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Elogio da beleza atlética
O que leva um renomado professor de literatura de Stanford a escrever um livro sobre esportes? Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht esboça uma resposta ao revelar que nada jamais foi tão intenso em sua vida quanto as emoções experimentadas nos eventos esportivos a que assistiu. Entender esse fascínio, vivenciado tanto numa partida futebol quanto numa luta de boxe, é ponto de partida desta aventura intelectual sofisticada, que propõe uma análise original do fenômeno esportivo.
Para Gumbrecht, antes é preciso superar a dificuldade que os intelectuais têm de fazer elogios aos esportes, e aceitar que assistir a um evento esportivo corresponde a uma experiência estética, tal qual apreciar um concerto ou uma pintura. Pense na arrancada de Maradona do meio de campo até o gol da Inglaterra na Copa do Mundo de 1986, ultrapassando cinco adversários no caminho - essa aparição inesperada pode ser encarada como uma epifania.
Com uma prosa clara e apurada, Gumbrecht nos leva para um delicioso passeio pela história do esporte, do tempo dos semideuses gregos e gladiadores romanos à atual transformação das disputas esportivas num negócio rentável, e ainda propõe uma tipologia das diferentes sensações que os esportes provocam nos espectadores, ligadas à contemplação dos corpos, ao sofrimento, às formas, às jogadas e ao timing dos atletas.
Para Gumbrecht, antes é preciso superar a dificuldade que os intelectuais têm de fazer elogios aos esportes, e aceitar que assistir a um evento esportivo corresponde a uma experiência estética, tal qual apreciar um concerto ou uma pintura. Pense na arrancada de Maradona do meio de campo até o gol da Inglaterra na Copa do Mundo de 1986, ultrapassando cinco adversários no caminho - essa aparição inesperada pode ser encarada como uma epifania.
Com uma prosa clara e apurada, Gumbrecht nos leva para um delicioso passeio pela história do esporte, do tempo dos semideuses gregos e gladiadores romanos à atual transformação das disputas esportivas num negócio rentável, e ainda propõe uma tipologia das diferentes sensações que os esportes provocam nos espectadores, ligadas à contemplação dos corpos, ao sofrimento, às formas, às jogadas e ao timing dos atletas.
182 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2005
About the author
Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht
95 books23 followersHans Ulrich Gumbrecht is the Albert Guérard Professor in Literature in the Departments of Comparative Literature and of French & Italian (and by courtesy, he is affiliated with the Department of Iberian and Latin American Cultures/ILAC, the Department of German Studies, and the Program in Modern Thought & Literature). As a scholar, Gumbrecht focuses on the histories of the national literatures in Romance language (especially French, Spanish, and Brazilian), but also on German literature, while, at the same time, he teaches and writes about the western philosophical tradition (almost exclusively on non-analytic philosophy) with an emphasis on French and German nineteenth- and twentieth-century texts. In addition, Gumbrecht tries to analyze and to understand forms of aesthetic experience 21st-century everyday culture. Over the past forty years, he has published more than two thousand texts, including books, translated into more than twenty languages. In Europe and in South America, Gumbrecht has a presence as a public intellectual; whereas, in the academic world, he has been acknowledged by ten honorary doctorates in seven different countries: Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Portugal, Russia, and Georgia. He has also held a large number of visiting professorships, at the Collège de France, University of Lisbon, University of Manchester, and the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, among others. In the spring of 2017, he was a Martin Buber Fellow at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
October 23, 2019
Por que achamos os atletas ou as pessoas atléticas atraentes? Será que é por causa do formato do seu corpo, por causa de seus movimentos graciosos ou por causa da paixão competitiva que eles despertam na gente enquanto torcida? Segundo o linguista Hans Ulrich Gumbretch é um pouco de cada um desses elementos. Em um livro com um teto primoroso que dá gosto de ler, o estudioso nos conduz por diversas categorias de classificação dos corpos e das agências esportivas que podem justificar essa nossa necessidade de "elogiar a beleza atlética" das mais diferentes formas. Este livro vai me ajudar a tecer uma pesquisa sobre atração homossexual sobre os corpos atléticos dos super-heróis das revistas em quadrinhos e seus equivalente em live action. Nem todas as categorias dos jogos esportivos podem servir para o entretenimento super-heroico, mas muitas delas fazem eco na mesma lógica do espetáculo competitivo que gera o elogio da beleza de corpos bem definidos e de movimentos graciosos e altruístas. Um livro bastante recomendado para aqueles e aquelas que querem estudar mais a fundo as relações entre esporte, beleza e eroticidade.
