SACRED FLAME or PILOT-LIGHT?

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 480, 3 September 1948, Page 6

SACRED FLAME or PILOT-LIGHT?

WE asked our London correspondent to go to the Olympic Games, not to report them, but to report what meaning, if any, they had for an intelligent spectator whose thoughts run normally in other channels. Here is the result.

VE thousand competitors, 58 nations, 136 events in 17 sports, 200 broadcasters, 40 languages, a million, spectators-it all sounds inhuman, and remote from my understanding, which I usually try to exercise on the individual and his works; nevertheless, because The Listener asked me to, I joined some 90,000 others and went out to the Wembley Stadium on August Bank Holiday, in the company of a New Zealander who knew without looking at his programme what records waited to be beaten in all the events, whether one man’s style might ‘beat another . man’s. stride, whether the expected winners of the finals were exerting themselves in the heats, and all those things. And I enjoyed myself, and went back again the next day. I daresay I seemed very vague, and insensitive about those important points, which were exercising the minds not only of my companion but of practically the whole of that polyglot multitude, but perhaps my excuse is acceptable in these days of psychological excuses. The only race I ever won in my life was a potato race, on the Basin Reserve in Wellington. As I was unquestionably the slowest boy there, I was given one potato fewer than the others. By

some oversight (or was it deliberate) the absent potato was the one on the far end of the row. At the age of seven, I won the race easily, satisfied that the handicap was+a fair one, and very proudly accepted the certificate that was offered as a prize (which I think had a picture of Rodin’s Thinker on it). It was not until some years later when I mastered the elements of geometry and algebra that I realised what a hollow victory it had been; my only race, and my victory had been a deceit, my certificate a lie! I believe it must have been from that time that any share I had of a normal interest in winning races began to léave me. Therefore, my mind may have been wandering at the most important moments at Wembley-when the races were ending-such is the force of old psychological inhibitions; and certainly my binoculars were wandering at the starts. As at August, 1948, I still jump when the gun goes off, and binoculars have a way of leaping from the starting line to 2an empty stretch of track, or to a pile of clothing .in the arena, or to the irrelevant Royal Party. VEN so, although I missed the very things other people bought their tickets to see, I not only enjoyed it, but was moved. Mainly by incidental and irre'evant things, of course; and yet perhaps they were not irrelevant to the

idea of Baron de Coubertin, the descendant of Cvrano de Bergerac and Rubens, who is said to have originated this modern revival of the Olympiad. It was an idealistic belief in the power of an_. ,international gathering. of sportsmen to recapture all that was good in the original Greek idea, and the moments I enjoyed enough to want to pass them on were the moments when I felt I was a human animal similar to those thousands of others who were thinking and talking in three dozen different tongues, and not different (as the headlines and the public men who govern our destinies here make one inevitably feel), not a unit of scmething separate and incompatible. ° At Marylebone station I found a group, of Negroes all talking together on the’ platform. When the Stadium train came in, I contrived to be behind them,

knowing that they would almost fill one compartment themselves; I think they were a little surprised that I chose to go in alone with them, and they never spoke to me, but they revealed themselves, in their cheerful -humorous

