The Supernatural, in Its Cycling Form, Will Never Reach the End
In the middle of the immense tide of cars that ebbed slowly from
the Monza autodrome the day before yesterday- backlit by the
setting sun's fading rays, it looked like a herd wreathed in dust
that one sees in westerns- here and there, lost in this gigantic
chaos, some spots of vivid color stood out. It was the racers,
still wearing their jerseys and transfigured by the exertion; some
were perched on the team cars among the spare wheels, others leaned
out of a truck's rear window, and others were still on their bicycle
saddles because no one, in this throng, had bothered to give them a
lift; and so they had fifteen kilometers of extra effort to complete
the Giro- adding to four-thousand kilometers already done.
They saw us: they saw our dusty car, our official nameplate, our
sun-baked faces. We belonged to the same gang: them and us, fragments
of a small, fascinating world that was at last dispersing to re-enter
the dullness of everyday life. We looked at each other with a sad,
understanding smile; like soldiers returning from war who, in the
hubbub of a big railway station, are immediately considered as
brothers. During the Giro, we and the racers had remained virtual
strangers; but now, no, now all the others were strangers and we
instead were suddenly friends, we alone in that crowd could
understand each other, parties to a secret full of melancholy.
For nineteen days we had seen them gallop throughout the entire
peninsula with great astonishment, their legs the sole source of
energy, and we watched them continue in the Alps, on the climbs
and descents, right next to precipices. One hundredth of what the
last of them had done would have crushed us even twenty years ago
when we were young, and we would have been taken to the hospital for
at least a month. What remained now of all this frightful labor? Had
it produced anything? Nothing. Pure fatigue, then, offered in
sacrifice to a senseless mania?
And yet, as soon as these men proceeded, passing from city to city,
the people- astonishingly!- abandoned their business or their spade,
jumped out of bed, came down from the remotest homesteads, traveled
very long distances on foot, waited in the rain and sun for entire
mornings, and there they were, the people of all Italy, farmers,
laborers, old salts, mothers, decadent old men, paralytics, priests,
beggars, thieves, massed along four thousand kilometers, and they
weren't what they were the day before, a new, powerful feeling
possessed them, they were laughing, yelling, the sorrows of life
forgotten for a few instants, they were happy, without a doubt, and
we can vouch for that here.
Does something as crazy and preposterous as the Giro d'Italia by
bicycle serve a purpose, then? Of course it does: it is one of the
last meccas of the imagination, a stronghold of romanticism, besieged
by the gloomy forces of progress, and it refuses to surrender.
Look at them, as they pedal and pedal through the fields, hills, and
forests. They are pil;grims traveling to a distant city that they
will never reach: they symbolize, in flesh and blood, as depicted in
an ancient painting, the incomprehensible adventure of life. That is
what it is- pure romanticism.
They are knight errant who leave for a war where there are no lands
to be conquered: and the giants who are their enemies resemble the
windmills of Don Quixote, they have neither human limbs nor faces,
they are called distance, grade, suffering, rain, fear, tears and
wounds. And this, too, is rather romantic.
They are young slaves , prisoners of an ogre who has tied them to an
enormous leaden grinder and they churn around, flogged till the blood
runs, and from the surrounding woods their women call, weeping, but
the slaves cannot reply. And is this not romanticism?
They are madmen, because they could cover the same ground without
exerting themselves, and instead they wear themselves out to speed
along flat out; almost all of them could earn the same amount of
money without suffering, and instead they prefer the agony, Yes,
here, too, is some romanticism.
And they are also monks; belonging to a special brotherhood ruled
by its own, tough laws. Each of them hopes for grace, but ut is
granted to very few, one or two per decade. Yet they continue because
they know that the world will confer on the chosen few, without even
being aware of it, a sort of sacred investiture. And then the glory
will be dazzling. A pure fairytale, this, too, worthy of times long
past.
But now the fairytale has come to an end. The knights errant, the
pilgrims, the madmen, the monks have gone back home; these are
ordinary men, surrounded by their mothers, wives and toddlers; free,
and a little sad. The finish banner where prizes were contested has
been most carefully taken and placed in the storage room of the
Association “Velo e Sport” of Saveria Mannelli. The raze on Mario
Fazio's right elbow is already healing. The complaint by racer
Croci-Torti concerning the three thousand-lire fine (for repeated
holding onto one of the officials cars) begins its eternal slumber
among the international jury's notebooks piled in a closet at La
Gazzetta dello Sport. The aluminum flash that Gino Bartali
contemptuously flung away three kilometers after Cervieres has by
chance been found by a young shepherd and now dangles from his belt.
In the gutter between Cagli and Acqualunga, where it had crawled to
die, the ants have already devoured almost half of the stray dog run
over by one of the caravan's radio trucks. And the sun, the wind,
the rain nibble away at the cardboard posters nailed to the larches
below the Passo di Pordoi, and which urge the fans: “Do not push the
racers!” It looked as if there would be no end to it, and it is
already part of the past. Today people are talking about other
things, of the Giro del Lazio, of the Tour de France (is it or isn't
it true that Bartali doesn't want to race on the same team as Coppi?),
of velodromes, of the Tour of Switzerland, of what tomorrow will
bring. Such is life!
And nest year, in May, the starter will once more lower his flag,
and again the year after that, and so on, spring after spring, the
enchantment will live on. Until the day (but will we still be alive?)
when reasonable people will say it is absurd to continue; by then,
bicycles will have become rare, almost comical scrap metal, used by
a few nostalgic maniacs, and voices will be raised ridiculing the
Giro d'Italia.
No, don't give up, bicycle. By then we will probably be dead and
buried. Coppi will be an emaciated, shaking little grandfather
unknown to the new generations; other names will be shouted by the
crowds. Do not yield, oh “divine bicycle,” as Henri Desgrange, the
Tour's patron has said. If you were to surrender it would mean the
end, not only of an era in sports, a chapter in civilization; but
also put an even greater restriction on what is left of the realm of
illusion, where simple souls find relief. At the risk of seeming
ridiculous, take off again on a cool May morning, and travel the
ancient roads Italy. By then we will be traveling by rocket trains;
atomic energy will be sparing us the least little effort; we will be
extremely powerful and civilized. Pay no attention to us, bicycle.
Just fly along, with your frail strength, by mountains and valleys,
sweat, strive and suffer. From his isolated alpine hut, the
woodcutter will still come down to shout hurrah, fishermen will
climb up from the beach, accountants will abandon their ledgers, the
blacksmith will let the fire die so he can come to celebrate you,
the poets, the dreamers, the good, and the humble people, still
sensitive to kindness, will still crowd the edges of the roads,
forgetting poverty and hardship, thanks to you. And the young girls
will cover you with flowers.
- Dino Buzzati, Milan, June 13th, 1949.