September 14, 2023
Egy dalt hallgatva vagy egy verset szavalva egyidejűleg van ott a jelentés és a prozódia. Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht szerint ugyanez igaz a sportra is, legyen szó a sport műveléséről, vagy annak apollóni (elemző), vagy düonüszoszi (tömeggel eggyé váló) nézéséről és élvezetéről, innen pedig már nem nehéz a szépségének felismerése sem.
A sportokkal, különösen a versenysportokkal kapcsolatban mindig paradox érzések kavarogtak bennem, mert miközben képes voltam heves érzésekkel tombolni egy játékon, ugyanolyan lelkesen tudtam bólogatni a versenysportok megítésésével kapcsolatos intellektüel klisékre is, let légyen szó arról a felvetésről, hogy a sport a politikai manipuláció eszköze (lásd a nácikat), vagy a művészek* és tudományos körök sporttal kapcsolatos lesajnáló hangnemének jogosságáról.
Gumbrecht ezzel a könyvvel újrahuzalozta a fejemben a témát és kardcsapással oldotta fel a bennem lévő paradoxont. Ehhez a szépség fogalmát ragadta meg, ami a sportok esszenciális elemének tart és amit a sporttal való viszonyában Kant ízlésítélet elemzésére támaszt, úgy hogy a paradoxonokat paradoxonokkal kezeli. Mert mi is az a dolog, amit szépnek nevezünk? Kant szerint a szépség egy tárgy célszerűségének formája, amennyiben azt a célszerűséget bármiféle cél megjelenítése nélkül észleljük a tárgyon. Nem szükséges, hogy valaminek célja legyen, annak érdekében, hogy szép legyen, mégis amit szépnek találunk, úgy tűnik, mintha célja lenne... És valahol itt búvik meg a kisördög az egész témában, amit Gumbrecht szerintem csodálatosan szétszed, pont mint a nagy sportolók akik úgy visznek véghez nagy dolgokat, hogy hagyják, hogy dolgok történjenek velük. Olyan érzésem volt a kötet olvasása közben, mintha a szerző egy hullámon ülve írt volna, amiről azt hinné az ember, hogy ő keltette, valójában azonban szó sincs erről, mert ez a hullám eddig is ott volt és ő csak siklik rajta.
Gumbrecht visszamegy a görögök Agón (verseny) és az Araté (kiválóságra törekvés) fogalmakig, az utóbbi magába foglalja az előbbit, az előbbi azonban nem szükségképpen foglalja magába az utóbbit és innen könnyű felismerni a jelen kapitalista versenyszellemének párhuzamait, ami az Agón diadalát hozta magával a sportban (is). Számtalan kiváló sporttörténeti ismertetéssel nyitja fel az olvasó szemét és mutat rá ennek a megintcsak paradox következményeire.
Nagyon hosszan lehetne erről a könyvről beszélni, hosszabban, mint amennyi idő elolvasni, így csak ajánlani tudom.
* mert nem műalkotásként felismerhető és azokként elismerő időtálló tárgyakról van szó.
A kötet Szépség a sportban - Tömeg a stadionban címmel magyarul is megjelent. Ez a könyv két Gumbrecht kötet egyben, így nem lehetett a Goodreads felületén editionként összekapcsolni.
A sportokkal, különösen a versenysportokkal kapcsolatban mindig paradox érzések kavarogtak bennem, mert miközben képes voltam heves érzésekkel tombolni egy játékon, ugyanolyan lelkesen tudtam bólogatni a versenysportok megítésésével kapcsolatos intellektüel klisékre is, let légyen szó arról a felvetésről, hogy a sport a politikai manipuláció eszköze (lásd a nácikat), vagy a művészek* és tudományos körök sporttal kapcsolatos lesajnáló hangnemének jogosságáról.
