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NO WAY BUT TO FIGHT

GEORGE FOREMAN AND THE BUSINESS OF BOXING

Although not for the casual fan—if those exist in boxing anymore—students of the sport will find plenty to chew on.

An account of a punch man–turned-pitchman and the business in which he made his name.

A two-time heavyweight champion of the world and Olympic gold medalist, George Foreman (b. 1949) has led a fascinating life in and outside of the ring: a poor child who became a rich man; an overweight man and a world-class athlete; a devoted man who has been married five times; a sports commentator; a reality show subject and sitcom actor; and, of course, a home-shopping network star who sold a staggering number of meat cookers. Most pertinently, he went toe-to-toe with some of the best pugilists in the history of a quintessential American sport. In his first book, Smith (Sport Management and History/Nichols Coll.) approaches his subject in a scholarly manner, and readers receive such conclusions as, “He had not yet achieved the ‘emotional invulnerability’ of a soul aesthetic even if he looked the part,” and are regularly referred to more than 50 pages of footnotes. Unquestionably, the author did his homework, including research into declassified government documents, and he takes readers to far-flung locales, including Zaire in 1974 for the famous "Rumble in the Jungle" with Muhammad Ali. “Like a matador,” writes Smith of the fight, “he circled the ring, using his fists and his words to manipulate Foreman into a position for the estocada. Foreman looked to gore him, but he had been weakened by seven rounds of Ali’s physical and verbal banderillas.” In addition to Foreman’s bouts, the author also offers detailed (sometimes overly so) examinations of how those fights came to be, illustrating the nature of the sport—what Foreman says is “truly a gangster’s game”—more than providing a nuanced picture of the man.

Although not for the casual fan—if those exist in boxing anymore—students of the sport will find plenty to chew on.

Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-4773-1976-5

Page Count: 408

Publisher: Univ. of Texas

Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2019

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2019

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NIGHT

The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...

Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children. 

He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions. 

The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the sphere of suffering shared, and in this case extended to the death march itself, there is no spiritual or emotional legacy here to offset any reader reluctance.

Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006

ISBN: 0374500010

Page Count: 120

Publisher: Hill & Wang

Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006

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WHEN BREATH BECOMES AIR

A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...

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A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.

Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”

A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.

Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6

Page Count: 248

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015

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