Culture
What teams think of the 2025 Club World Cup: Opportunity, concerns and financial benefits
The expanded Club World Cup begins in 100 days, with the 32-team tournament taking place in the United States from June 14.
It is the first time the club edition of the World Cup will mirror the national team version of the tournament. There have been worries about the additional workload on players — FIFPro and the World Leagues Association threatened legal action in May last year. There are also concerns over high ticket prices.
FIFA announced there will be $1billion (£775m) in prize money for the Club World Cup, which will be distributed among all 32 clubs. FIFA president Gianni Infantino said, “All revenue generated by the tournament will be distributed to the participating clubs and via club solidarity across the world, as FIFA will not keep a single dollar.”
So how do the clubs themselves feel about the tournament? The Athletic has approached teams and senior figures at clubs for their perspective on the competition. Fifteen of the teams involved responded to our enquiries. Unless otherwise noted, those spoken to did so under the condition of anonymity as they did not have permission to speak.
Here, we share their perspectives on the Club World Cup.
Chelsea (England)
Chelsea have been taking the tournament seriously for a long time.
The first indication was the decision to part ways last May with head coach Mauricio Pochettino because they did not want any uncertainty over the role going into the Club World Cup. Pochettino was given only a two-year deal with an option for another 12 months in 2023. His replacement, Enzo Maresca, was handed a five-year deal.
Senior players who departed on loan in the January window, including Joao Felix and Renato Veiga, have clauses that mean they can return before it begins (loan agreements normally last until June 30), giving Chelsea the strongest squad possible.
Chelsea have not agreed a front-of-shirt sponsor for this season but believe being on display in America can help their bargaining position in ongoing talks with interested parties. They also see it as a genuinely good opportunity to win some silverware.
Simon Johnson
Seattle Sounders (U.S.)
The Sounders look at the Club World Cup as a “generational” opportunity. After playing in the 2022 Club World Cup in Morocco, Seattle see this tournament as a showcase for the city, the fanbase and the club.
With a chance to play in front of their home supporters against Atletico Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain, the Sounders believe it’s a rare opportunity to showcase themselves as a marquee franchise in MLS and one of the top clubs in the Americas.
Seattle will also host several games at the 2026 World Cup, including a U.S. men’s national team group-stage game, and believe the tournaments are a chance to advertise the city’s support for soccer across the globe. In a way, it’s putting the Sounders in the shop window for potential players and new fans.
Paul Tenorio
Al Ahly (Egypt)
Al Ahly are looking forward to the tournament and want to present themselves to a wider audience, especially considering they will open the tournament against Inter Miami.
The record 12-time CAF Champions League winners want to face the best teams in the world and view the Club World Cup as an opportunity to test themselves against different opponents on the global stage — similar to the previous versions of the competition where they finished in third place on four occasions. It’s also a learning experience off the field as the tournament will allow the club to interact and connect with teams from around the world.
Al Ahly celebrate winning the CAF Champions League (Fadel Senna/AFP via Getty Images)
Participating in the Club World Cup is viewed as a crowning of Al Ahly’s domestic and continental achievements in the past couple of years.
Even if their chances of winning the whole thing are slim, they are heading to the U.S. to do their best.
Ahmed Walid
Wydad AC (Morocco)
For Wydad, the Club World Cup represents an opportunity in many ways. The first and most obvious is money: last year, 30 per cent of their revenue came from participating in the CAF Champions League, but this year they didn’t qualify, so a financial gap needed to be filled. The roughly $50million (£39m) they will earn just for participating in the Club World Cup will plug that gap and then some.
That money will, they hope, allow them to close the gap slightly with European teams on player trading. If they negotiate with a potential signing and a European team made any kind of offer, they simply couldn’t compete. With this additional income, they hope this will change. They look to the basketball arm of their club, which can attract American players because there is less of a financial disparity between them and some European clubs.
Interestingly, they could also parlay their appearance at the Club World Cup into a conversation about being part of a multi-club ownership group. To this point, European-based models, such as Red Bull or City Football Group, have mostly shown little interest in acquiring an African club for a variety of reasons — sporting, economic, organisational — but the hope is that a decent showing at this tournament might make them more attractive as a takeover target.