Gumbrecht ezzel a könyvvel újrahuzalozta a fejemben a témát és kardcsapással oldotta fel a bennem lévő paradoxont. Ehhez a szépség fogalmát ragadta meg, ami a sportok esszenciális elemének tart és amit a sporttal való viszonyában Kant ízlésítélet elemzésére támaszt, úgy hogy a paradoxonokat paradoxonokkal kezeli. Mert mi is az a dolog, amit szépnek nevezünk? Kant szerint a szépség egy tárgy célszerűségének formája, amennyiben azt a célszerűséget bármiféle cél megjelenítése nélkül észleljük a tárgyon. Nem szükséges, hogy valaminek célja legyen, annak érdekében, hogy szép legyen, mégis amit szépnek találunk, úgy tűnik, mintha célja lenne... És valahol itt búvik meg a kisördög az egész témában, amit Gumbrecht szerintem csodálatosan szétszed, pont mint a nagy sportolók akik úgy visznek véghez nagy dolgokat, hogy hagyják, hogy dolgok történjenek velük. Olyan érzésem volt a kötet olvasása közben, mintha a szerző egy hullámon ülve írt volna, amiről azt hinné az ember, hogy ő keltette, valójában azonban szó sincs erről, mert ez a hullám eddig is ott volt és ő csak siklik rajta.
Gumbrecht visszamegy a görögök Agón (verseny) és az Araté (kiválóságra törekvés) fogalmakig, az utóbbi magába foglalja az előbbit, az előbbi azonban nem szükségképpen foglalja magába az utóbbit és innen könnyű felismerni a jelen kapitalista versenyszellemének párhuzamait, ami az Agón diadalát hozta magával a sportban (is). Számtalan kiváló sporttörténeti ismertetéssel nyitja fel az olvasó szemét és mutat rá ennek a megintcsak paradox következményeire.
Nagyon hosszan lehetne erről a könyvről beszélni, hosszabban, mint amennyi idő elolvasni, így csak ajánlani tudom.
* mert nem műalkotásként felismerhető és azokként elismerő időtálló tárgyakról van szó.
A kötet Szépség a sportban - Tömeg a stadionban címmel magyarul is megjelent. Ez a könyv két Gumbrecht kötet egyben, így nem lehetett a Goodreads felületén editionként összekapcsolni.
April 22, 2023
Dado que trata una temática rara vez tratada, este ensayo posee valor genuino (si no fuera por su originalidad, le habría puesto una estrella menos).
Sin embargo, el autor cae en vicios que van haciendo la lectura cada vez más agónica. Comenzando por la patada a las interpretaciones de Freud, Foucault, Norbert Elias, Caillois o Bourdieau (por considerarlas intelectualistas) a, mucho peor, la mitificación excesiva de atletas particulares sin distanciamiento alguno y con una proyección personal rallando el ridículo.
El ensayo tiene grandes virtudes por su atrevimiento especulativo: asociar arte y deporte a través de los conceptos (aun a menudo erráticos, por cierto) de performance, arete griega, sacrificio y estética kantiana. Es en este último ejemplo donde mejor se ve la tensión (y contradicción) entre la libertad subjetiva y significante del arte con la normatividad teleológica y calificadora del deporte. Pero, y ahí Gumbrecht es muy sugerente, sin duda hay poderosos nexos de unión: véase el Kendo japonés, por ejemplo.
El capítulo más interesante, a mi parecer, es aquel en que describe el extraño itinerario histórico y discontinuo de los deportes, ahondando en la lucha ideológica entre amateurismo y profesionalización económica (aunque tampoco le saca mucho partido, al faltarle espíritu crítico al autor). También merecen un vistazo sus parámetros estéticos en el deporte y su análisis de la belleza de las jugadas.
En definitiva, sugerente e interesante (audaz), pero fallido, mistificador, pesado y delirante.
