Best Boxing Books

[p4p1]

in your oppinion what are some of the best boxing books you have ever read ill start of with the teddy atlas book i thought it was a top book
view from my corner by angelo dundee was also good

[Ambling Alp]

I guess a lot depends on what you are looking for.
For a biography, it depends somewhat on how interested you are in the particular fighter. Some biographies are interesting because you seldom hear see much about that particular fighter.

I have a book called "The Legendary Champions". It focuses on the early heavyweights champion from Sullivan to Tunney. Sullivan,Corbett, Fitzsimmons, Jeffries,Johnson,Dempsey and Tunney get most of the attention. Hart, Burns, and Willard don't get a lot. It has a lot of interesting side stories and background information. It does have a lot of "hero worship" that some people probably won't like.

I like books like "The Encyclopedia of Boxing" by Gilbert Odd. It lists the dates and sites of every title fight, interesting little factoids, and a brief story of almost every champion in history and a few challengers.
Harry Carpenter's "Boxing: An Illustrated History" also has lists the dates and sites of the title fights, and briefly covers the history of boxing from John L. Sullivan's time up to when the book was written, 1982. Has a lot of great photographs.
A Pictorial History og Boxing by Nat Fleischer and Sam Andre is similar. It gets updated every few years.

Peter Hellers "In This Corner" is a classic. Former champions tell their story in their own words.

I read these books when I was a kid and have always been partial to them.

More recently, I found "Facing Ali" was pretty interesting as well. You got the viewpoint of fighters of various levels, some of whom only had one huge fight in their career.

[oliverfennell]

Chris Eubank's autobiography is the best boxing book I've read.

[raylawpc]

I guess a lot depends on what you are looking for.
For a biography, it depends somewhat on how interested you are in the particular fighter. Some biographies are interesting because you seldom hear see much about that particular fighter.

I have a book called "The Legendary Champions". It focuses on the early heavyweights champion from Sullivan to Tunney. Sullivan,Corbett, Fitzsimmons, Jeffries,Johnson,Dempsey and Tunney get most of the attention. Hart, Burns, and Willard don't get a lot. It has a lot of interesting side stories and background information. It does have a lot of "hero worship" that some people probably won't like.

I like books like "The Encyclopedia of Boxing" by Gilbert Odd. It lists the dates and sites of every title fight, interesting little factoids, and a brief story of almost every champion in history and a few challengers.
Harry Carpenter's "Boxing: An Illustrated History" also has lists the dates and sites of the title fights, and briefly covers the history of boxing from John L. Sullivan's time up to when the book was written, 1982. Has a lot of great photographs.
A Pictorial History og Boxing by Nat Fleischer and Sam Andre is similar. It gets updated every few years.

Peter Hellers "In This Corner" is a classic. Former champions tell their story in their own words.

I read these books when I was a kid and have always been partial to them.

More recently, I found "Facing Ali" was pretty interesting as well. You got the viewpoint of fighters of various levels, some of whom only had one huge fight in their career.

The Legendary Champions is quite well-written and supremely entertaining - maybe the best written boxing book of the last 50 years. Other than that, its crap. The author did little, if any, independent research and essentially relied on stuff like Boxiana for the old bareknuckers and the self-serving autobiographies of the champions about whom he writes.

[Ambling Alp]

I loved reading that book when I was a kid. I used to check it of our public library a lot. Then a couple of years ago, the library had a sale and I bought it for $1.00. I would have paid $30.

Thanks for ruining one of my favorite childhood memories! :(

The book was certainly biased in favor of those "giants" from bygone days. (Sullivan,Corbett,Fitz,Jeffries,Johnson,Dempsey & Tunney.) They are blown up to almost mythical proportions. And I do wish there was more on Hart,Burns,Willard and some of the top black contenders who never got a shot.

I'm sure some of the stories are made up or atleast exaggerated. However, I believe most of it to be accurrate.
I like the specific descriptions of specific rounds in some key fights.
Most of all, there is a lot of great info that you rarely find in one place.
For someone who wants to start learning about heavyweight boxing before the 1930's its a great place to begin. I still go back to it once in a while.

[Flump]

Larry Holmes:Against The Odds

Christian Guidace: Hand of Stone

Nat Fleischer: 50 Years At Ringside.

[raylawpc]

I loved reading that book when I was a kid. I used to check it of our public library a lot. Then a couple of years ago, the library had a sale and I bought it for $1.00. I would have paid $30.

