Tag: sports writing
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#29: ‘The Fight’ by Norman Mailer
‘The Fight’ is Norman Mailer’s first-hand account of Muhammad Ali and George Foreman’s famous meeting in Kinshasa, Zaïre in 1975, for the world heavyweight title. ‘The Fight’ is one of those classic books that regularly appears in the regurgitated online ‘top-ten’ lists of boxing books that you must read! Obviously, the history of professional boxing…
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#28: ‘The Art and Aesthetics of Boxing’ by David Scott
‘The Art and Aesthetics of Boxing’ by David Scott is a really great exploration of how artists have tried to represent boxing and boxers, through literature and visual arts. As Scott lays out the history of artistic representation of the sport and its participants, there is also a parallel thread building, addressing the necessity to…
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#27: ‘In Black and White’ by Donald McRae
‘In Black and White – The Untold Story of Joe Louis and Jesse Owens’ by Donald McRae is a brilliantly deep and thorough exploration of the tandem sporting careers and eventual friendship of sporting legends, boxer Joe Louis, and athletics all-rounder Jesse Owens. If you’ve read my previous posts you’ll know just how highly I…
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#26: ‘Jacobs Beach’ by Kevin Mitchell
‘Jacobs Beach – The Mob, the Garden & the Golden Age of Boxing’ by Kevin Mitchell focuses on the period during which Mike Jacobs was the talent booker for Madison Square Garden, at the time the only place to make a career as a top tier boxer. If you were a boxer in New York,…
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#25: ‘The Road to Nowhere’ by Tris Dixon
‘The Road to Nowhere – A Journey Through Boxing’s Wastelands’ by Tris Dixon is a record of Dixon’s travel across numerous U.S. states, attempting to speak to forgotten boxers. I have a special fondness for any book in which the author goes off on a quest to talk to a group of people before it’s…
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#24: ‘The Whitechapel Whirlwind’ by John Harding
‘The Whitechapel Whirlwind’ by John Harding is the story of British-Jewish boxer Jack ‘Kid’ Berg. As with my previous post about Teddy Baldock, this book is a fantastic account of British boxing at a time where boxing gyms were found in numbers throughout the working-class areas of London, and other British cities, and boxing cards…
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#23: ‘Teddy Baldock – The Pride of Poplar’ by Brian Belton
‘Teddy Baldock – The Pride of Poplar’ by Brian Belton is the story of Britain’s youngest ever boxing world champion. Born at Poplar in east London in 1908, and coming from a family of fighters, Teddy Baldock went on to beat American Archie Bell at the Royal Albert Hall and take the world bantamweight title.…
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#22: ‘In Sunshine or in Shadow’ by Donald McRae
‘In Sunshine or in Shadow’ by Donald McRae is a book looking at the history of amateur boxing on both sides of the Troubles in Belfast and Northern Ireland, and the effect which the amateur eventually had on the pro game. Over the past two years Donald McRae has become one of my favourite authors…
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#21: ‘Berserk’ by Don Stradley
The subtitle for ‘Berserk’ by Don Stradley is ‘The Shocking Life and Death of Edwin Valero’, which is one of the most succinct and apt taglines for a book that I’ve come across. Even within the confines of boxing, which is full of wild stories, Valero’s is truly shocking. This is mainly a tale of…
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#20: ‘The Bittersweet Science’ edited by Carlo Rotella and Michael Ezra
‘The Bittersweet Science’ is a collection of fifteen essays about American boxing and boxers, edited by Carlo Rotella and Michael Ezra. Now, this is no judgement on this book, but I almost have no recollection of reading it, though this has much more to do with the fact that I read this book around 18…
Writers on Boxing 