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October 13, 2008

 

Football Books: A Best Sports Writing Addendum

We have in the past noted the paucity of books about football among sports writing's most cherished tomes (though there have been a few). Even in the list of "The Best Sports Journalism Ever" that I posted recently, there was only a single football piece represented (the Plimpton), and it is only obliquely about football. So, when I saw The Week (one of my favorite magazines) had highlighted not one but four football books in its most recent issue, I thought it worth noting. They are: Boys Will Be Boys by Jeff Pearlman about the hard partying Cowboys during the team's dynasty of the 1990s; Giants Among Men by Jack Cavanaugh harks back to the New York Giants of the '50s and '60s and looks at football as it was in a much different era; War as They Knew It by Michael Rosenberg covers the Michigan versus Ohio State football rivalry during the tumultuous 2970s on college campuses; and Playing the Enemy by John Carlin is not quite about football but brings to light how a single rugby game in South Africa helped the country begin healing as apartheid ended.

Meanwhile, in the comments of the original sports writing post, bdr mentions a pair of books that give the literary treatment to that other, other football: soccer.

"(Excellent) novelist Tim Parks wrote a book about following Serie A squad Hellas Verona around Italy for a season (as they tried to avoid relegation - unsuccessfully) with its hardest-core fans called A Season with Verona, that's terrific.

"Philip Ball, who covers soccer for The Guardian, wrote a book about Spain, Spanish history, and how it all plays out in Spanish football called Morbo that's even better."

- C. Max Magee @ 6:24 PM ~ comments: 5 ~ Links to this post

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Comments:

I quite liked Peter Gent's North Dallas Forty. His second football novel, The Franchise, was too over-the-top, but had many pleasurable moments.
# posted by Blogger Robert Boyd @ October 13, 2008 6:59 PM
 
One of my favorite books, "A Fan's Notes," while not exclusively about football writes about it in rapturous detail, with a focus on Frank Gifford's career. Great writing.
# posted by Blogger Ben Dooley @ October 13, 2008 8:11 PM
 
Plimpton has a good football book--I think the title is One More July...
# posted by Blogger chall gray @ October 13, 2008 10:53 PM
 
It's all about Michael Lewis's The Blind Side.
# posted by Anonymous Anonymous @ October 14, 2008 1:52 AM
 
I'm trying to think how you haven't mentioned The Damned Utd by David Peace. A monumental book.

Thanks for the great site.

Cheers

Matt
# posted by Anonymous matt @ October 17, 2008 8:37 AM
 

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