olympics

Over at the Financial Times, Harry Eyres makes a few interesting observations on the state of poetry in relationship to sports.

… Pindar is of particular relevance here because his surviving complete poems are all victory odes associated with games … Just as much as the athletes, he wanted to win and hated coming second.

–  from of Poetry and Motion

I can’t say much more on the article here because of FT’s, erm, conservative internet copyright policy. (Please do give the article a read). But maybe it’s about letting athletes strive for excellence, while forcing poets to be “accessible.” Big props to London mayor Boris Johnson then for commissioning the poet Armand D’Angour to pen an Olympic Pindaric Ode for the London games. I know what you’re thinking: I missed it too. Thankfully, Matt Pickles and the University of Oxford have made the text available to the public, with a Greek translation if your English is rusty.