What do Jay Z, Osama Bin Laden, and the Queen of England have in common? If your answer is an English football club based in north London that wins trophies almost every (nine years, having not won the Premier League since the 2003-04) season, then congratulations!— you are a true believer. To the uninitiated, Arsenal F.C. is one of the most popular sports teams in the world, with a fan base said to number 100 million.
And of course, when more than one in every 100 people on the earth today is a ‘Gooner’, as the Arsenal fan is called, there are bound to be contradictions aplenty. Where else, but in a football club, could an American rapper, a Saudi terrorist, and a Germanic royal, lay their vast cultural differences aside and congregate in the house of worship that is Emirates Stadium? Before masterminding the downfall of the Wild West, Bin Laden was said to attend Arsenal matches at Highbury, where, presumably, he cheered on The Arsenal (whose founding members worked in a munitions factory that built weapons during the world wars for the British Army, which in 2003 invaded Afghanistan in the hope of bringing him to justice) and compared opposition players to turds.
Although football is not the most popular sport in this country, those lonely souls who follow it know that it is the greatest game in the entire universe. What other sport stirs up such strong sentiments in its spectators? Such was the passion that one Kenyan had for Arsenal that when his team was losing to Manchester United in a Champions League semi-final in 2009, he went home and hanged himself. Of course, while most fans aren’t willing to show that level of dedication to the cause, it remains to be said that outside of religion and nationality, few other communities inspire such undying commitment in its members. I mean, where else— but in pubs and stadiums— do you see full-grown men burst into song (and tears) every week?
Which brings us to Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch. The autobiographical novel talks about Arsenal from the perspective of the author himself, who seems to regard the club as an intimate lover. After his parents divorced when he was young, he found in Arsenal a community to belong to. From 1968 onwards, he would religiously attend every match at the home ground, sharing in the team’s joys and sorrows as if doing so were his life’s purpose. It is obvious from the first page that Hornby’s fixation is disturbingly unhealthy: as a kid he used to know the names of the wives and girlfriends of the 1971 Double-winning Arsenal team. And on one occasion, while attending a match with his girlfriend, so engrossed was he in the action that when she suddenly fainted, he failed to help her out. Unsurprisingly, the pair broke up not too long afterwards.
If truth be told, the 1992 novel now seems a little dated. In the freewheeling casino that is today’s Premier League, the idea of fans grumbling about players earning a hundred quid a week sounds remarkably quaint. But some things never change; and Hornby’s understanding of the irrational impulses that drives the sports fan (crazy) is stunningly accurate. His offbeat sense of humour and characteristically English self-deprecation also makes this book both the best and the worst book to read on the bus. You don’t have to like football to enjoy this book. In fact, the less you know about Arsenal, the more you’ll laugh.
Samedi Quelquechose 