Blog Archives
Nothing to do with fair play, Don Aimer
Somebody Stole My Game Chris Laidlaw HodderMoa, $39.99, ISBN 9781869711924 The Awa Book of New Zealand Sports Writing Harry Ricketts (ed) Awa Press, $40.00, ISBN 9780958291620 These two books complement each other, and their paths criss-cross. In Somebody Stole My…
Tagged with: Awa Press, Chris Laidlaw, Don Aimer, Harry Ricketts, HodderMoa, Issue 91, Spring 2010
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sport
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sport
Finding touch, Chris Laidlaw
Tall Tales (Some True): Memoirs of an Unlikely Writer Greg McGee Penguin Books, $37.00, ISBN 9780143009139 McGee describes himself as an unlikely writer. This rather begs the question: what makes for a likely writer? Someone who has been brought up…
Tagged with: Chris Laidlaw, Greg McGee, Issue 86, Penguin Books, Winter 2009
Posted in Media, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Media, Non-fiction, Review
Strikes against the head, Chris Laidlaw
Tackling Rugby Myths: Rugby and New Zealand Society 1854-2004 ed Greg Ryan University of Otago Press, $39.95, ISBN 1877276979 It was Voltaire, who, not without a dash of cynicism, declared that all history is but myth that time has rendered…
Tagged with: Autumn 2005, Chris Laidlaw, Greg Ryan, Issue 69, Otago University Press
Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review, Sport
Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review, Sport
“Who’s this Pinetree?” Chris Laidlaw
The Judas Game: The Betrayal of New Zealand rugby Joseph Romanos Darius Press, $29.95, ISBN 0958240906 Meads Brian Turner Hodder Moa Beckett $49.95, ISBN 1869589173 A little anecdote buried in Joseph Romanos’ latest book The Judas Game: The Betrayal of…
Tagged with: Brian Turner, Chris Laidlaw, Darius Press, Hodder Moa Beckett, Issue 58, Joseph Romanos, Winter 2002
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sport
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sport
An eye on the ball, Graham Mourie
Rights of Passage: Beyond the New Zealand Identity Crisis Chris Laidlaw Hodder Moa Beckett, $29.95, ISBN 1 86958 723 5 Chris Laidlaw was a quality All Black in the late 1960s, who achieved prominence by firing a Parthian shot at…
Tagged with: Chris Laidlaw, Graham Mourie, Hodder Moa Beckett, Issue 42
Posted in Economics, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Economics, Non-fiction, Review
Passion and precision, Chris Laidlaw
A Lucky Man Keith Quinn Shoal Bay Press, $44.95, ISBN 0908704917 It is one of life’s idiosyncrasies that the nicer a guy is, the more some people will feel compelled to hate him. Keith Quinn, the doyen of television sports…
Tagged with: Chris Laidlaw, Issue 47, Keith Quinn, March 2001, Shoal Bay Press
Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review
A fly on the All Black wall, Chris Laidlaw
Inside the All Blacks Robin McConnell HarperCollins, $39.95 ISBN 1 86950 274 4 One of the hardest things to do in any book about the sociology of sport is to draw the line between breathless spectatorship and real analysis. Robin…
Tagged with: Chris Laidlaw, HarperCollins, Issue 36, Robin McConnell
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sociology, Sport
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sociology, Sport
For love and money, Chris Laidlaw
Posted in Comment, Essays, Sport