Arts versus Sports

It's annoyed me for years that the Arts in our newspapers get such short shrift compared to Sport. Oh, yes, we have two pages (on the same day, Thursday) each week, given over to the Arts. But wait, Sport not only gets a minimum of three or four pages per day, but a complete and separate section of its own on a Friday. 

Reviews of concerts and theatre events each get a minimum number of words (300) and even some of those may be cut at the sub-editor's discretion, if they get a review at all. And sometimes the reviews are so late that they're no use to someone making up their mind whether to go to a show or not. The Taieri Musical Theatre production of Grease which took place last week from Thursday to Saturday, with four performance in all, got a review, but it didn't appear until Monday this week, after the show had closed. This isn't unusual. 

So I was immensely pleased to see someone else commenting on this issue in today's paper. 

Letter to the Editor in the Otago Daily Times, 28.7.16, page 20.

The ODT (7.7.16) reported in just 87 words the outstanding clean sweep by the New Zealand Youth choir at a recent international competition in Pardubice, Czech Republic. The choir won all four categories and the Grand Prix.

Imagine if this [had] been given an All Blacks’ victory treatment. Front page, with a picture, it would have included: every piece of music the choirs sang, how many points were awarded in each category, the judges’ comments, which choir members had sore throats or mild colds, biographical details of “new caps” in the choir and performance statistics for those who had been in the choir before, comments on their training and preparation, and reactions to the win from singing teachers and choral experts. The conductor would be a household name.

Dreaming, I know, as apparently we are far more interested in reading 500 words on the naming of the Russian Olympic athletic team.

Rosemary McBryde, 

Waitati. 

Dale Ralph Davis

I've just finished reading Dale Ralph Davis' book, The Wisdom and the Folly - an exposition of the Book of First Kings, for what must be the third time, I think (and it only came out in 2002).   I've got all of his set of commentaries on the history books in the Bible: they run through from Joshua to 2nd Chronicles. 

What I like about his commentaries is that there a wonderful mix of real exposition and application, solid background, good storytelling that relates to the original texts, and humour.   Yes, humour - something most commentaries lack.  

Davis is no lightweight - as one of the reviewers quoted on the back cover notes: The range of scholarship is extraordinary (is there any learned book or paper on First Kings that this writer has not winkled out?).  And that's the thing.  Davis can stand in the ring and box with the best of them.  He never disagrees with another writer completely; in one footnote he will castigate the writer for ignoring the text itself and reconstructing it (he has a particular concern about those commentators who claim to be able to read which 'later Deuteronimist' added which verse or line, or rearragned the text), in another he will note that the same writer has made a valuable contribution to our understanding.   He will note that 'many writers' believe that such and such a biblical town was located here or there; Davis will have a good reason for saying that they're wrong...

You can have confidence in Davis, I believe.  He's certainly done his homework.   But beyond this he's concerned to bring out the reason why the Biblical writer has written what he's written; why he's left out details that might be of interest; why he focuses on one action in the life of a king and not another.  And overall Davis does this very well. 

Furthermore, Davis has a wonderful fund of relevant stories: he retells incidents from the American Civil War and from both the World Wars, stories relating to baseball and other sports, and anecdotes from the lives of great preachers and saints.  What's the relevance?   The war stories reflect the foolish behaviour of the kings and their warfare in First Kings, and reinforce the message; the sports stories reflect the management, intution, and craftiness of coaches and players and connect that to the way the kings and prophets and others behave in the Scriptural text; the anecdotes remind us that God doesn't change and his saints both need to remember this, and be reminded of it.

I'd love to quote something of Davis' humour, but it's difficult to pick out a line without providing the context in which the (punch)line works.  His wit and self-effacing humour pervade the books. 

If you've found other commentaries tedious, or obscure, or heavygoing, try out Davis. 

TVNZ7 under threat

I've only recently discovered TVNZ7 because we only got Freeview in the last few months.   Admittedly TVNZ7 has a tendency to repeat itself, which can be fine if the subject is interesting enough. This is obviously part of their policy and means that programmes get more than a single airing, and turn up at different times of the day. 

They have a bit too much news on for my taste - the less news the better, is my motto.  By which I mean TV news, since it's entirely geared around whatever they have pictures of.  If there aren't any pictures, it's not news.

But TVNZ7 is under threat of closure.  For a start it isn't interested in sport, which makes it something of a heretic's channel in NZ.  It's very interested in ART which makes it something of an oddball channel in NZ.  And it's interested in talking about art, and showing it, and thinking about it, and discussing it and everything else you can do with it.   There's a programme on one of the other main channels - How to look at a painting - or something along those lines.   It's not a bad programme - it's shown late at night, of course, when everyone's making their last hot drink before going to bed - and Justin Paton, the presenter, is a good communicator.  But it has a tendency to do the quick flick thing, where picture after picture is whipped across the screen until your eyeballs fall out.   Occasionally Justin will stop and focus (or is allowed to stop and focus) and then the programme actually comes to life, when he tells you what is able to be seen in the painting in question.  But this doesn't happen nearly often enough.

