Friday, March 30, 2012

William Wordsworth Explains Why We Care About Sports

Well, sort of. Here, from 1806, is one of Wordsworth's greatest poems, all about how we waste our lives worrying about money, and how much better off we would be if we could open our minds to the greatness of legend. It's a nice poem to think about as you ponder why so many people care so much about watching heroic figures participate in legendary combat:

The World Is Too Much with Us, by William Wordsworth
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. -- Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

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