- Hardcover: 228 pages
- Publisher: W&N; Ill edition (22 Sep 2005)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0297844202
- ISBN-13: 978-0297844204
- Product Dimensions: 26.2 x 22.4 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 522,721 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Review
'dazzling... a handsome history of heavyweight boxing... stylishly written... terrific, arresting... it deserves a place on any fight fan's coffee table.' (THE INDEPENDENT )
'... this truly wonderful book ... fantastic photographs... It's a cliche to say "if you only buy one book on heavyweight boxing, make sure it's this one", but the simple truth is it has to be said.' (SUNDAY SPORT )
'... this truly wonderful book ... fantastic photographs... It's a cliche to say "if you only buy one book on heavyweight boxing, make sure it's this one", but the simple truth is it has to be said.' (SUNDAY SPORT )
SUNDAY SPORT
'... this truly wonderful book ... fantastic photographs... It's a cliche to say "if you only buy one book on heavyweight boxing, make sure it's this one", but the simple truth is it has to be said.'
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I must admit I picked up ‘Kings of the Ring’ with a little trepidation. I like my sports books to be correct in every detail as well as sparkling and original, and I was concerned this might be coffee table fare – great on pictures but light on text. I found myself extremely pleasantly surprised.
The book is broken up into chapters on all the heavyweight champions and a few who never won universal recognition, from the bareknuckle days to the present, and yet it manages a seamlessly coherent narrative. In the early 20th century, for example, the theme is one of white (mainly Irish-American) men striving to the top while battling to keep African Americans out of the loop. This allows the author, Gavin Evans, to delve deeper than any other I have read into the lives of some of the great fighters who were frozen out of the title race (Peter Jackson, Sam Langford and Harry Wills) and also to look at the failings of the great champions with an unblinking eye.
He clearly admires many of these men and the way they fought, but he never allows that to blind him to their many faults. As he writes in his introduction, “In retrospect their flaws probably seem more remarkable than in their own airbrushed times: the extreme racism of most of the early white gloved champions, the violence against women and other men, the greed, the stupidity, the links with organised crime, the alcohol and the drugs.” All of this is exposed without recourse to euphemism or, indeed, for hyperbole and in some cases the picture that emerges is genuinely shocking. For example, I was raised to think of Jack Dempsey as a sweetheart outside the ring as much as he was a killer inside the ropes, but, sadly, this book presents a very different picture of the man: a violent, racist, bully for much of his life. Jack Johnson, Joe Louis and even Rocky Marciano also emerge more flawed, or rather more rounded, than the bowdlerised versions of their lives I’d previously encountered.
Despite all this, Evans clearly adores the old heroes – as much for their flaws as for their assets – and he lovingly provides vivid details of their fights and their lives as champions. In the end, though, he emerges as something of a modernist, taking the view that boxing, like every other sport, has moved on. He ends by predicting, tongue presumably not too far from cheek, that in 50 years time we’ll be saying: “Ah, Tyson, Holyfield, Lewis, Klitschko – they don’t make them like that any more.”
So, definitely worth a cover-to-cover read and on top of that the pictures are truly wonderful. I’ve been following boxing for many moons but most of the pictures of the old champions were ones I’d never seen before, and they include contemporary cartoons and other illustrations. Highly recommended.
The book is broken up into chapters on all the heavyweight champions and a few who never won universal recognition, from the bareknuckle days to the present, and yet it manages a seamlessly coherent narrative. In the early 20th century, for example, the theme is one of white (mainly Irish-American) men striving to the top while battling to keep African Americans out of the loop. This allows the author, Gavin Evans, to delve deeper than any other I have read into the lives of some of the great fighters who were frozen out of the title race (Peter Jackson, Sam Langford and Harry Wills) and also to look at the failings of the great champions with an unblinking eye.
He clearly admires many of these men and the way they fought, but he never allows that to blind him to their many faults. As he writes in his introduction, “In retrospect their flaws probably seem more remarkable than in their own airbrushed times: the extreme racism of most of the early white gloved champions, the violence against women and other men, the greed, the stupidity, the links with organised crime, the alcohol and the drugs.” All of this is exposed without recourse to euphemism or, indeed, for hyperbole and in some cases the picture that emerges is genuinely shocking. For example, I was raised to think of Jack Dempsey as a sweetheart outside the ring as much as he was a killer inside the ropes, but, sadly, this book presents a very different picture of the man: a violent, racist, bully for much of his life. Jack Johnson, Joe Louis and even Rocky Marciano also emerge more flawed, or rather more rounded, than the bowdlerised versions of their lives I’d previously encountered.
Despite all this, Evans clearly adores the old heroes – as much for their flaws as for their assets – and he lovingly provides vivid details of their fights and their lives as champions. In the end, though, he emerges as something of a modernist, taking the view that boxing, like every other sport, has moved on. He ends by predicting, tongue presumably not too far from cheek, that in 50 years time we’ll be saying: “Ah, Tyson, Holyfield, Lewis, Klitschko – they don’t make them like that any more.”
So, definitely worth a cover-to-cover read and on top of that the pictures are truly wonderful. I’ve been following boxing for many moons but most of the pictures of the old champions were ones I’d never seen before, and they include contemporary cartoons and other illustrations. Highly recommended.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I've always followed boxing and i have a good knowledge of the sport and most of the boxers of the last 15 years or so. However, previous to reading this book my boxing knowledge of the older fighters was extremely patchy at best. However reading this book changed all that and i now consider myself to have a pretty indepth knowledge of the history of heavyweight boxing.
The book is brilliantly layed put and presented, with some stunning photos in it. The acual writing is also up to these same high standards as well, and the book goes into great detail about the lives and careers of all of the great heavyweights of the last 100 years and beyond. The chapter on the origins of boxing and the bareknuckle era is particulary interesting as i didn't have a clue about this era at all previosly.
Basically, this book is absolutly perfect for anyone who wants to increase their knowledge on heavyweight boxing, but it is also just as perfect for boxing nuts who already know a lot about the sport. Recommended for all people interested in boxing
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Kings of the Ring lives up to its billing as a history of heavyweight boxing. All the great names are there from the bareknuckle sluggers to the highly trained athletes such as Lennox Lewis. I found the book to be a chronicle of the evolution of the heavyweight division demonstrating the great strides in technique and entertainment achieved over a relatively short time line. The book is a compromise between what the boxing purists would want and the requirements of tabloid newspaper readers. For the purists there are blow by blow accounts of some of the great clashes between these heavyweight titans. For those fascinated by sporting sleaze and scandal, the warts and all details of lives lived to the limit are all there. The irony is that such strong men in the ring can be so frail outside it when the crowds of admirers have gone. Big and glossy with many of the most famous fight shots from the history of the sport, the book is as good pictorially as for its words.
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