Nick Miller
Mamelodi Sundowns (South Africa)
When Sundowns goalkeeper Ronwen Williams was nominated for the Yashin Award at the Ballon d’Or ceremony in 2024, he told The Athletic that the Club World Cup “…can help people realise the gap isn’t quite as big as it seems”.
He wasn’t referring to non-Africans. Instead, he believes the competition can help players from his continent realise how talented they are.
To say Williams is excited about travelling to the United States is an understatement. “We can’t wait to be a part of it, to try to open doors for African football,” he said.
Sundowns have become one of the most talked-about clubs in Africa over the past decade due to investment from mining tycoon Patrice Motsepe, who is also the president of the Confederation of African Football (CAF). While the club have won nine of the last 11 South African Premiership titles, they have only lifted one CAF Champions League trophy, back in 2016.
The Club World Cup has been high on their agenda for some time, with weekly meetings centred on media engagement and ticketing.
The U.S. gives Sundowns the opportunity to globalise their brand in new markets. With a significant African diaspora in the U.S., Sundowns hope to engage new fans who can identify with the club’s story as well as the abilities of their players.
Simon Hughes
Palmeiras (Brazil)
Palmeiras are still waiting on clarity for certain elements of the tournament — like how the prize money will be distributed. But they are understanding, given it is the first edition of the tournament, and they have been impressed by how quickly FIFA have responded to their other queries.
The club view it as an important tournament both in sporting and marketing terms, given the global visibility. They are aiming to make the most of the opportunity commercially and have worked on their squad in a bid to go far in the tournament.
Mario Cortegana
Fluminense (Brazil)
Fluminense lost 4-0 against Manchester City in the final of the Club World Cup in 2023 but are animated by the opportunity to test themselves against other global heavyweights.
The club do not expect a huge surge in sponsorship income — there are strict rules governing the number of brand logos visible on shirts, for instance — but expect to reap more indirect benefits from increased international brand recognition.
Fluminense will be competing in the tournament (Buda Mendes/Getty Images)
The prospect of a showpiece match against Borussia Dortmund, plus the realistic possibility that Fluminense will progress from a fairly weak group (Sundowns and South Korean side Ulsan are their other opponents), also proved to be a big draw with transfer targets in the last Brazilian off-season.
Jack Lang
Botafogo (Brazil)
“It has been many years since Botafogo have competed on a global stage,” John Textor, the majority owner and chairman of Eagle Football Holdings Limited, Botafogo’s leading shareholder, tells The Athletic. “So the chance to play the best teams in the world, in the biggest media market in the world, is incredibly important as we try to reestablish our reputation among the world’s greatest clubs.
“Our fans are excited, too, for these very same reasons. Our club is known as ‘the most traditional’ and ‘the glorious’ based on its historic reputation as a ‘grandfather’ of Brazilian football, so they have yearned for the return of our club to a position of global prominence. We are just starting to rebuild that reputation, forgotten for many years, and this opportunity in the United States is the first step. Truth be told, our fans will expect much more. They expect us to win.
“It’s a huge story in Brazil. Four big clubs, all participating against the best in the world… it’s been many years since Brazil has seen such an opportunity.”
Matt Slater
Flamengo (Brazil)
Jose Boto, Flamengo’s director of football, told The Athletic: “Flamengo views the creation of the new Club World Cup with great enthusiasm and congratulates FIFA for this initiative, which is a milestone in the evolution of global football. Bringing together the best clubs in the world in an innovative format is a great step towards further strengthening club football and providing a unique experience for players and fans.
“For us, it is an honour and a privilege to have the opportunity to represent Brazil and South American football at this event. We are confident that the United States, with its world-class sporting infrastructure, will offer modern and optimal facilities for the competition, providing all the necessary conditions for a tournament of the highest level.
“The history of hosting major events, such as the 1994 World Cup and various editions of the Olympic Games, is a benchmark of attendance and public enthusiasm on U.S. soil. In addition, the proximity of the 2026 World Cup further reinforces the interest and growth of football in the region.
“We believe this edition of the Club World Cup will be an absolute success, both in terms of infrastructure and audience, further consolidating football as a truly global phenomenon.”
Mario Cortegana
Manchester City (England)
City are embracing the revamped format and the chance to add a new trophy to their collection.
Although more games seem to be the last thing they need this season, the money involved appeals to the more financially minded members of the hierarchy, while Guardiola’s stance is similar to his outlook on pre-season tours: he and his players will go wherever the club need them to.
