Author: Ramachandra Guha
Editor(s): Ramachandra Guha
Publisher: Picador India
Year: 2002
Language: English
Pages: 476
ISBN/UPC (if available): 0330396137
Description
This volume celebrates the best writing on the game and includes many pieces that have been out of print, or difficult to get hold of, for years. It is also truly international in its selection.
This anthology is a tribute to the finest writers on the game of cricket and an acknowledgement that the great days of cricket literature are behind us. There was a time when major English writers took time off to write about cricket, whereas the cricket book market today is dominated by ghosted autobiographies and statistical compendiums.
The older cricketing nations such as England and Australia are well represented here. But so are the countries where the game is followed with the greatest passion - India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and, above all, the West Indies. There are even pieces on a Fijian batsman and an American fast bowler. The book's gallery of great writers includes Neville Cardus, C L R James, John Arlott, V S Naipaul, J B Priestly, Jack Fingleton and C B Fry.
This definitive anthology is a must for any cricket follower or anyone interested in sports writing elevated to high art.
The Picador Book of Cricket celebrates the best writing on the game and includes many pieces that have been out of print for years. The older cricketing nations such as England and Australia are well represented here. So are the countries where the game is followed with the greatest passion: India, Pakistan and the West Indies. The book’s gallery of great writers includes Neville Cardus, C L R James, John Arlott, V S Naipaul and Jack Fingleton.
REVIEWS
Wide-ranging, well informed and thoughtfully put together…there is enough quirkiness to balance the old guard and that combination ensures the almost relentless excellence of this collection.
-Tim Rice, Literary Review
Any serious novice student of cricket literature will enjoy and benefit from this broad sweep, while the experience scholar, too, will find much of interest.
-David Frith, Sunday Times
This plural and hugely enjoyable anthology is proof enough that cricket is now equally at home on the damp fields of Co. Dublin or the backstreets of Bombay.
-Conor O’Callaghan, Irish Times
Ramachandra Guha has compiled an anthology of impeccable and peerless writing…This is a first-class anthology.
-Jonathan Bouquet, Observer
Contents
RAMACHANDRA GUHA-INTRODUCTION
JOHN ARLOTT-CRICKET AT WORCESTER:1938
FROM GRACE TO HUTTON
ALAN GIBSON- Great Men Before Agamemnon
C B Fry- The Founder of Modern Batsmanship
BERNARD DARWIN- Genial Giant
Ray Robinson- The Second Most Famous Beard in Cricket
J H FINGELTON- Never Another Like Victor
Bernard Hollowood- The Greatest of Bowlers
IAN PEEBLES- The Colossus of Rhodes
Ralph Barker- The American Lillee
NEVILLE CARDUS- The Millionaire of Spin
R C Robertson-Glasgow- Three English Batsmen
RONALD MASON- Imperial Hammond
W J O'Reilly- Young Don Bradman
J H FINGLETON- Brightly Fades the Don
C L R James- The Black Bradman
J H FINGLETON- My Friend, the Enemy
E W Swanton- Compton Arrives
ALAN ROSS- Hutton Departs
'Evoe'- Can Nothing Be Done?
FROM MILLER TO TENDULKAR
RAY ROBINSON- Touch of Hero
Ray Robinson- Much in a Name
RAY ROBINSON- The Original Little Master
C L R James- A Representative Man
JOHN ARLOTT- In His Pomp
Ray Robinson-Southern Southpaws
FRANK KEATING- Down Under and Out
Scyld Berry- Gavaskar Equals Bradman
JOHN WOODCOCK- Kapil's Devil
Donald Woods- Twist Again
MARTIN JOHNSON- A Man with a Secret
Scyld Berry- Botham's Fastest Hundred
HUGFH McLLVANNEY- Black Is Bountful
Frank Keating- Marshall Arts
MARTIN HOHNSON- Kind of the Willow
B C Pires- Emperor of Trinidad
FRANK KEATING- Final Fling For the Fizzer
Mike Selvey- Sachin of Mumbai
SURESH MENON- Tendulkar of the World
Alan Ross- Watching Benaud Bowl
LITTLE HEROES
A A THOMSON- Bat, Ball and Boomernag
John Arlott- Rough Diamond
NEVILLE CARDUS- Robinson of Yorkshire
David Foot- Character in the Counties
ROWLAND RYDER- The Unplayable Jeeves
C L R James- The Most Unkindest Cut
Mathew Engel- A Great Fat Man
DALE SLATER- Abed and Apartheid
Philip Snow - The Fijian Botham
SUJIT MUKHERJEE- A Jesuit in Patna
Neville Cardus- A Shastbury Character
ALAN GIBSON- The unmasking of a Dashing Oriental Star
N S Ramaswami- Iverson and the Lesser Arts
RICHARD CASHMAN- The Celebrated Yabba
Hubert Phillips- An Englishman's Crease
MATCHES
RALPH BARKER- The Demon Against England
Neville Cardus- The Ideal Cricket Match
C L R JAMES- Barnes v. Constantine
J H Fingleton- The Best Test I have Known
RICHIE BENAUD- The Last Day at Brisbane
Mike Masrqusee- David Slays Goliath
R C ROBERTSON- The One-Way Critic
STYLES AND THEMES
J H FINGLETON- The Brilliance of Left-Handers
John Arlott- Fast and Furious
IAN PEEBLES- Opening Batsman
JohnArlott- Not One to Cover
GERALD BRODRIBB- The Big Hit
Ian Peebles- Ballooners
NEVILLE CARDUS- The Umpire
J H Fingleton- Cricket Farewells
Tunku Varadarajan- To Lord's with Love - and a Hamper
ALAN ROSS- The Presence of Ranji
Gideon Haigh- Sir Donald Brandname
B C PIRES- Coping with Defeat
Ian Woodbridge- Ashes Dream Teams
JOHN ARLOTT- Australianism
V S Naipaul- The Caribbean Flavour
J B PRIESTLEY- The Lesson of Garfield Sobers
Neville Cardus- The Spirit of Summer
A A THOMSON- Winter Made Clorious
Neville Cardus- What's in a Name?
ROWLAND RYDER- The Pleasures of Reading Wisden
RAMCHANDRA GUHA - Epilogue: An Addict's Archive
R C Robertson-Glasgow- The Bowler's Epitah