Thanks for ruining one of my favorite childhood memories! :(

The book was certainly biased in favor of those "giants" from bygone days. (Sullivan,Corbett,Fitz,Jeffries,Johnson,Dempsey & Tunney.) They are blown up to almost mythical proportions. And I do wish there was more on Hart,Burns,Willard and some of the top black contenders who never got a shot.

I'm sure some of the stories are made up or atleast exaggerated. However, I believe most of it to be accurrate.
I like the specific descriptions of specific rounds in some key fights.
Most of all, there is a lot of great info that you rarely find in one place.
For someone who wants to start learning about heavyweight boxing before the 1930's its a great place to begin. I still go back to it once in a while.

Please don't misunderstand: It was one of the best written boxing books that I think I've ever read. I brought it in early 1975, and I read the whole thing in one sitting at my fiance's apartment (much to her chagrin). I still marvel at the guy's writing style - he's the Sugar Ray Robinson of writing.

But as a book, its just full of misinformation. He essentially rewrote the stories out of other books, and thus perpetuated many of those myths.

[Poncey]

Hauser's book of Ali is the most comprehensive of his I've read.

Atlas's book is the best Boxing book I've read. It's worth it just for the LaLonde and Tyson stories.

Dark Trade is an essential read.

Paul Briggs's book is very good until he finds religion.

Hands Of Stone is the best Duran book you can find

Pound For Pound is the best Sugar Ray Robinson book I've read.

La Vida Loca is the most eye opening book I've read. If only Tapia stayed clean, what a fighter he'd have been.

Joe Egan's is very interesting at times.

[BoxBuzz]

Had to mention this one......

[zojo]

Favorite: Tunney

After reading this thread, I just ordered "Facing Ali" on amazon

[Baby Face Finster]

You can't go wrong with the following. I highly enjoyed all of them:

The Hardest Game: McIllvaney on Boxing - Hugh McIllvaney
The Sweet Science - A.J. Liebling (Probably the best written boxing book ever)
Only In America: The Life and Crimes of Don King - Jack Newfield
The Devil and Sonny Liston: Nick Tosches
The Sweet Science Goes Sour: How Scandal Brought Boxing To It's Knees - Thomas Myler
Falling Hard: A Rookie's Year In Boxing - Chris Jones

[alexpaterson]

Budd Schulberg - Ringside is very intresting

The 4 Kings is also very good

[Srebmun]

Hauser's book of Ali is the most comprehensive of his I've read.

Atlas's book is the best Boxing book I've read. It's worth it just for the LaLonde and Tyson stories.

Dark Trade is an essential read.

Paul Briggs's book is very good until he finds religion.

Hands Of Stone is the best Duran book you can find

Pound For Pound is the best Sugar Ray Robinson book I've read.

La Vida Loca is the most eye opening book I've read. If only Tapia stayed clean, what a fighter he'd have been.

Joe Egan's is very interesting at times.

I loved Hauser's Ali book, thought it was the best (Ali) I'd read.
I loved Atlas and Hands of Stone too, I felt I learned a lot about them both, both as men and fighters, as opposed to Hearns's book which was a bit light in my opinion.

Becoming Holyfield - I love the positive message in it, you can learn a lot about how to conduct yourself when the chips are down, I have a few pages marked and I've gone back and read them a few times.

War Baby by Kevin Mitchell and King of the Gypsies by Bartley Gorman are good reads too.

But my fav' thus far is Four Kings - I couldn't put that down and is highly rated.

I'm going for Dark Trade next.

[Knucklez]

There's a recent Joe Gans biography that I've been meaning to get hold of. Anyone read it?

[BoxBuzz]

There's a recent Joe Gans biography that I've been meaning to get hold of. Anyone read it?

That sounds like a promising read, I'm still looking for anyone's review of the book regarding Young Stribiling.

[allworld80]

Just ordered off Ebay:

A Flame of Pure Fire: Jack Dempsey and the Roaring 20's
Tunney
American Son - Oscar De la Hoya

[Deno1986]

Micky Wards book is a good read although the first few chapters are based on Dickie Ecklund.