Once they’re there, they’ll try to win.
Sam Lee
Real Madrid (Spain)
The board at Real Madrid are generally in favour of the Club World Cup, but president Florentino Perez, head coach Carlo Ancelotti and some players have highlighted their concerns over the calendar. They were also surprised by how late the dates were confirmed, along with venues and who they would face.
However, they issued a statement in June last year after Ancelotti expressed his doubts in an interview: “At no time has Real Madrid questioned its participation in the new Club World Cup to be organised by FIFA. Our club will play, as planned, this official competition that we face with pride to make our millions of fans around the world dream again with a new title.”
Madrid are the Champions League holders (Thomas Coex/AFP via Getty Images)
Despite their doubts, they consider the tournament to be very important for marketing and finances. If they win the final, it could be worth around €100million (£84m; $108m) to them. Madrid also have a good relationship with FIFA.
Since the pandemic, all of Real’s pre-seasons have taken place in the U.S. and it is undoubtedly the market that attracts and interests them the most.
Mario Cortegana
Bayern Munich (Germany)
Bayern are really popular in the U.S. and are looking forward to spending time directly with their fans and fan groups over there — they have offices in America, so there’s a big opportunity to show their best face in a competitive environment. Given German football’s restrictions and the staging of competitive games abroad being a non-starter, this is a rare chance to do something different.
There is some trepidation about the tournament’s popularity and a bit of bewilderment over the timing of their games — a couple of them kick off at 3am CEST, which hardly suits their domestic fans. There have already been murmurs of discontent from ultra groups in response to that scheduling as well as some of the exorbitant ticket prices being charged.
Bayern are braced for tension. Playing in front of long-distance fans is one thing, but taking competitive matches away from season ticket holders and pricing them out of attending is a new issue for German football and one that will not be resolved quietly.
Sebastian Stafford-Bloor
Paris Saint-Germain (France)
Sources close to the hierarchy at Paris Saint-Germain admit the organisation behind the Club World Cup has not been perfect, but they think it is a positive for football’s ecosystem. There is also a belief that it would be the wrong tournament to target over workload concerns. The Club World Cup already exists — it is only being revamped — and it is only going to run every four years.
There is also positivity over the deal with DAZN and the addition of new commercial partners — and the potential redistribution of money from the tournament. For PSG, the income will be significantly higher than what would be generated from a pre-season tour.
However, there are concerns over filling the stadiums in the U.S. Sources at PSG hope there will be a significant push — possibly even involving President Donald Trump — to shift tickets before the tournament kicks off. In all, it is viewed by those close to the hierarchy as a potential cherry on the cake for the season.
Mario Cortegana
Borussia Dortmund (Germany)
Financially, the Club World Cup comes at a convenient time for Dortmund. They sit 10th in the Bundesliga and only have an outside hope of playing Champions League football — and benefiting from its riches — next season. The payday FIFA is promising the participating clubs will be invaluable, then, particularly with the squad due to undergo a major rebuild in the summer
Socially, it’s an opportunity. Dortmund are among a group of clubs at the top of German football who believe that the domestic game should be doing more to grow itself and that other teams in the division should be spending more time in fertile markets, including the United States. And, given there is no hope at all of ever playing Bundesliga games outside Germany — fan power makes that impossible — this will be as close as the club gets to being able to export an authentic version of themselves.
How successful will the tournament be? The club are not sure. Kick-off times are inconvenient for German supporters and it’s unclear what kind of traction the competition will have with U.S. supporters.
One strange technical detail to add: Chelsea midfielder Carney Chukwuemeka is on loan at Dortmund, but that deal — provided it is not made permanent — will expire between the end of the Bundesliga season and the start of this tournament. He has started promisingly in Germany, with a few exciting cameos, but that may not be relevant in Dortmund by the summer.
Sebastian Stafford-Bloor
Atletico Madrid (Spain)
The Club World Cup is seen as a big opportunity — on lots of different levels.
Senior figures at Atletico were very proud to have qualified, especially qualifying ahead of Barcelona as one of the two clubs involved from La Liga, and believe it demonstrates the club is part of the European elite.
Atletico see the Club World Cup as a big opportunity (Denis Doyle/Getty Images)
Last summer’s €200million investment in new players — including €75m for Argentine World Cup winner Julian Alvarez and €42m on England international Conor Gallagher — was also made knowing that a deep squad would be required for what was going to be a very long season for Diego Simeone’s side.
