigued! Dad said just now that the point of the game is to wear down the bowler. "So it's a game of attrition?" I asked. "Yes," he answered. We also speculated that in the very unlikely scenario that cricket becomes an Olympic sport, the Olympic Games themselves will have to be extended from two weeks to 20. LOL.

I'll dig out the bat and will let you know the name of the Indian cricketeer. I know Indians are mad about the game.

[cosmolinguist]

Your dad talks like a batsman. :) Cricket is kind of a war of attrition. The bowlers will say it's all about wearing down the batsmen.

Probably theyre both right. The only difference between them is that bowlers can mess up and four or six runs might get scored off them, but they go right back and bowl again; if the batsman messes up and gets out, theyre done. (For that innings, at least.)

We also speculated that in the very unlikely scenario that cricket becomes an Olympic sport, the Olympic Games themselves will have to be extended from two weeks to 20. LOL.

I'm sure it was, you know, at some point... But actually cricket has other forms besides the five-day Tests. There's a kind called Twenty20, or T20, that lasts about as long as a baseball game (indeed is so like baseball that I don't have any use for it). But it's the most popular kind of cricket, thanks to being what's played in the Indian Premier League.

[quuf.livejournal.com]

How's this for serendipity? I stumbled upon it just today, having no idea cricket would pop up:

Later, [Samuel Beckett] was to play for Dublin University and played two first-class games against Northamptonshire. As a result, he became the only Nobel laureate to have an entry in Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, the "bible" of cricket.

[cosmolinguist]

Ha, it's nothing like a bible, it's much less controversial. :)

Lovely Samuel Beckett. An ex who's still dear to me is enamored of him, and I'm always encountering more reasons to think he's justified in that opinion.

[cosmolinguist]

Indeed I've just told Andrew about my overthinking-of-this-Wisden-as-bible metaphor, and he agreed, saying "it's much more like the Book of Common Prayer!"

Made me laugh, but I'm not sure anyone else would find it apt or amusing.

[quuf.livejournal.com]

Made me laugh, too!

Beckett really did give beggars the coat off his back. That's the sort of chap he was.