Sports writing is hot

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Sports writing is hot
 

Sports writing is hot. One of the best-selling books published in the US every year is the acclaimed The Best American Sports Writing, which started in 1991 and has been guest-edited by such literary luminaries as Richard Ford and David Halberstam.

In New Zealand, the genre started with a rush in 1992 with the publication of Lloyd Jones’ superb anthology Into the Field of Play, but since then nothing.

It’s a gap Harry Ricketts will more than amply fill with his The Awa Book of New Zealand Sports Writing. The book contains 80 pieces of writing, covering just about every imaginable sport, from rugby to archery.

Some of the content will surprise. ‘Sports writing is certainly not confined to newspapers and magazines, although some of these journalists are exceptional,’ Ricketts says, citing The New Zealand Herald’s Richard Boock and North & South’s Margot Butcher as among his favourites. ‘I was thrilled to also find many gripping sports stories in novels, short stories and plays.’ 

The book bears this out, with pieces by Kate di Goldi, Patricia Grace, Witi Ihimaera, Brian Turner, Fiona Kidman, Maurice Gee, Lloyd Jones, Pauline O’Regan and numerous other prominent writers.

For Ricketts, though, the highlights are writings by sportspeople themselves. ‘What can beat Ed Hillary’s famously laconic description of standing for the first time on the summit of Everest, or the words of Mark Inglis on achieving the same feat fifty-three years later?’ he says. The book doesn’t shy away from controversy – watch out for Tana Umaga’s account of the O’Driscoll affair, and David Geary and Justin Gregory on the underarm incident – and also proves that sport can be wildly humorous. Fish have nothing to fear when playwright Roger Hall casts a line.

Harry Ricketts was born in London in 1950 and moved to Malaysia and Hong Kong before coming ashore in New Zealand in 1981. His sports writing includes How to Catch a Cricket Match. He teaches creative non-fiction and English at the Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University, Wellington. As well as being a cricket fanatic, he has recently taken up tramping.

The Awa Book of New Zealand Sports Writing will be officially launched on June 9.

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