Fiddle, fish, fence, flick, grope, glance, poke, prod, nurdle, tickle, turn, squirt, biff, bash, slash, smash … just a few of the options open to a batsman. No wonder the philosopher of language and cricket fan was impressed.

This article is from theguardian.com by James Gingell.

Ludwig Wittgenstein, it is said, loved cricket. Curious, perhaps, for such a famously serious Austrian to have affection for so trivial and English a game, but I have a theory as to why.

Maybe he liked the game’s hypnotic rhythms, its genteel pace, the easy ebb and flow of an even match. Maybe his eyes and ears enjoyed the game’s distinctive sights and sounds: the flapping white flannels and the rounded knock of bat on ball. Maybe it was the drama, the gladiatorial confrontation of a furious quick bowler hurling rock-hard leather towards a belligerent batsman. All of this grand and strange theatre might have helped him unknit his brow, do some unthinking and achieve the kind of meditative state so important to big intellectual breakthroughs.

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