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| The Sweet Science (Penguin Sports Library) |  | Author: A. J. Liebling
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Category: Book
List Price: $9.95
Buy New: $8.00
You Save: $1.95 (20%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 888060
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7 x 5 x 1
ISBN: 0140061916
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.830973
EAN: 9780140061918
ASIN: 0140061916
Publication Date: September 1, 1991
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Product Description
A.J. Liebling's classic New Yorker pieces on the "sweet science of bruising" bring vividly to life the boxing world as it once was. It depicts the great events of boxing's American heyday: Sugar Ray Robinson's dramatic comeback, Rocky Marciano's rise to prominence, Joe Louis's unfortunate decline. Liebling never fails to find the human story behind the fight, and he evokes the atmosphere in the arena as distinctly as he does the goings-on in the ring--a combination that prompted Sports Illustrated to name The Sweet Science the best American sports book of all time.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
Sweet writing April 5, 2008
Sports Illustrated designated "The Sweet Science" the best book about sports ever written in the Western World and I agree with that assessment. Author Abbott Joseph Liebling was as fine a writer as American journalism ever produced and his favorite subject was "The Sweet Science" of prizefighting in its golden era. Liebling wrote for The New Yorker (not known for its sports coverage) and he renders the boxing world (including its characters, cynicism and lingo-ese) with clarity and uncommmon eloquence. Liebling gives you such "broken" (financially from hunger) fighters as Rocky Marciano, technicians such as Archie Moore and aggressive aces such as Jake LaMotta and Sonny Liston in as vivid terms as possible. He doesn't shrink from his task, either. He relates his blow-by-blow reports with the uncannny knack of one who knows the sharp consequences of a faulty defense. He's amazing, Liebling is, and his "Sweet Science" is the epitome of graceful sportswriting in a bluntly articulate age. I can't think of a more rewarding book for any sports fan. Liebling is a wonder. He was a counterpuncher. Every time you let down your guard he surprises you with a shot to the ribcage.
 Cut-rate Mencken but still entertaining... September 2, 2007
1 out of 6 found this review helpful
If you like boxing and reading, then you are truly a rara avis. But if you do happen to belong to such a tiny cohort, then this book should provide a couple hours' entertainment.
Liebling tries too hard to emulate H.L. Mencken's style, and he doesn't have the chops for it...but, at the same time, he knows how to describe the action inside the ring. (Not as well as Jack London, but well enough.) At all times, you sense the depth of his love for boxing.
Another reason to recommend this book is that Joyce Carol Oates thinks Liebling was a racist. (I know, I know...who the hell is Joyce Carol Oates?) If you read the book, you'll discover that he wasn't...and a few more things besides.
Rest In Peace;Floyd.... May 31, 2006
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
The late,great Floyd Patterson,who became the first heavyweight to regain the title after losing it,is as good a reason as any to name a book about boxing,'The Sweet Science'.In this particular case,'A.J. Liebling's masterpiece about boxing(mostly
in the fifties)was voted the best sports book ever, by Sports Illustrated.The incredibly colorful characters Liebling focuses on would be hard to beat by any writer in any field,even if he may not have gotten all of it right.For example,he seems to actually get along with Rocky Marciano's manager,Al Weill,even though evidence elsewhere suggests that Rocky may have retired to get away from him.And I think he resorted to cliche in describing Irish Billy Graham as as "good as a fighter can be without being a hell of a fighter"(p.250);Graham is a Hall of Famer who was robbed in a welterweight title fight against Kid Gavilan-and my (Jewish) uncle idolized him.But Liebling,who wrote on "serious subjects" for 'The New Yorker'and was an award winning war reporter, attended the first fight ever held in Yankee Stadium in 1923-and remained optimistic about the future through the lens of boxing,concludes,"I reflected with satisfaction that old Ahab(Archie)Moore could have whipped all four principals on that card within 15 rounds,and that while (Jack)Dempsey may have been a great champion,he had less to beat than Marciano.I felt the satisfaction because it proved that the world isn't going backward,if you can just stay young enough to remember what it was rewally like when you were really young."
Great Stuff! May 13, 2006
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
I've been searching for this book for years. I'm from Brockton, MA and I certainly appreciate great boxing prose. The new intro really adds nothing to the book and Mr.Anasi even gets Ezzard Charles' name wrong--calls him "Ezra" in the intro--which also indicates poor editing. Leibling gives you the total world of a great fight--not just whats going on in the ring but the world surrounding the fight. Very real, often funny, thoroughly engaging. I want to read more of his stuff.
Boxing as culture March 18, 2006
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
When asked which is the best book on boxing ever written, anyone with any inclination towards the literary side of The Manly Art will instinctively site Liebling's classic collection of essays written in the early '50s collected in this volume. On the evidence here, I cannot dispute the consensus. Liebling gives you not a history or a list of profiles of boxers but an entire world and a culture. He captures the feel of going to a boxing match in the early '50s, the crowds, the managers, the trainers and assorted characters. The best thing you can say about a piece of literature is that it places you in the action, you can physically feel that you are there and present. I have read no other book on Boxing that accurately captures this the way Liebling does in The Sweet Science. He's also an accomplished and erudite writer, a highly cultured man who brings that cultural sensitvity to something often considered, by those ignorant of these things, to be base and low-brow.
The fighters themselves - Marciano, Moore, Sadler, Robinson, Patterson, Farr - come across less as legends and more as contemporary sportsmen. It seems incredible to me that once upon a time you could just buy a ticket and stroll into the Marciano-Moore fight! For me, that fight and many others was the stuff of mythology and yet Liebling succeeds in making it real and tangible.
Final note: anyone who after reading this feels an uncontrollable lust to acquire Pierce Egan's Boxiana volumes will be enthralled to know that there is a company in Canada, Nicol Island Publishing, who have published at least three of the total of five volumes. Unfortunately, Amazon does not seem to sell any of them.
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