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The Silent Season of a Hero

The Sports Writing of Gay Talese

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1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

One of America's most acclaimed writers and journalists, Gay Talese has been fascinated by sports throughout his life. At age fifteen he became a sports reporter for his Ocean City High School newspaper; four years later, as sports editor of the University of Alabama's Crimson-White, he began to employ devices more common in fiction, such as establishing a "scene" with minute details-a technique that would later make him famous. Later, as a sports reporter for the New York Times, Talese was drawn to individuals at poignant and vulnerable moments rather than to the spectacle of sports. Boxing held special appeal, and his Esquire pieces on Joe Louis and Floyd Patterson in decline won praise, as would his later essay "Ali in Havana," chronicling Muhammad Ali's visit to Fidel Castro. His profile of Joe DiMaggio, "The Silent Season of a Hero," perfectly captured the great player in his remote retirement, and displayed Talese's journalistic brilliance, for it grew out of his on-the-ground observation of the Yankee Clipper rather than from any interview. More recently, Talese traveled to China to track down and chronicle the female soccer player who missed a penalty kick that would have won China the World Cup. Chronicling Talese's writing over more than six decades, from high school and college columns to his signature adult journalism- and including several never-before-published pieces (such as one on sports anthropology), a new introduction by the author, and notes on the background of each piece-The Silent Season of a Hero is a unique and indispensable collection for sports fans and those who enjoy the heights of journalism.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from November 15, 2010
      Talese has covered a number of topics, but his career's most constant thread is sports, and this collection show what makes his writing so strong: Talese finds the poignant in the everyday. In "Portrait of a Young Prize Fighter," for instance, Talese withholds his subject's name until the end: "This young prize fighter's name happens to be Jose Torres. But he actually thinks, talks and dreams like dozens of other inexperienced professionals who train each day in Stillman's... seem to agree that despite all the punching, boxing still beats working for a living." It's a deft way to show the near-impossibility of becoming a household name in a crowded field. Even a simple piece about college ball has the kind of descriptive prose hardly seen in this genre today. Whether recounting a workaday game or taking on the monolithic topic of Muhammad Ali—which he did so well in his 1996 Esquire piece, "Ali in Havana," (included here)—Talese's writing possesses so much color and clear description of the world beyond the stadium that even non-sports fans will cheer. Photos.

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  • OverDrive Read
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  • English

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