Club CEO Miguel Angel Gil Marin and president Enrique Cerezo attended December’s draw in Miami and Atletico are very keen to promote the club brand in the U.S., having visited in pre-season regularly in recent summers.
Gil Marin and Cerezo will probably sell their majority stake within the next five years. Atletico are part-owned by U.S. investment manager Ares Management Corporation, which increased its share last summer. Winning a prestigious international tournament on American soil would make the club even more valuable to interested buyers.
Dermot Corrigan
Red Bull Salzburg (Austria)
The club’s individual approach might be better reflected through the prism of the Red Bull network as a whole, for whom the U.S. is a big footballing focus.
Last summer, RB Leipzig were delighted with the reception they received around their games in New York and Miami, where they played Aston Villa and Wolverhampton Wanderers and held a range of coaching seminars and activation events. It was the first time the club had toured outside Europe and given the ideological opposition and cynicism they face domestically, the U.S. sports culture — combined with Red Bull’s existing presence in MLS and across international sport — is an easier environment in which to operate.
Expect Salzburg to embrace those opportunities in much the same way. They have not had an easy season and might not be much of a factor in the tournament itself — a group with Al Hilal, Pachuca and Real Madrid looks tough — but there’s plenty of enthusiasm about exporting the brand.
Sebastian Stafford-Bloor
Inter Miami (United States)
Since signing Lionel Messi, owner Jorge Mas has spoken about the club’s ambition to become a global brand. The worldwide proliferation of pink Inter Miami jerseys is a testament to the progress made.
The Club World Cup offers a chance to put the actual soccer product on a stage for the world to see.
“It’s a difficult group that presents challenges, but I am very hopeful to compete,” Mas said last year. “A good tournament for the team would be to make it out of the group stage and compete. Our first objective is to make it out of the group stage and then compete with those who qualify to the next round.”
Messi acknowledged the value of the tournament for a league and a team that are still trying to gain respect in the eyes of the world.
“This is very important for the club, especially, to participate for the first time in a World Cup that will take place in the country and for MLS to have two teams is a wonderful thing,” Messi said in an interview with Apple Music. “Everything that’s happening creates an opportunity for MLS to keep growing in football, as a league, and for other players to have the opportunity to come and keep growing.
“Football is different from the sports they are accustomed to watching in the U.S. and it should be managed differently. It’s a different sport and this is an opportunity to change the chip, to shift, and for MLS to continue maturing.”
Paul Tenorio
(Top photo: Brennan Asplen/Getty Images)
Let’s memorize a poem! Not because it’s good for us or because we think we should, but because it’s fun, a mental challenge with a solid aesthetic reward. You can amuse yourself, impress your friends and maybe discover that your way of thinking about the world — or even, as you’ll see, the universe — has shifted a bit.
Over the next five days, we’ll look closely at a great poem by one of our favorite poets, and we’ll have games, readings and lots of encouragement to help you learn it by heart. Some of you know how this works: Last year more Times readers than we could count memorized a jaunty 18-line recap of an all-night ferry ride. (If you missed that adventure, it’s not too late to embark. The ticket is still valid.)
This time, we’re training our telescopes on W.H. Auden’s “The More Loving One” — a clever, compact meditation on love, disappointment and the night sky.
Here’s the first of its four stanzas, read for us by Matthew McConaughey:
The More Loving One
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.
Matthew McConaughey, actor and poet
In four short lines we get a brisk, cynical tour of the universe: hell and the heavens, people and animals, coldness and cruelty. Commonplace observations — that the stars are distant; that life can be dangerous — are wound into a charming, provocative insight. The tone is conversational, mixing decorum and mild profanity in a manner that makes it a pleasure to keep reading.
Here’s Tracy K. Smith, a former U.S. poet laureate, with the second stanza:
How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
Tracy K. Smith, poet
These lines abruptly shift the focus from astronomy to love, from the universal to the personal. Imagine how it would feel if the stars had massive, unrequited crushes on us! The speaker, couching his skepticism in a coy, hypothetical question, seems certain that we wouldn’t like this at all.
This certainty leads him to a remarkable confession, a moment of startling vulnerability. The poem’s title, “The More Loving One,” is restated with sweet, disarming frankness. Our friend is wearing his heart on his well-tailored sleeve.