TVNZ7 is far more inclined to stop and look.   That's what I like about it. 

Please! a moratorium!

"She died doing the thing she loved."

Apart from the sheer cliche aspect of this phrase, it's becoming the 'thing' to say when someone falls off a cross country bike and kills themselves, or drowns crossing a river while tramping, or while kayaking on a lake, or falls off a mountain while climbing. Just to name a few examples.

I think it's time for a moratorium on this sick-making phrase, which not only appears in news reports - usually a friend is quoted as saying it - but also in obituaries and death notices. It's as if there's some kudos in dying while you're doing something sporty.

But what about people who die while looking after their family, or while baking a pie for a sick neighbour, or while playing the piano in a concert, or while painting a wonderful painting, or while trying to finish a remarkable book? Don't they die doing something they love? But you never hear about it.

As always, outdoor activity and sport are seen as the king things to do. Yup, they're worth doing, but not usually worth dying for.

Artists are important

The loss of recognition of artists, thinkers, and scientists has impoverished our culture in innumerable ways, but let me mention one. When virtually all of a culture’s celebrated figures are in sports or entertainment, how few possible role models we offer the young. There are so many other ways to lead a successful and meaningful life that are not denominated by money or fame. Adult life begins in a child’s imagination, and we’ve relinquished that imagination to the marketplace.


Dana Gioia
“The Impoverishment of American Culture” in The Wall Street Journal

Now for athlete's hands

It’s difficult to resist coming back to the topic of athlete’s foot/fingers/hands even though the focus of this blog is supposed to be the arts rather than the sporting world. Still, if one can’t be a bit random at times in terms of topics on a blog entitled Random Notes, what’s the point of having such a blog? And, after all, searches for athlete’s foot/fingers/hands are very common; whereas searches for other topics on my blog aren’t quite so frequent.
So, onto the gross part: as a result of checking out the searches for athlete’s foot/fingers/hands I discovered an article on ‘why athletes pee on their hands.’ O…k….
Seemingly it’s a waste of time for them to do so, so it’s a bit of a superstition, and the writer of the article Why Athletes Pee on Their Hands explains why. Urine, rather than toughening the hands, actually softens the skin, since it’s a form of moisturiser. One lives and learns. However, I won’t offer that usual advice: Don’t try this at home. Try it - it certainly won’t hurt you. Just make sure you clean up after you!
Another site notes that, ‘One of our most cherished honours is to have become the preferred destination for care of the professional athlete’s hand and wrist.’ When I wrote my original tongue-in-cheek post I hadn’t given the care of athlete’s hands the slightest thought; while the fingers had come into the picture, the hands hadn't. And there’s no doubt athlete’s hands suffer enormously, taking a huge amount of strain. This applies especially to those who toss themselves around by the hands on athletic horses or those uneven bars. The strain on the hands must be enormous. (I was watching some young people doing just this on telly, on the weekend.)
Yet another good reason why people should stick to music and forget sport. If you’re going to have some form of RSI, then far better to have got it in the pursuit of beauty.

Book of the Week

Okay, book of the week: The Encyclopedia of Nutritional Supplements by Michael Murray. 576 pages of information on improving your health naturally. I thought it was only sports people who took nutritional supplements, but seems like everyone and his brother/sister is into it.
I find it hard to imagine anyone working their way through nearly 600 pages of stuff on such a topic, but plainly I’m lacking in imagination. As one reviewer on Amazon.com puts it: This is an excellent reference book on vitamins and other nutritional supplements and a "must have" for those interested in learning more about improving their health naturally. It is very well laid out and chock-a-block full of useful information on the dosage, available forms and reasons why each supplement is beneficial. It makes me more confident when I'm shopping for supplements and I'm able to avoid making mistakes buying "snake oil" or empty supplements that have little nutritional value. Thank you Dr. Murray.
I just had a thought. Maybe this is the book to check up on when you’re trying to find out about athlete’s foot and athlete’s fingers, as so many people on Google seem to be doing. And since sportspeople are amongst the highest users of nutritional supplements, the book must surely contain something about this topic.

Lining up

I’ve never been one for lining up for hours for a concert or a sporting event. If I can’t get in the door quick smart, I’m not particularly interested. That may be because I live in a smallish city that’s notorious (so we’re led to believe) for people booking tickets at the last minute.
When I see people spending all night out on the street to be the first in line for tickets for something I just have to go ho hum. Better things to do. I’m sure at some period of my life (maybe in my youth) I’ve lined up for something, but whatever it was, the memory has long gone.
That’s why I’d use a broker if I was going for something like Red Sox tickets. Not that I’m likely to be, since I live in a different part of the world, but if I was, I’d try out the Great Seats brokers. They don’t just sell Red Sox tickets, they sell tickets for Jerry Seinfield, Police and a host of other concerts. Come in out of the cold and go online for your front row seats…!