Books to the Ceiling

Having written about this year’s Kentucky Derby, I now feel I should say something about the Preakness. This race does, after all, take place at Pimlico Racetrack*, a Baltimore venue which I have frequently driven past. (But have I ever attended the races there? Don’t think so, and can’t say why not…)

It’s hard not to be stirred by Big Brown’s stellar performance. (That’s him, in the above picture.) Here’s John Scheinman of the Washington Post:” With the jockeys on Racecar Rhapsody [love that name!], Stevil, Hey Byrn and others pushing mightily to keep up. Kent Desormeaux shook his reins at Big Brown and got a response rarely seen in horse racing.”

I love the excitement of the announcer as he proclaims that “Kent Desormeaux looked in the rear view mirror and nobody was there!”

And yet…think of the pressure now being brought to bear on this magnificent animal, his jockey, and his trainer. After the tragedy of Eight Belles at the Derby, the anxiety is palpable.

The last Triple Crown winner was Affirmed in 1978. He was the third horse in that decade to gain thoroughbred racing’s greatest prize. Seattle Slew won in 1977; he was preceded by the great Secretariat in 1973. Before that, no horse had won all three races since Citation in 1948. (Click here for a complete list of Triple Crown Winners.)

My parents frequently attended the Belmont Stakes and occasionally traveled to Baltimore for the Preakness. They had never been to the Kentucky Derby. In 1973, Dad said, “Lil, let’s go to all three races. They’ve got a real winner this time.” And so it proved. I still remember my mother describing the near-hysteria in the grandstand and the clubhouse as Secretariat galloped toward the finish line. Many of the spectators were in tears.

[Secretariat]

The next day’s headline in the New York Times, if I remember correctly, was “Thirty-one Lengths to Immortality.” Talk about seeing no one in the rear view mirror!

The Belmont takes place on June 7. We wish Big Brown well. No - let me broaden that: We wish all the participants well, both equine and human.

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*This interesting, rather poignant article appeared recently in the Washington Post. It seems that some of the stable hands at Pimlico live in small rooms in the training stables. The accommodations, though austere, are rent free. Darryl Scott, one of the residents, says, “I could make more money doing something else, but if you love horses the way I do, you’re going to stay.”

In which your Faithful Blogger and her spouse wander through the house alternately singing “Ferry Cross the Mersey” ( See the post just prior to this one) and “Amazing Grace:”

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Horse racing is the only sport I care about. This interest is a legacy bequeathed to me by my Dad, who went to the track religiously every Saturday. (This led me as a child to believe that everyone’s father worshipped at the shrine of Belmont, Flamingo Park, Hialeah Raceway, etc. etc.)

So yesterday, we watched the Kentucky Derby and witnessed the triumph of Big Brown and the simultaneous tragedy of Eight Belles. Veterinarian Larry Bramlage called the breakdown of Eight Belles “almost inexplicable,” but according to Sally Jenkins’s angry hit-’em-where-they-live opinion piece in today’s Washington Post, it was anything but.

Big Brown, winning the Kentucky Derby

Eight Belles, as horse lovers will want to remember her

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Since leading a discussion of The Professor’s House, I’ve been needing more Willa Cather in my life. Recently I listened to a wonderful reading by Barbara McCulloh of O Pioneers. Then last night we watched the Hallmark Hall of Fame production made in 1992 and starring Jessica Lange and David Strathairn. It was, quite simply, outstanding.

O Pioneers is the story of Alexandra Bergson and her family, immigrants who came to America in the late 19th century in order to farm the rich, open prairie lands of Nebraska. The Bergsons are Swedish, but they count the French and Bohemians among their friends and neighbors. This is a tale of struggle, conflict, sorrow, and ultimately, endurance. The film brings Cather’s story vividly to life: it is beautifully acted and visually very compelling. The drama is abetted by Bruce Broughton’s surging soundtrack- maybe too surging, in some spots? - but never mind; it was great, too, Mr Broughton seems to have channeled Aaron Copland in this magisterial score, for which, BTW, he won an Emmy.

O Pioneers was shot entirely on location in the Cornhusker State. There’s plenty of “waving wheat” - the place looked gorgeous! If you have a chance to see the film, watch for the scene in which several dozen young men on horseback ride out to meet the bishop. They have come to receive his blessing and escort him safely back to their church, where is to officiate at a funeral. It is a deeply stirring sequence.

There is much great writing in the novel. I was really pleased that the film included this sentence: “The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.”

And speaking of terrific writing…

I continue to make my way, slowly and carefully, through The Age of American Unreason. Susan Jacoby’s erudite book - is it a treatise? a jeremiad, perhaps? A polemic? - demands close and careful reading, filled as it is with history, philosophy, and portraits of fascinating - and often infuriating - people.

Anyway, in order to describe certain metaphysical theories, such as social Darwinism, that fly in the face of actual facts, she came up with a phrase that I just love: “bloviating arrogance.” From now on, I shall have my antennae attuned to pick up signs of bloviating arrogance in everyday life. Something tells me I won’t have to look far!