speculation on the day’s events, and when we left the train I believed I understood a little more about the African Negro, though my understanding of the American who fears him must have decreased in the same proportion. As the crowd from the train flowed towards the Stadium I found the French language coming in at one ear, a Slav language coming in at the other; and by walking slowly, so that the crowd was passing me all the way, I multiplied the number of tongues by three, and amused myself by trying to guess from dress and outward manner. what language might belong. Results quite negative. LL of a sudden, there was a voice at my shoulder. I am so accustomed now to chance meetings with New Zealanders in London, that I assumed it was another, but it was'a man I have never seen before. "That was the Australian Flyer," he said, in a very confidential tone. "Oh!" I said. Quickly I deduced that he had not come from the train, but was on his way to the Stadium from some event at the Empire Pool. "Mrs. someone-or-other,’? he went on. I forget her name. They call her the Australian Flyer. She came through without a hair out of place. . Not a hair out of place! Whew!" Then he drew ahead and disappeared. To this day I have no idea what he meant, or who the Australian Flyer was -he may have meant Austrian-but I enjoyed meeting him. I passed the birdcage where Jamaicans, Swedes, Cingalese, Belgians, were warming up on a miniature cinder track. At the entrance a_harassedlooking London lady was coaxing two small children, who were armed with the autograph-book and pencil that strikes such fear into such brave athletes. "Aw, go on," she said. "You missed a whole lot of them there. Try that Danish lady, quick." Inside the Stadium I found my New Zealander in his seat, and joined him on a wooden bench only 30 feet from the sacred gas-ring, whose flame has not been as constant as might have been wished. (It went out twice at Dover, and was hastily rekindled from one of the two spares in the official’s car, which were also lit from the light of

the sun in the temple of Zeus at Olympia.) It was a large floppy yellow flame, burning butane gas. The heat waves in the air above it made the binoculars useless for the starts of the hurdle races anyway, regardless of the gun. SETTLED down and began to take in my surroundings-90,000 other human beings in that huge basin; loudspeakers giving every announcement in English and French (McCorquodale sounds like an invention of Edward Lear’s, in French); an oval of refreshing green contrasting very happily with the brick-red of the cinder track; thermosflasks and sandwiches being fished out from the bags by my experienced neighbours; the hakas (if one may use our word) of the foreign claques, who presumably booked their seats in bulk and now gave tongue with good effect, in time with the beat of their leaders, ending, "Eya, Eya, Eya." I think they were French. It was not very Greek, of course. The competitors were not naked, and it was not necessary for a woman to enter the arena’in disguise if she wished to see her son compete. Far from it; there were aS many pretty hats to be seen as there shortly will be at the school sports 12,000 miles away-to say nothing of the incomparable Fanny Blankers-Koen and all the other female competitors. Neither was there any ostentatious displays by rich tyrants of four-horse chariots. Nor was it avowedly a pagan occasion. The Archbishop of York gave a dedicatory address at the opening, and Sir Malcolm Sargent conducted the Hallelujah Chorus. . It was emotional, though. Ninety thousand hearts beating faster and faster altogether (while the heart of Baron de Coubertin lies peacefully, at his own wish, in the Greek village of Olympia). Emotional and a little uncomfortable. Ninety thousand beating hearts, but a good fifty thousand sore bottoms on wooden benches, and another fifteen to twenty thousand pairs of legs shifting the balance restlessly from one to the other. Emotional, a little uncomfortable, and a little apprehensive about the weather. It was fine when I arrived. But there was a threatening cloud. (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) "We'll be glad of that fire yet," said @ voice behind me. Other references I have heard to the unquenched flame have also been wanting in awe. "One may question, of course, whether Greeks themselves had much more success with their tallow or whatever it was they used; and doubtless there were sceptics among the 40,000 who were seated af ancient Olympia. But not, I hope, any to compare with my New Zealander, who. assured me that "They turn it down at night and just have a pilot-light going." The man who can believe in the Minister of Fuel more easily than he can believe in Apollo is indeed an unbeliever. ' LSO, there was something lacking of deference to the musical compositions that were to be heard from time to time. The procedure for the Olympic Victory Ceremony, which is held for each completed event at some suitable moment in the Stadium (such as during the 10,000 metre walk or the putting-the-shot) was as follows: The winners, first, second, and third for each event came out in blazers and slacks, and ‘stood quietly in the arena, and then were called three at a time to a dais where they were given their medals. Behind the giant scoreboard (which cost £20,000 to put up) Navy signallers were hurriedly sliding into place the boards giving the names of the winners and their countries; the name-boards had been specially painted each day for each placed winner, which presumably accounted for some of the £20,000. Now this took a. few moments to do, and it was understandable if the multitude found the dexterity of the Navy signallers as fascinating as any Olympic event. Well, the wrestling results had all been completed, the name-boards had been painted (in some very improbable combinations of letters, too) and so we were ready for the Victory Ceremony, which is completed by the breaking out of the winner’s national flag over the scoreboard, and the playing by the R.A.F. band of his National Anthem, The fly-weight results went up. Turkey had won. We saw the Turk take his medal, and turn towards the pole; the flag broke, and the band played the Turkish National Anthem; which turned out to be not that thing by Mozart but something else altogether; it was not even connected with the Ruins of Athens, which might have been seemly, in the context. It was something quite other-a nonentity of a tune in the minor mode. _ The results came down, the winners departed, and we sat down. The Navy men hustled round behind the board. Knowing their business, they left the word Turkey in its place. The bantamweight winners came out. ‘A new Turk swung on his heels to face a fresh flag, and with him, we 90, ee stobd again to attention. The bantam-weight results went down, © and we seated ourselves, while the lightweight results began to go up. The R.A.F. Band, just below me, made no rustle on their music stands. The Navy men, knowing their business, left the word: Turkey in its place. A ‘third brawny Turk stood stiffly to attention. So did we. How can the mind but wander, at such a time? I remembered the two volumes of a huge dictionary I once had. access to, wherein were two pages of the themes of the National Anthems of the world. I remembered having thought when I saw them that that