The poem could end right there: two stanzas, point and counterpoint, about how we appreciate the stars in spite of their indifference because we would rather love than be loved.
But the third stanza takes it all back. Here’s Alison Bechdel reading it:
Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.
Alison Bechdel, graphic novelist
The speaker downgrades his foolish devotion to qualified admiration. No sooner has he established himself as “the more loving one” than he gives us — and perhaps himself — reason to doubt his ardor. He likes the stars fine, he guesses, but not so much as to think about them when they aren’t around.
The fourth and final stanza, read by Yiyun Li, takes this disenchantment even further:
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.
Yiyun Li, author
Wounded defiance gives way to a more rueful, resigned state of mind. If the universe were to snuff out its lights entirely, the speaker reckons he would find beauty in the void. A starless sky would make him just as happy.
Though perhaps, like so many spurned lovers before and after, he protests a little too much. Every fan of popular music knows that a song about how you don’t care that your baby left you is usually saying the opposite.
The last line puts a brave face on heartbreak.
So there you have it. In just 16 lines, this poem manages to be somber and funny, transparent and elusive. But there’s more to it than that. There is, for one thing, a voice — a thinking, feeling person behind those lines.
When he wrote “The More Loving One,” in the 1950s, Wystan Hugh Auden was among the most beloved writers in the English-speaking world. Before this week is over there will be more to say about Auden, but like most poets he would have preferred that we give our primary attention to the poem.
Its structure is straightforward and ingenious. Each of the four stanzas is virtually a poem unto itself — a complete thought expressed in one or two sentences tied up in a neat pair of couplets. Every quatrain is a concise, witty observation: what literary scholars call an epigram.
This makes the work of memorization seem less daunting. We can take “The More Loving One” one epigram at a time, marvelling at how the four add up to something stranger, deeper and more complex than might first appear.
So let’s go back to the beginning and try to memorize that insouciant, knowing first stanza. Below you’ll find a game we made to get you started. Give it a shot, and come back tomorrow for more!
Play a game to learn it by heart. Need more practice? Listen to Ada Limón, Matthew McConaughey, W.H. Auden and others recite our poem.
Question 1/6
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
Tap a word above to fill in the highlighted blank.
Your first task: Learn the first four lines!
Let’s start with the first couplet. Fill in the rhyming words.
Monday
Love, the cosmos and everything in between, all in 16 lines.
Tuesday (Available tomorrow)
What’s love got to do with it?
Wednesday (Available April 22)
How to write about love? Be a little heartsick (and the best poet of your time).
Thursday (Available April 23)
Are we alone in the universe? Does it matter?
Friday (Available April 24)
You did it! You’re a star.
Ready for another round? Try your hand at the 2025 Poetry Challenge.
Edited by Gregory Cowles, Alicia DeSantis and Nick Donofrio. Additional editing by Emily Eakin,
Joumana Khatib, Emma Lumeij and Miguel Salazar. Design and development by Umi Syam. Additional
game design by Eden Weingart. Video editing by Meg Felling. Photo editing by Erica Ackerberg.
Illustration art direction by Tala Safie.
Illustrations by Daniel Barreto.
Text and audio recording of “The More Loving One,” by W.H. Auden, copyright © by the Estate of
W.H. Auden. Reprinted by permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd. Photograph accompanying Auden recording
from Imagno/Getty Images.
Literature
‘Romola’ (1863) by George Eliot
Who knew that there’s a major George Eliot novel that neither I nor any of my friends had ever heard of?
“Romola” was Eliot’s fourth novel, published between “The Mill on the Floss” (1860) and “Middlemarch” (1870-71). If my friends and I didn’t get this particular memo, and “Romola” is familiar to every Eliot fan but us, please skip the following.
“Romola” isn’t some fluky misfire better left unmentioned in light of Eliot’s greater work. It’s her only historical novel, set in Florence during the Italian Renaissance. It embraces big subjects like power, religion, art and social upheaval, but it’s not dry or overly intellectual. Its central character is a gifted, freethinking young woman named Romola, who enters a marriage so disastrous as to make Anna Karenina’s look relatively good.
