Eurovision

The New Yorker magazine recently published an article about Eurovision, an annual singing competition that becomes the most-watch television event in the world. Anthony Lane’s article makes it sound rather peculiar – somewhat of a joke and also very serious. The competition has included several names that became quite popular: ABBA, Celine Dion, Cliff Richard and Julio Iglesias, and the dance act Riverdance.

The NYer blog includes this quote from Clive James:

In place of the conquerors’ fevered dream of a Europe united by the sword, the peaceful commercial republics of the New Europe make do with such cultural manifestations as the Eurovision Song Contest—a kitschy classic that every year draws a huge television audience, whose more sophisticated members amuse each other with jokes about how dumb it is. The jokes keep changing. For years, Norway’s songs reliably lost (“Norvége … nul points”); then they started winning. More recently, much derisive hilarity has attended the earnest efforts of Turkey. Between laughs, though, the less sophisticated but more thoughtful viewers should take heart: there was a time when the Turks stood at the gates of Vienna and bristled with the armed intention of getting into Europe by less tuneful means.

Here’s the website and there’s more here. There are plenty of videos on YouTube if you ask Mr. Google.