BoxRec

Anyone know about this book? Is it worth the read?
Does it cover the sport up to and including the shift to the Sullivan years?

Elliot J. Gorn, The Manly Art: Bare-Knuckle Prize Fighting in the Nineteenth Century (Ithaca, 1986)

The author lists an immense number of sources he used, and not all of them are purely boxing-related, as he tries to describe the conditions and the society from the times he is talking about, not only about boxers. A lot of primary sources too (miscellaneous old newspapers).
.
Here's the table of contents from it:

Illustrations
9
Preface
11
Prologue: The English Prize Ring
19
1. Hats in the Ring
34
"The Tremendous Man of Colour"
34
First Blood
36
Professors of Pugilism
47
Ideology and the Ring
56
2. The First American Champions
69
The Rise of "Yankee" Sullivan
69
The Battle of Hastings
74
"The Great $10,000 Match between Sullivan and Hyer"
81
3. The Age of Heroes
98
"The Good Time Coming"
98
The Era of John Morrissey
108
The Fate of Champions
123
4. The Meanings of Prize Fighting
129
Working-Class Culture in Antebellum Cities
129
Meaning in Mayhem
136
The Rites of Violence
144
5. Triumph and Decline
148
"The Great Contest for the Championship of the World"
148
Civil Wars
159
"...The Gangs Who Rage and Howl at the Ropes"
164
6. "Fight Like a Gentleman, You Son of a Bitch, If You Can"
179
The Rise of Sports
179
The Strenuous Life
185
Fighting Clerks, Boxing Brahmins, Vigorous Victorians
194
7. The End of the Bare-Knuckle Era
207
"My Name's John L. Sullivan and I Can Lick Any Son-of-a-Bitch Alive"
207
The New Order
216
"...Nigh New Orleans upon an Emerald Plain..."
227
"The Champion of All Champions"
237
Epilogue: The Manly Art
248
Notes
255
Index
307

Sounds like a book I'm going to track down! thanks for the info!

Ive got it and I found it interesting.
He has some stuff in there about some of the more notorious Gypsy/Traveller fights.
Fun stuff.

BoxBuzz wrote:Anyone know about this book? Is it worth the read?
Does it cover the sport up to and including the shift to the Sullivan years?

Elliot J. Gorn, The Manly Art: Bare-Knuckle Prize Fighting in the Nineteenth Century (Ithaca, 1986)

I've read this book and thought it was OK, even though Gorn obviously has a great passion for using looooong and drawn out sentences.
That was frustrating at times.

A much better book about bare-knuckle history was, in my opinion, "Bare Fists" by Bob Mee. Easy to read and difficult to put down.
Much more to the point boxing wise as well.

-KOKid-

-KOKid- wrote:

BoxBuzz wrote:Anyone know about this book? Is it worth the read?
Does it cover the sport up to and including the shift to the Sullivan years?

Elliot J. Gorn, The Manly Art: Bare-Knuckle Prize Fighting in the Nineteenth Century (Ithaca, 1986)

I've read this book and thought it was OK, even though Gorn obviously has a great passion for using looooong and drawn out sentences.
That was frustrating at times.

A much better book about bare-knuckle history was, in my opinion, "Bare Fists" by Bob Mee. Easy to read and difficult to put down.
Much more to the point boxing wise as well.

-KOKid-

Aye, Thats the one I read , Bare Fists.
not the Gorn one sorry bout that.
Kokid is right , good read.

Again...thanks for the info!

The Gorn book is good and if you want a great book read JOHN L SULLIVAN AND HIS AMERICA.

Mee's book is on a different subject, really. Gorn wrote about American boxing, while Mee on boxing history in general. Plus, while Mee uses plenty of sourses too, but he doesn't always give out where this or that comes from, so it's not easy to cross-check the validity of information at times.

I have this book, and it's really more about the social aspect of the bareknuckle era rather than a history of the period. some of the stories I've never heard of but if you're looking for flavor and results, bob mees book is more your style.

I have this book also and would certainly recommend it. John L. Sullivan and his America is one of the best boxing books that I have ever read and also one of the most thoroughly researched biographies out there. Adam Pollack's books on heavyweights are very well researched as well. If I could recommend just one book right now it would probably be John L. Sullivan and his America...it's simply just a fantastic book!


The next book that I will likely get is Kevin Smith's "The Sundowners." His first in the series "Black Genesis" is one of the best books out there on that era, if not the best and I imagine that "The Sundowners" is even better as it covers boxers between 1870 thru 1930...and volume 3 in the series will finish up the trilogy. They are certainly three of the most important boxing books out there with the fighters that are covered. Nat Fleischer wrote the Black Dynamite series of books, but there were many errors in that series, which Kevin did a top-notch job on his series.