Sin embargo, el autor cae en vicios que van haciendo la lectura cada vez más agónica. Comenzando por la patada a las interpretaciones de Freud, Foucault, Norbert Elias, Caillois o Bourdieau (por considerarlas intelectualistas) a, mucho peor, la mitificación excesiva de atletas particulares sin distanciamiento alguno y con una proyección personal rallando el ridículo.
El ensayo tiene grandes virtudes por su atrevimiento especulativo: asociar arte y deporte a través de los conceptos (aun a menudo erráticos, por cierto) de performance, arete griega, sacrificio y estética kantiana. Es en este último ejemplo donde mejor se ve la tensión (y contradicción) entre la libertad subjetiva y significante del arte con la normatividad teleológica y calificadora del deporte. Pero, y ahí Gumbrecht es muy sugerente, sin duda hay poderosos nexos de unión: véase el Kendo japonés, por ejemplo.
El capítulo más interesante, a mi parecer, es aquel en que describe el extraño itinerario histórico y discontinuo de los deportes, ahondando en la lucha ideológica entre amateurismo y profesionalización económica (aunque tampoco le saca mucho partido, al faltarle espíritu crítico al autor). También merecen un vistazo sus parámetros estéticos en el deporte y su análisis de la belleza de las jugadas.
En definitiva, sugerente e interesante (audaz), pero fallido, mistificador, pesado y delirante.
June 23, 2017
I loved it. Gumbrecht's framework is nuanced, which makes his work unique in that its not a sports-for-sports sake work, not sociology, and not mainstream sports writing. It's a philosophical work about aesthetics, really. Plus, it's personal, which I appreciate as Gumbrecht's framework flows out of his emotional relationship to sports. Bonus: the best explication/application of Kantian aesthetic I've seen. Lovely book.
April 26, 2013
I bought this book having certain expectations in my mind. I remember reading several essays from Gumbrecht's "1926", and though I cannot clearly remember what they are about, I remember that I enjoyed reading them. Maybe it happened because of the form, Gumbrecht's style of writing, which is quite easy and I would even say full of grace. Having all that in mind, I took from the shelve "In Praise of Athletic Beauty".
However, I did not get what I wanted. Well, Rolling Stones warned about that several decades ago :) The book mainly consist's of Gumbrecht's own meditations, which I, personally, would label as too philosophical and speculative. It was too descriptive with its rather long (in relationship to the whole size of the book, of course) historical resumes; and these descriptions were intertwined with the author's own thoughts, which he based upon the body of Western philosophical texts. I would like the book to be more analytic than descriptive, but that is my own preference.
Still, there were certain ideas I liked. Firstly, I found interesting Gumbrecht's idea of sport as something that is also connected to the sphere of aesthetics, and watching sport as a form of aesthetic experience. That is clearly something so think about, though my first move was to agree with him without any "but". The author relies on Kant, when arguing why sport is connected to aesthetics, and Frankfurt School to show and debunk the parting between high-culture and mass-culture. From my point of view, he does it in a quite persuasive way, though I could not agree on his use of a category of "taste" without referencing to Bourdieu and the constructiveness of this category. Secondly, the author illustrates that being a fan or watching sport passionately is a form of hedonism, and it is something I would undoubtedly agree on. Further, I also found interesting Gumbrecht's connection of arete and agon to today sport as factors that can explain what we are interested in particularly when watching sport games, and what stays behind our judgments on athelets and moves that they do while playing.
Overall, I would recommend the book if one wants an interesting and thought-provoking easy-reading, or if one's interested in the aesthetics of sport.
However, I did not get what I wanted. Well, Rolling Stones warned about that several decades ago :) The book mainly consist's of Gumbrecht's own meditations, which I, personally, would label as too philosophical and speculative. It was too descriptive with its rather long (in relationship to the whole size of the book, of course) historical resumes; and these descriptions were intertwined with the author's own thoughts, which he based upon the body of Western philosophical texts. I would like the book to be more analytic than descriptive, but that is my own preference.
