Category: culture

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culture sport

The Soul of a Stadium is in its Name and the English are Preserving it

The sports stadium is a part of the fabric of a city. Any municipality worth its salt has a sporting complex but a stadium or an arena that supports top-flight athletics is something that many urban centers pursue for prestige. One of the marks of a megacity is the number of stadiums and arenas: one is not enough and the more there are the greater the prestige and the more diverse the sporting interests. The very size of modern stadiums speaks to the popularity and centrality – and, of course, the economic possibilities – of sport.

The modern sports stadium has evolved from Hellenic and Hellenistic models. Sports stadiums were often large in antiquity, demonstrating that the popularity of sport and its ability to bring people together in one place is not a modern phenomenon. Like seemingly much else, this central sporting landmark did not exist in feudal Western Europe. One could certainly argue that the dourness and backwardness of medieval Europe are connected to the lack of proper sporting complexes.

The tradition of the large stadium may have bypassed some eras but there is a traceable lineage back to those ancient archetypes. I recently visited Afrodisias and marveled at the size of the stadion. The grandeur continued into the Roman age, best exemplified by the Colosseum in Rome and later the Hippodrome of Constantinople. The modern stadium, which arose in the United Kingdom in the mid-19th century, built off the antique example.

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books culture history

The Periodic History Reader, Volume 1

A selection of histories read in the period covering January to April of 2020.

In God’s Path by Robert G. Hoyland [Oxford University Press, 2015]

The Arab Conquests and the Creation of an Islamic Empire

The rapid expansion of Islam is one of history’s most fascinating events and the exploration of its causes is just as fascinating. How could a group of nomadic tribes pour out of the desert and remake the map of late antiquity by conquering lands from the Atlantic to the Hindu Kush in a century? Hoyland’s book is an erudite account that attempts to answer that question, beginning by explaining the context of pre-Islamic Arabia and proceeding through to the fall of the Ummayad caliphate. It’s an excellent work – highly readable while expertly synthesizing the complexity of the period. The assumed premise of the question I pose above, that the Arabs came out of nowhere, is punctured by one of the many interesting insights the book provides. The Arab conquerors did not come out of nowhere – they had been fighting with and against the Byzantines and Sasanians for decades. The conquering armies weren’t filled with the fire of holy war but the pursuit of booty. They used the time-honored tradition of leaving the locals in charge after the fighting was done (as long as tributes were paid). And the conquering wasn’t as easy as posterity makes it seems, while Islam itself didn’t gain a widespread foothold for a long time (partly as a deliberate policy of Muslims, who realized that the more people converted the less revenue they made off of taxing non-Muslim populations). By no means is this a popular history: but it is highly readable while maintaining a high degree of scholarship. Highly recommended for those interested in the era. [4/5]

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books culture fiction

The Periodic Fiction Reader, Vol 1

A selection of fictional works read in the period from January-ish through April 2020.

Hyperion by Dan Simmons [4/5, for now]

Hyperion, winner of the Hugo award in 1990, is considered one of modern science fiction’s classics. I recently made my way through the same paperback I first read over twenty years ago to see how it held up (as an aside, my favorite reading medium is surely the mass-market paperback, perhaps a nostalgic reaction to the most common format in my childhood and one that is no longer as prevalent as it should be). This is a complex novel, as much a literary fiction exercise as a popular science fiction, with several plot threads deftly managed across intertwined stories with a common element: the planet Hyperion, home to a mysterious being called the Shrike, which seems to be a vengeful and murderous deity, and the equally mysterious Time Tombs, where time flows backward. The structure of the book is based on the Canterbury Tales: six travelers tell their tales while on a pilgrimage to the Time Tombs. The novel is ambitious and Simmons creates a universe of complex personalities, politics, and science. His prose struck me as somewhat muscular, reflective of the time when it was written, but there was nothing that felt dated about the overall experience and his talent as a writer is obvious. I’m unsure of my final feelings: it should be admired for its accomplishment but whether or not I enjoyed the experience of reading it is still out for verdict. I probably won’t have a final conclusion for some months yet and perhaps that in and of itself validates the reading. It’s a must for serious science fiction readers.

The Subtle Knife/The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman [5/5 and 4/5]

I’d read the full His Dark Materials trilogy not too long ago but my interest in revisiting it was rekindled after recently reading Pullman’s La Belle Sauvage and watching HBO’s serialization of the first novel. Having enough familiarity with its plot and characters, I skipped that first novel – The Golden Compass – and started my re-read with The Subtle Knife. It’s a wonderful book that seamlessly expands the story’s scope to our and other worlds while retaining focus on the journeys and growth of the main characters, Lyra and Will. The third book loses some of that focus as it takes on a full-scale universal conflict, spends more time with other characters, and develops related tangents (such as an imaginative diversion into xenobiology) though ultimately all the threads satisfyingly come back together with Lyra and Will at their center. It’s tempting to classify the trilogy as young adult fiction, given that the protagonists are adolescents, but that is to deny it due justice as a member of fantasy fiction’s pantheon and its wide appeal to readers of all ages. Pullman’s prose is excellent, the action and flow inexorable, and the characters memorable.

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culture

Best things I watched in 2016

This is a list of the best things I watched in 2016 on a screen be it a film or a television show. Obviously best is a subjective term in this case but I figure my taste exceeds that of most people so I have no qualms with saying that best is actually an objective term in this case. I suppose I should note my predilections when it comes to TV and film: my primary criterion for quality is entertainment. I like action and adventure and fun and I often find “serious” and “deep” themes in visual arts to be tiring and dull.

My enjoyment of the most recent Star Wars film, Rogue One, was challenged by a friend who asked what I learned from the film. I learned nothing but I was mightily entertained (enough to see it again). That’s what matters to me and I will argue until the end of our time on this world that entertainment is the most important aspect of art.

Of course there are exceptions and you will find them below. There are some films that challenge my perception of the world around me and force a paradigm shift in my personal philosophy and outlook. These are just as entertaining to me as are the dumb adventures that are my usual fare and so the objective becomes the subjective again as different people are entertained differently.

Note: this list covers what I actually watched in 2016 regardless of when the film or show was actually made or released.

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