[Goodnight, Irene]

Just ordered off Ebay:

A Flame of Pure Fire: Jack Dempsey and the Roaring 20's
Tunney
American Son - Oscar De la Hoya

I have read both the Tszyu & De La Hoya ones. I own them. Would be interested in your take when you get through with American Son

I had a suspicion that De La Hoya was never in the wrong in all his life, & those suspicions were confirmed with American Son

[yiddle]

when boxing was a jewish sport in a good read

[Srebmun]

I picked up Hurricane: The Life of Rubin Carter, Fighter at the w/end, am already loving it and I've only read a few pages. I loved the movie with Denzel.

[enrique]

The Nick Tosches book on Liston is pure crap and the Holyfield autobio is a boring puff piece. George Foreman's autobio is also somewhat disspointing.

For good boxing books, In the Corner -by Peter Heller- is a diamond. The books by Jose Torres are solid with insightful good writing. Anything by AJ Liebling or WC Heinz is pure gold. The Michael Izenberg book on John L Sullivan is an erudite, magnificent book. Almost all the bios of Dempsey and Jack Johnson I have read are worthwhile. I also recommend the writings of Ring and Rex Lardner, Mike de Lisa's "Cinderella Man," and Norman Mailer's "The Fight."

Clay Moyle's bio of Sam Langford is a magnificent piece. The Joe Gans bio has a lot of data but I found the writing style somewhat dull.

[granberry]

Yeah, NORMAN MAILER is a great boxing writer.

LOL

And I understand he was a pretty tough guy himself.

He sliced up one of his wives with a knife.
__________________________________________


Norman Mailer Arrested in Stabbing of Wife at a Party

NY TIMES November 22, 1960
http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/07/13/r ... bbing.html

Norman Mailer, the writer, was arrested last night and accused of stabbing his wife, Adele. Mrs. Mailer, 37 years old, was in critical condition last night at University Hospital, Second Avenue and Twentieth Street.

She was taken to the hospital at 8 o'clock Sunday morning with stab wounds in the abdomen and back. She apparently rode there in a private car.

According to the police of the West 100th Street station, where the 37-year-old writer was being held, Mrs. Mailer told physicians at the hospital that she had fallen on glass in her apartment at 250 West 94th Street. The physicians were suspicious and notified the police.

Mr. Mailer was also arrested a week ago on a disorderly conduct charge after an argument over a $7.60 bill at the Birdland nightclub.

Wound Near Heart

When detectives went to question his wife Sunday at the hospital, they were told she was too ill to be questioned. One wound was said to be near her heart.

Last night, the hospital permitted the police to question her. They said she admitted with reluctance that her husband had stabbed her.

She said the stabbing occurred about 5 A.M. Sunday at a party at their apartment.

Mrs. Mailer told the police she could give no reason for the stabbing.

She said her husband suddenly walked up to her, looked at her, stabbed her with what she thought was a penknife or clasp knife, and left the apartment.

Mrs. Mailer said her husband later took her to the hospital.

The detectives learned that Mr. Mailer planned to visit his wife at the hospital last night. At 10:30 when he arrived, he was arrested.

Mr. Mailer has denied the accusation, according to Deputy Inspector John L. Kinsella.

The author came to public attention after World War II with "The Naked and the Dead," a novel of warfare in the South Pacific. It achieved critical acclaim and was a best-seller.

Last week, when the Citizens Emergency Committee met to draft a petition to Governor Rockefeller for an investigation of the city's Police Department, he was among the writers and editors who attended.

A week ago the writer was arrested on a charge of disorderly conduct after he was refused credit for his bill at Birdland. He assertedly tried to pay his bill with a credit card, although the law prohibits the purchase of liquor on credit.

He was paroled for a hearing today in Magistrate's Court.

Last summer in Provincetown, Mass., he was involved in a dispute with two policemen and was jailed. The author represented himself at the trial and was acquitted.

[Srebmun]

Have just ordered off Amazon

Ringside - Budd Schulberg
My View from the Corner - Angelo Dundee
Dark Trade - Donald McRae (meant to get this a while ago)
The Sweet Science - A.J Liebling

Can't wait.

I was looking to buy the 16h Round but cheapest I could see it for new was £150

[Ezzard]

Anyone rread this?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hit-Man-Brian-D ... 930&sr=8-1

Any good?

[Srebmun]

Anyone rread this?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hit-Man-Brian-D ... 930&sr=8-1

Any good?

Enjoyable alright but way WAY too light on the actual man, more like this fight then that fight then this fight then that fight. Doesn't go into him enough the way, say, Hands of Stone does about Duran.

Still worth the read tho' IMO.