Here are two pieces that might require you to put on your thinking caps.
Roger Robinson, Then and Now
Several people have recently sent me a copy of an article by Aussie, Masters runner, Roger Robinson that originally appeared in Outside Magazine. It's about life, racing, and living to the hilt after age 80. I think that age is quickly creeping up on many of our readers and some have even arrived on that bus. In the article Robinson talks about a recent experience racing a 3000 meters on the track against all comers and his thoughts about doing that as he was being lapped multiple times. Is it worth it? Are there benefits? Is he being reasonable in his expectations? What are his expectations? Although it did not greatly inspire me to go racing under such conditions, it may inspire you. I think one way to avoid getting passed is to run road races and start on the back row. That way only you will do the passing, unless of course you take off too fast and then all those you thought you had beaten start putting you back where you belong. I've noticed that when they give out awards at races where there are youngsters as well as a few 80 year olds, the audience always seems to want to give a standing ovation when those over 80s stagger up to get their awards. Is it to congratulate them for longevity, willingness to get out there at their age, or what? Why should we feel any different from a youngster who got third place?Often times it is only one person of either gender and I ask, "Who did they beat to merit such applause?" Well, Robinson explains some of this from his point of view. Roger Robinson, Living Old to Run Link.
And while I have your attention I wanted to share this query with you from John Cobley the astute writer of the blog racingpast.ca. If you have a thought or better still an answer to John's question you can send it this way at irathermediate@gmail.com Respondents will receive a 'free' subscription to this blog.
Bizarre Runner Depicted in a Respected Novel
It’s not difficult to find a novel about
runners--Echenoz’s recent book on Zatopek comes to mind--but I can’t recall
ever finding a novel with a runner as a minor character. Until now.
And what a strange character this runner
is.
I have just been reading The Fox in the Attic by Richard Hughes
for a book group. The novel was published in 1961 to high critical acclaim. It
was to be the first book of a trilogy, but the third was never completed.
Hughes’s novel is set in 1923 and compares
British and German cultures following WW1. The first half of the book is set in
England, while the second takes place in Germany and features a young Adolf
Hitler as a character.
The runner appears near the end of the
novel when the central character, Augustine, is being guided around the
Bohemian district of Munich. Reinhold, his guide, sees the runner “at the top
of a tall lamp-post, squatting cross-legged on the very lamp itself.” We are
told that at this moment the runner is listening to the snoring of a “burgher”
through an upstairs window. Reinhold calls to him, “Come down, Jacinto, and
have a drink with us horrible Philistines! Help us to wash out our sins.” But
Jacinto “only shook his head slightly, finger to the lips.”
Although winter, Jacinto is dressed “only
in vest and running shorts.” Hughes describes him as “a dark young man, who
looked like a prentice yogi.” The guide then tells Augustine, “Jacinto’s a
young Brazilian sculptor of distinct promise. He’s also a first-class
professional runner: he lives for his art but runs for his living.”
Jacinto’s unusual artistic interests are
explained by Reinhold, the guide: “He would now appear to be cultivating a
connoisseurship in snoring. Doubtless he sprints from superlative snorer to
snorer all over the city. I bet he’s just finished his rounds.”
After this explanation to Augustine,
Reinhold again calls Jacinto down, and when the runner slides to the ground, he
is asked, “Tell me, is it possible to translate the essential rhythms of a
snore like that into marble?”
Once inside a café, Jacinto asks Augustine,
“Can you run?” When Augustine answers, “Yes…no, I mean not like you,” Jacinto
is relieved: “Then I needn’t challenge you when I’d far rather get drunk.” But
he still questions Augustine: “If you don’t run what do you do? I mean for a
living.” Reinhold interrupts here: “He snores.” Jacinto takes this joke
seriously: “Impossible! He hasn’t the nose.”
Finally Jacinto argues aesthetics with
Augustine and completely dominates the discussion, partly because he doesn’t
listen to Augustine’s ideas and partly because Augustine is quickly overcome by
the strength of the Munich beer.
Then, after just 3½ pages Jacinto
disappears from the novel.
Richard Hughes wrote this novel in the UK during the 1950s. He would of course have been familiar with Roger Bannister’s achievements. As well, he would probably have been aware of Zatopek and Pirie. But I suspect his idea of a runner-character was initiated by Dr. Otto Peltzer, the celebrated German runner of the 1920s. Peltzer became well-known to the British in that decade after running brilliantly at London’s Stamford Bridge in 1926. He was also known to be an eccentric, carrying around a large bag of “medicines” wherever he went. But if Peltzer was Hughes’s original inspiration for Jacinto, I can’t explain why he chose to make him a Brazilian. After all, Hughes was using Jacinto to illustrate the art movement in post-WW1 Germany. Nevertheless, I think he made Jacinto a runner because he clearly thought running to be an eccentric activity—a common attitude in the UK before the 1970s running boom.
Does anyone out there in in the “Vest”
world know of any other novels where runners are minor characters?
John Cobley
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