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
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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.
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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