The emission of heat from my breath coalesced with the bitter cold of the night as I gazed across the field through the translucent cloud of carbon dioxide to not only see its two-dimensional beauty crafted from artificial material, but the finesse of soccer players weaving in and out of each other moving the object of play in diagonal and parabolic directions. Nothing is more explicit on Maxwell Field than the presence of benevolent sportsmanship and irrevocable passion for this European sport carried out by each individual. And with each individual being a quintessential aspect of the entire team, the game is an arena of diverse culture and styles of play.
The echoes of laughter and whoops give a voice to the field. At night, when barely a single soul is strolling around the UC Berkeley campus, it is the amalgamation of cheers and communication among players which draws attention to the field in the solemn night by those whom so happen to pass by on the outside. The field is analogous to a stage for a disparate symphony. Instead of the in sync collaboration of instruments performing together in creating a brilliant piece of musical art, the field is a repertoire of music conducted by the referee’s whistle and played by the soccer virtuosos changing the tempo of the game, as the clock runs down time, from adagio to allegro and vice-versa. Nothing is more beautiful than the styles of play coinciding with each other to produce a distinct harmony to those who look onto the field from the outside.
When the lights turned off, I walked beyond the gates back to the 'normal' life. Looking back as everyone disperses to get back to their own lives off of the field, I conjectured that books seemed to be forbidden entities when someone engages himself onto the pitch and into the game. People walk out to the street with bags holding athletic gear or other sports equipment instead of their Jansport backpacks with pencils and pens in the front pocket, notebooks and lecture notes in the big pocket. The moments that occurred before the lights turned off are merely words of the past. Of course those who were there watching the game first-hand will be able to recall highlight moments and what the final score was. But surely, they can’t expound what it felt like to be there watching in the midst of the night under the lurid white lights. There is only one-way to experience the thrill of competition and the gregarious ambiance inside the gates of Maxwell Field – simply be there.
Uncritically: Wow, this is an amazing prose piece. I cannot adequately describe it, short of flailing helplessly and gesturing madly. Which makes this next part so hard.
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Personally, I am not a big sports fan, but reading this blogpost made me want to attend a late-night soccer game at Maxwell Field, maybe even play (heaven forbid!). Although it starts and ends in first person, much of the writing in this piece seems to be a description narrated by an omnipotent figure, which sees, all at once, the big picture and minute details that make up the entirety and wholeness of the location. There is constant interplay between the present cacophony of action, and the stillness outside the field, conveyed through the mention of the bright floodlights that illuminate the playing field, while nary a soul wanders outside at this hour. The description is bolstered with an intriguing use of auditory as visual details—a sort of synesthesia. An Thien depicts the soccer game as an orchestra of movements, and carries the musical metaphor through the rest of the piece. Along with music, he also portrays the game in terms of mathematics: the field as a two-dimensional plane, and the players moving in diagonals and parabolas. These unlikely allusions are reminiscent of Lakoff’s Metaphors We Live By and Wallace’s Tornadoes, Trigonometry and Tennis.
There is no intimate voyeurism here, although this broad description brings up a point de Certeau quotes in “Walking in the City.” ““The Place de la Concordes does not exist,” Malaparte said, “it is an idea.”” (de Certeau 104) In the same way, Maxwell Field does not exist as a place itself, since it’s only, as the piece puts it, a “geometrical plane of green felt” It is the idea of a game in full swing, raucous fans, and being caught up in the action that makes Maxwell Field what it is, and entice one to simply be there.