collection of tunes might well represent the worst music in the world, with a few exceptions. And here was one, and not an exception. What was it that it called to mind? Then I remembered -it was that song in The Week-end Book: I wish I WERE a elEPHanTlaphus and could PICK up the coCOnuts with my nose. We'l, anyway, it would be over in a minute. The third Turk and his run-ners-up left the dais. The Navy men tore down their name-boards, painted for such a brief moment of glory and now gone from sight for ever. Ninety thousand pairs of eyes watched what they did. The word Turkey stayed just where it was. This was the fourth time. It was altogether too much, and the crowd had to laugh-but uneasily, as if. there was the thought in the back of everyone’s mind that an International Incident could as easily start this way as any other, in these times. Once more we stood, and knowing the tune well by this time I began to memorise the bass part. If it hadn’t been for some. Hungarian fellow, who was inconsiderate enough to have won the next

section, I believe I would know it all now. Emotional, a little uncomfortable, a little apprehensive about the weather, and lacking in solemnity, 90,009 of us. We watched three heats of a steeplechase, enduring vicarious agony for the several competitors who looked as_ if they ought to fall dead rather than do -that water-jump once more; in each single heat, the Swede gained a few yards at the water-jump, while all the others lost some by landing well into the water; we watched a little Spaniard in red overtake the Swede in blue three laps running on the flat, and three laps running lose his advantage to the Swede at the water-jump. We applauded the winning Swede because he was a human being of strength and endurance; we applauded a tired, limping Briton who came in half a lap later beceuse. he was a human being. We watched the discus. We watched the cloud. We watched one competitor of whom much was expected. Others had -seen him in heats, and for. special reasons he was regarded as a hero, The moment of his expected triumph came, and we

watched his swiftness and" ease. The triumph seemed to be his. Thousands of hearts fluttered. Then there was a mishap, and he was out of the event altogether, The hero fallen! He went alone to the competitors’ exit, -his head held high, and a wave of consoling applause followed him along the crowd. "He’s a cow of a joker, actually," my companion told me. "It’s gone to his head-or so they say." Realism or idealism? Scepticism or faith? Sacred flame or pilot. light? Doves, bringing word of peace, or clouds,, bringing warning of war?’ Pindar’s odes, glorifying the athlete as the image of physical and moral perfection, or Antipodean bluntness? I don’t know. Perhaps the Archbishop of York knows, or the King of England, or Labeach (the one-man-team from Panama), or the man who told me about the Australian Flyer (or the Australian Flyer herself), or the man who turns the flame down at night when 90,000 backs have been turned, and only the cleaners are there to see he does it carefully. Perhaps no one has ever known the answer to that uncom-

fortable question:

A.

A.