Still, there were certain ideas I liked. Firstly, I found interesting Gumbrecht's idea of sport as something that is also connected to the sphere of aesthetics, and watching sport as a form of aesthetic experience. That is clearly something so think about, though my first move was to agree with him without any "but". The author relies on Kant, when arguing why sport is connected to aesthetics, and Frankfurt School to show and debunk the parting between high-culture and mass-culture. From my point of view, he does it in a quite persuasive way, though I could not agree on his use of a category of "taste" without referencing to Bourdieu and the constructiveness of this category. Secondly, the author illustrates that being a fan or watching sport passionately is a form of hedonism, and it is something I would undoubtedly agree on. Further, I also found interesting Gumbrecht's connection of arete and agon to today sport as factors that can explain what we are interested in particularly when watching sport games, and what stays behind our judgments on athelets and moves that they do while playing.
Overall, I would recommend the book if one wants an interesting and thought-provoking easy-reading, or if one's interested in the aesthetics of sport.
October 6, 2015
Gumbrecht's fundamental premise is that there is a reason for watching sport and writing about sport that doesn't try to make it about something else. He's right, of course, for many the experience of sport is simply about sport, about body movement, about pleasure.
Even though I teach in a sports programme I am not at all 'sporty' and don't particularly like it – but I still derive pleasure from watching sport-done-well. I won't dwell on Gumbrecht's historical content – it is always unfair for a specialist to use their own field to critique a non-specialist. It may offend my philosopher friends that I particularly like the chapter on 'fascinations', and his case that we derive pleasure in sport from watching bodies move and perform, from a sense of suffering in sports performance, from the grace of sport, from the interaction of athletes and their performance tools (I see in this my appreciation of equestrian sports), from aesthetic form, and from well-timed plays (this last is two issues for Gumbrecht – plays and timing). I see in his case a basis for some of my appreciation of the thing I work with professionally – sport.
However, and alas, so many of his examples draw on material that is culturally defined and dependent (he admits that) that the sorts of claims being made for sport qua sport are hard to sustain: quite simply, the meaning of sport, the pleasure of sport, lies in the interaction of the sprots practice and its cultural and social contexts that give it meaning. The case is elegantly made but in the long run Gumbrecht's abstraction of sport from its socio-cultural makers of meaning result it being less compelling than it at first appears. (There is a very good collection of critical essays in Sport in History, the first issue of 2008.)
Even though I teach in a sports programme I am not at all 'sporty' and don't particularly like it – but I still derive pleasure from watching sport-done-well. I won't dwell on Gumbrecht's historical content – it is always unfair for a specialist to use their own field to critique a non-specialist. It may offend my philosopher friends that I particularly like the chapter on 'fascinations', and his case that we derive pleasure in sport from watching bodies move and perform, from a sense of suffering in sports performance, from the grace of sport, from the interaction of athletes and their performance tools (I see in this my appreciation of equestrian sports), from aesthetic form, and from well-timed plays (this last is two issues for Gumbrecht – plays and timing). I see in his case a basis for some of my appreciation of the thing I work with professionally – sport.
However, and alas, so many of his examples draw on material that is culturally defined and dependent (he admits that) that the sorts of claims being made for sport qua sport are hard to sustain: quite simply, the meaning of sport, the pleasure of sport, lies in the interaction of the sprots practice and its cultural and social contexts that give it meaning. The case is elegantly made but in the long run Gumbrecht's abstraction of sport from its socio-cultural makers of meaning result it being less compelling than it at first appears. (There is a very good collection of critical essays in Sport in History, the first issue of 2008.)
July 7, 2008
Gumbrecht's loose and scattered little book on athletics is disappointing from an intellectual standpoint but satisfying as a document of intelligent enthusiasm and (even) autobiography. His arguments concerning beauty, agon and arete, spectatorship, and so forth are all interesting, but they seem underdeveloped, and I kept waiting for the knockout punch that would seal the connection I sense between music and sports. It didn’t come. Still, Gumbrecht, a Stanford literature professor (and avid Stanford football fan), seems like a great guy, and he has a congenially romantic way of seeing the world.
June 23, 2009
A really interesting attempt at defining what is so fascinating and captivating about sports without appealing to anything external or outside of sport. Worth a read by any fan or athlete.
July 18, 2011
interesting book specially when gumbrecht reflects about the human body.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews