- Hardcover: 576 pages
- Publisher: Faber and Faber; 1st edition edition (6 July 1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0571178553
- ISBN-13: 978-0571178551
- Product Dimensions: 23.9 x 16.5 x 5.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 908,511 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
Enjoying a celebrity shared by perhaps only Gladstone and Queen Victoria of his contemporaries, W.G. Grace was the world's first sporting superstar. Researched in archives from Grimsby to Australia, and drawing on diaries, letters, and access to the cricketer's own library, this biography offers a radical analysis of Grace's career. It also reviews the more controversial aspects of his conduct, including verbal and physical altercations both on and off the field, and his kidnapping of an Australian cricketer from Lord's. Discussion of his private life encompasses his childhood, his marriage, his children, his grief at the death of a daughter and later his eldest son, and his career as a doctor. The book includes an extensive statistical survey by Bill Frindall.
About the Author
Simon Rae's award-winning W. G. Grace: A Life received widespread acclaim on its publication in 1998. He has also edited a number of anthologies, and for five years presented BBC Radio 4's 'Poetry Please!'. For nearly ten years he wrote regular topical poems for the Guardian and published two collections of them, Soft Targets and Rapid Response. He collaborated with Ronald Searle on a book of cartoons and poems, The Face of War, and in 1999 he won the National Poetry Prize. His first stage play, A Quiet Night In, was produced in Bristol and London the same year. In 1999/2000 he was poet in residence with Warwickshire County Cricket Club and MAC at Edgbaston, and he was Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Warwick University for 2000/2001.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Immensely well written and thoroughly researched, this paints a warts and all picture of W G Grace. A prodigously talented cricketer, he was also a very obvious "shamateur" - a supposed amateur making a very healthy living from the game of cricket, as well as someone who would go to almost any lengths to win a match, including if not exactly breaking the rules then certainly bending them in the extreme. As an Essex ex-patriate one of my favourite sections is where Grace and his Gloucestershire team take on Essex at Leyton. Grace makes a big mistake in offending Essex's volatile and dangerous fast bowler Charles Kortright by referring to the Essex team as "rabbits ready to put back in the hutch". Kortright works Grace over a treat, peppering him with short balls and clearly getting him LBW and caught behind during one aggressive over, and yet even then Grace's reputation saves him as he glowers at the umpire and intimidates him into not giving him out. Finally Kortright rips another one through Grace's defence and removes two stumps from the ground. Grace stood his ground for a second, then walks off in a foul mood - to be accompanied by one of the earliest and best recorded bits of sledging from Kortright who exclaims "surely you're not going, Doctor? One of the stumps is still standing."
A sheer joy for any true cricket fan and the typically well presented and researched figure work of Bill Frindall is a joy to go through.
A sheer joy for any true cricket fan and the typically well presented and researched figure work of Bill Frindall is a joy to go through.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
As a cricket fan I'd obviously heard of WG Grace but had never read anything about him or realised exactly why he is such an icon.
This book takes an in depth look at his cricketing career and demonstrates why he was the second most famous English citizen of the Victorian era, the most famous being Queen Vicky herself.
It is clear that WG loved the game at all levels and was a true master, piling up runs, taking hundreds of wickets and breaking all sorts of records.
It also highlights certain tragedies in his life, notably the untimely deaths of members of his family and offspring.
The only criticism I have of the book is that I would have liked to have known more about WG outside of cricket, his work as a doctor as well as his family life but that's only a small gripe as I thoroughly enjoyed this book and reccomend it for anyone who loves the game of cricket.
This book takes an in depth look at his cricketing career and demonstrates why he was the second most famous English citizen of the Victorian era, the most famous being Queen Vicky herself.
It is clear that WG loved the game at all levels and was a true master, piling up runs, taking hundreds of wickets and breaking all sorts of records.
It also highlights certain tragedies in his life, notably the untimely deaths of members of his family and offspring.
The only criticism I have of the book is that I would have liked to have known more about WG outside of cricket, his work as a doctor as well as his family life but that's only a small gripe as I thoroughly enjoyed this book and reccomend it for anyone who loves the game of cricket.
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