It probably matters that many of Eliot’s other books have been adapted into movies or TV series, with actors like Hugh Dancy, Ben Kingsley, Emily Watson and Rufus Sewell. The BBC may be doing even more than we thought to keep classic literature alive. (In 1924, “Romola” was made into a silent movie starring Lillian Gish. It doesn’t seem to have made much difference.)
Anthony Trollope, among others, loved “Romola.” He did, however, warn Eliot against aiming over her readers’ heads, which may help explain its obscurity.
All I can say, really, is that it’s a mystery why some great books stay with us and others don’t.
‘Quiet Dell’ (2013) by Jayne Anne Phillips
This was an Oprah Book of the Week, which probably disqualifies it from B-side status, but it’s not nearly as well known as Phillips’s debut story collection, “Black Tickets” (1979), or her most recent novel, “Night Watch” (2023), which won her a long-overdue Pulitzer Prize.
Phillips has no parallel in her use of potent, stylized language to shine a light into the darkest of corners. In “Quiet Dell,” her only true-crime novel, she’s at the height of her powers, which are particularly apparent when she aims her language laser at horrific events that actually occurred. Her gift for transforming skeevy little lives into what I can only call “Blade Runner” mythology is consistently stunning.
Consider this passage from the opening chapter of “Quiet Dell”:
“Up high the bells are ringing for everyone alive. There are silver and gold and glass bells you can see through, and sleigh bells a hundred years old. My grandmother said there was a whisper for each one dead that year, and a feather drifting for each one waiting to be born.”
The book is full of language like that — and of complex, often chillingly perverse characters. It’s a dark, underrecognized beauty.
‘Solaris’ (1961) by Stanislaw Lem
You could argue that, in America, at least, the Polish writer Stanislaw Lem didn’t produce any A-side novels. You could just as easily argue that that makes all his novels both A-side and B-side.
It’s science fiction. All right?
I love science and speculative fiction, but I know a lot of literary types who take pride in their utter lack of interest in it. I always urge those people to read “Solaris,” which might change their opinions about a vast number of popular books they dismiss as trivial. As far as I know, no one has yet taken me up on that.
“Solaris” involves the crew of a space station continuing the study of an aquatic planet that has long defied analysis by the astrophysicists of Earth. Part of what sets the book apart from a lot of other science-fiction novels is Lem’s respect for enigma. He doesn’t offer contrived explanations in an attempt to seduce readers into suspending disbelief. The crew members start to experience … manifestations? … drawn from their lives and memories. If the planet has any intentions, however, they remain mysterious. All anyone can tell is that their desires and their fears, some of which are summoned from their subconsciousness, are being received and reflected back to them so vividly that it becomes difficult to tell the real from the projected. “Solaris” has the peculiar distinction of having been made into not one but two bad movies. Read the book instead.
‘Fox 8’ (2013) by George Saunders
If one of the most significant living American writers had become hypervisible with his 2017 novel, “Lincoln in the Bardo,” we’d go back and read his earlier work, wouldn’t we? Yes, and we may very well have already done so with the story collections “Tenth of December” (2013) and “Pastoralia” (2000). But what if we hadn’t yet read Saunders’s 2013 novella, “Fox 8,” about an unusually intelligent fox who, by listening to a family from outside their windows at night, has learned to understand, and write, in fox-English?: “One day, walking neer one of your Yuman houses, smelling all the interest with snout, I herd, from inside, the most amazing sound. Turns out, what that sound is, was: the Yuman voice, making werds. They sounded grate! They sounded like prety music! I listened to those music werds until the sun went down.”
Once Saunders became more visible to more of us, we’d want to read a book that ventures into the consciousness of a different species (novels tend to be about human beings), that maps the differences and the overlaps in human and animal consciousness, explores the effects of language on consciousness and is great fun.
We’d all have read it by now — right?
‘Between the Acts’ (1941) by Virginia Woolf
You could argue that Woolf didn’t have any B-sides, and yet it’s hard to deny that more people have read “Mrs. Dalloway” (1925) and “To the Lighthouse” (1927) than have read “The Voyage Out” (1915) or “Monday or Tuesday” (1921). Those, along with “Orlando” (1928) and “The Waves” (1931), are Woolf’s most prominent novels.
Four momentous novels is a considerable number for any writer, even a great one. That said, “Between the Acts,” her last novel, really should be considered the fifth of her significant books. The phrase “embarrassment of riches” comes to mind.
