So here we are, once again, coming up on the first Saturday in May and “the most exciting two minutes in sports.” That phrase is generally attributed to Grantland Rice but it is a paraphrase. He actually wrote, in 1935, that, “Those two minutes and a second or so of derby running carry more emotional thrills, per second, than anything sport can show.”
Which might seem a little … oh, excessive when what we are talking about is a horse race. But then, excess is at the soul of the Kentucky Derby and Grantland Rice is not the only writer to have gone a bit purple over what turf cynics think of as a “twenty horse cavalry charge.”
The writer who, beyond question, lavished the most evocative prose over the Kentucky Derby was William Faulkner when, in 1955, Sports Illustrated—then a money losing curiosity in the world of magazines and the Time Life empire—commissioned him to cover the event.
Faulkner had won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1949 and when he arrived in Louisville to cover the Derby, he learned that he had just been awarded the Pulitzer Prize for A Fable, his most curious and, perhaps, forgettable novel.
Faulkner, then, was not your typical sports writer. And he seemed to understand and respect what the boys at the Luce empire expected of him. He was a Southerner —was he ever—and he had a feel for things that stirred the blood. For old passions and instincts that the modern world wasn’t comfortable with but couldn’t quite extinguish, either.
Faulkner delivered. Did he ever. I read his piece every year just before the Derby. It begins this way:
Well, we plainly weren’t in Manhattan any more.
Having gotten the territory right, Faulkner moved on to the thing itself which was a horse race. And what was it, then, about horses and racing that so stirred the blood, even as the world of routine grew increasingly anemic? Well, there is the horse, for openers. Man and horse, after all, have a history:
But … the old urges can still be stirred and brought back to life.
Well … enough of Faulkner. For most people, a little of that sort of thing goes a long way. But give him the point. We are talking about something wonderful in its irrationality and passion. That is what the Derby is all about. Horses raised and trained at fabulous expense just to run against other horses in races of two minutes duration. Then, if they are successful, they are retired and put to breeding more horses to run and then breed. And, then, there is all the excess that doesn’t have anything to do with the horses. Not directly, anyway. There is the bourbon, served copiously in the form of mint juleps. Probably not Faulkner’s drink of choice but there is no accounting for taste. Some people may even like mint juleps.
And, my favorite part … the hats. Or, rather, the ladies in their hats. The hats are extravagant, of course, and that is the point. And the women who wear them— and look damned good in them—almost certainly wouldn’t wear them anywhere else. But they just seem so right in this particular place and time.
There is a long run up to the race and by post time a lot of bourbon has flowed. Still … it is exciting. Just as exciting as Grantland Rice wrote. (Also Faulkner, for that matter.) And you have to think it will always be thus and thanks be for that. It won’t be a question of can Bill Belichick call the right play or will some official blow the call. Perhaps they will make a robot horse in some dismal future but for now it is all flesh and blood and driving instinct. The urge to run and to race. And that is undeniably thrilling for two those two minutes.
There doesn’t seem to be any wonder horse in the field this year. No new Secretariat, the horse that still holds the record for the fastest Derby. There is a one-eyed horse running. The horse is named Patch and it will probably intrigue some betters and give the writers some material. Interesting to imagine what Faulkner would do with it.
One last thing about Faulkner. He not only knew horses and the passions they stir, but he also knew person writing talent. There was one person he specifically asked to meet when he was at the Derby that year. That person was Red Smith.
