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| Dear Karl, it sounds as if you are very busy with your smoking, shitting and childcare arrangements. |
I enjoy a good
book about football. Not only do they lend me credibility and verisimilitude
in pub debates, but they also help me surprise people who would not have
considered such analogies relevant to their lives with little nuggets of transferable
insight, such as the comparison (stolen without prejudice or fear of
consequences from Myths and Facts
about Football: The Economics and Psychology of the World’s Greatest
Sport) of England’s statistical over-performance on the international stage
with the staggering stupidity of current governmental policy on exiting the
European Union. The extrapolated point is that being at the heart of a network
of experience and expertise exchange has massive benefits for a country whose
population and therefore pool of talent is tiny when compared to other global players
like Brazil, whereas not being there brings equally considerable disadvantages.
Got that, Pfeffel?
Back to books though, and this one came to my attention primarily
because of one of the contributors, whose other works I enjoy reservedly on
occasion.
The premise: two famous European writers exchange letters (emails) whilst
watching the 2014 World Cup finals in Brazil, one from his armchair in Sweden,
the other in the homes and bars (and in one instance, the famous Estádio
Jornalista Mário Filho, or as it’s better known, the Maracanã Stadium) in Rio
de Janeiro.
The writers: the first, Karl Ove Knausgaard, Norwegian author of amongst
other things the infamously titled My Struggle, a six-book serial epic,
meandering through a life not markedly different from that of the author, in
hyper-realistic prose. The second, Fredrik Ekelund, is a Swedish translator and
author of books on football, crime novels, poetry, and in one notable instance,
his experience living as a transvestite. They're friends, and display a great deal of affection for each other.
The result? Not too much about football, in all honesty. We’re treated
to the views of two strikingly different men on the way their lives have been
lived, on what brings them pleasure and what doesn’t, on what it means to be a
man, and of course, there’s a bit about football. Karl Ove loves a tactical
match, even at the expense of goals and excitement, whereas Fredrik wants
passion, flair, and style. Typically, they each identify with contrasting teams
– Karl Ove with Andrea Pirlo’s Italian team (cynical, devious, blessed with
talent but tactically astute), whereas Fredrik finds himself swept up in the fervour
for the Brazil side that everyone in Rio expected to waltz to the trophy with few
missteps, playing open, expansive, delicious football and with no great
tactical acumen – much like David Luiz. Karl Ove mixes watching and writing
with childcare, missing deadlines, writing essays and sleeping in front of the
television, whereas Fredrik plays beach football, drinks caipirinhas, talks with
poets and enjoys the hospitality of the city he loves.
It’s as much a meditation on attitudes to class and literature as it is
a truthful reflection on what was billed as the greatest football tournament ever. It's often amusing, and informative, and insightful. Each wanders through his own beliefs (or lack thereof), Karl Ove bemoaning the feminist
disapprobation of his novels, Fredrik musing on the inherent nature of man as a
result, but often each disappears into their own rabbit hole at the slightest
provocation, so as a genuine back-and-forth discussion there’s not too much
resolution or agreement, except where they agree to disagree. However, it is
both enlightening and entertaining, and there’s just enough football to keep it
from becoming discomfiting. One seriously negative thing I will say is that it’s
a great shame that Ekelund’s work is not more widely translated into English –
his enthusiasms are infectious!
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