Five great novels by the same author is a lot for any reader to take on. Our reading time is finite. We won’t live long enough to read all the important books, no matter how old we get to be. I don’t expect many readers to be as devoted to Woolf as are the cohort of us who consider her to have been some sort of dark saint of literature and will snatch up any relic we can find. Fanatics like me will have read “Between the Acts” as well as “The Voyage Out,” “Monday or Tuesday” and “Flush” (1933), the story of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s cocker spaniel. Speaking for myself, I don’t blame anyone who hasn’t gotten to those.
I merely want to add “Between the Acts” to the A-side, lest anyone who’s either new to Woolf or a tourist in Woolf-landia fail to rank it along with the other four contenders.
As briefly as possible: It focuses on an annual village pageant that attempts to convey all of English history in a single evening. The pageant itself interweaves subtly, brilliantly, with the lives of the villagers playing the parts.
It’s one of Woolf’s most lusciously lyrical novels. And it’s a crash course, of sorts, in her genius for conjuring worlds in which the molehill matters as much as the mountain, never mind their differences in size.
It’s also the most accessible of her greatest books. It could work for some as an entry point, in more or less the way William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying” (1930) can be the starter book before you go on to “The Sound and the Fury” (1929) or “Absalom, Absalom!” (1936).
As noted, there’s too much for us to read. We do the best we can.
More in Literature
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Literature
‘Prayer’ (1985) by Galway Kinnell
Whatever happens. Whatever
what is is is what
I want. Only that. But that.
“I typically say Kinnell’s words at the start of my day, as I’m pedaling a traffic-laden path to my office,” says Major Jackson, 57, the author of six books of poetry, including “Razzle Dazzle” (2023). “The poem encourages a calm acceptance of the day’s events but also wants us to embrace the misapprehension and oblivion of life, to avoid probing too deeply for answers to inscrutable questions. I admire what Kinnell does with only 14 words; the repetition of ‘what,’ ‘that’ and ‘is’ would seem to limit the poem’s sentiment but, paradoxically, the poem opens widely to contain all manner of human experience. The three ‘is’es in the middle line give it a symmetry that makes its message feel part of a natural order, and even more convincing. Thanks to the skillful punctuation, pauses and staccato rhythm, a tonal quality of interior reflection emerges. Much like a haiku, it continues after its last words, lingering like the last note played on a piano that slowly fades.”
“Just as I was entering young adulthood, probably slow to claim romantic feelings, a girlfriend copied out a poem by Pablo Neruda and slipped it into an envelope with red lipstick kisses all over it. In turn, I recited this poem. It took me the remainder of that winter to memorize its lines,” says Jackson. “The poem captures the pitch of longing that defines love at its most intense. The speaker in Shakespeare’s most famous sonnet believes the poem creates the beloved, ‘So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.’ (Sonnet 18). In Rilke’s expressive declarations of yearning, the beloved remains elusive. Wherever the speaker looks or travels, she marks his world by her absence. I find this deeply moving.”
“Clifton faced many obstacles, including cancer, a kidney transplant and the loss of her husband and two of her children. Through it all, she crafted a long career as a pre-eminent American poet,” says Jackson. “Her poem ‘won’t you celebrate with me’ is a war cry, an invitation to share in her victories against life’s persistent challenges. The poem is meaningful to all who have had to stare down death in a hospital or had to bereave the passing of close relations. But, even for those who have yet to mourn life’s vicissitudes, the poem is instructive in cultivating resilience and a persevering attitude. I keep coming back to the image of the speaker’s hands and the spirit of steadying oneself in the face of unspeakable storms. She asks in a perfectly attuned gorgeously metrical line, ‘what did i see to be except myself?’”
‘Sonnet 94’ (1609) by William Shakespeare
They that have power to hurt and will do none,
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmovèd, cold, and to temptation slow,
They rightly do inherit heaven’s graces
And husband nature’s riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others but stewards of their excellence.
The summer’s flower is to the summer sweet,
Though to itself it only live and die;
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity.
For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.
“It’s one of the moments of Western consciousness,” says Frederick Seidel, 90, the author of more than a dozen collections of poetry, including “So What” (2024). “Shakespeare knows and says what he knows.”
“It trombones magnificent, unbearable sorrow,” says Seidel.
“It’s smartass and bitter and bright,” says Seidel.
These interviews have been edited and condensed.
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