My issue is not whether an a.e. can come from a sporting event -- it's whether it's worth talking about. (except while sitting on a bar stool)
What can such discussion reveal that's worth knowing about either the event or the person experiencing it? So -- yes, I've experienced a sense of memorable drama from a ball game -- even if it was only on a car radio listening to Ryne Sandberg hit his second home run of the game in the ninth inning against St. Louis back in September of the 1984 season. But who cares ? Except for those who play it -- there's nothing about baseball that's worth knowing -- it's just a pastime -- a pleasant diversion from the steam of events that define our lives. But dramatic poetry can be and should be different - - right? At least Aristotle thought so (and if he ever wrote an "Athletics" -- it's been lost -- just like his book on comedy) **************************************************** As I've been confessing, I'm mulling a still-woefully-fuzzy way the nature of those things we think we are are "referring to" when we say "a.e.". If we can momentrily talk about "kinds" of a.e., we get several kinds from a good Shakespeare play, and I don't pretend a football game can supply all those kinds. But there's a particular kind, the sort Aristotle chiefly emphasized, that comes from the unfolding of a "drama" with such things as an inevitability, triumph and failure, Nemesis, and more. I claim I've felt that in several sporting contests. However, a given Shakespeare play teems with a.e.'s (recall my earlier claim that works like plays and novels are not a single WoA -- they are a collection of many of them). Meantime, it is the very rare sporting contest that reaches a powerful level of drama, so I certainly wouldn't tell anyone they can just go to the ballpark and they're likely to have the same share of a.e.'s they'd get from a Shakespeare play. Tell me honestly -- have you never been a spectator to a "non-fiction" event -- on tv or in an arena -- whern you realized you were being seized by a sense of memorable drama? _____________________________________________________________ Ultimate Travel Deals - Click Now! http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL2211/fc/Ioyw6ijmDRMj8HofdjKSxbeBUPInwr RoY3gLzUn2JI0gOq1IqhjsCA/?count=1234567890
