Albert Camus’ Argument for Sport Over Art

The soul of every man, as seen through the eyes of Albert Camus.

If even one of his books is an indication, Algerian-born author and thinker Albert Camus was on something more than nodding terms with that insufferable condition known as Reality. This is the sort of person to whom one should be looking for wisdom and utterances which contain wisdom.

Accordingly, this sentence from the electronic home of the Camus Society bears relevance:

Camus was once asked by his friend Charles Poncet which he preferred, football or the theatre — Camus is said to have replied ‘Football, without hesitation.’

What Camus says here, specifically, concerns football — a sport he played with some enthusiasm and expertise, it seems, until such a time as he contracted tuberculosis. What he means, generally, one could reasonably infer, is sport — that thing which, like drama, provides a narrative, but which, unlike drama, is composed by the invisible hand of Fortune and not the actual, probably well-moisturized hand of someone who prefers that which is important to that which is pleasant.

Let us, reader, never prefer that which is important over that which is pleasant.