Product Description

1999 WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR

When Sir Derek Birley's magisterial book won the premier award for sports books, judges and critics were unanimous: not only was this a superbly erudite, trenchant, humorous and comprehensive history of the game of cricket; it had also immediately established itself as the standard work in its field, and could expect immense longevity. For Ian Wooldridge of the Daily Mail, it was, quite simply, 'a masterpiece'.

'A profoundly written, easily and stylishly written book, put together with a view to a shelf life of a good half-century, and as a work of reference a fair way beyond' - Simon Barnes, The Times

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #179197 in Books
• Published on: 2003-07-11
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Modern cricket suffers from being perceived as exemplifying the aristocratic circles from which it originated. It is the history behind this image which this book attempts to unravel, as Derek Birley illustrates cricket's uncertain position today. He cleverly shows that central to this uncertainty is the ethos of competition underpinning modern ethics--an ethos within which cricket, having originated in a leisurely environment, fares badly.

In concentrating on the aristocratic origins of the sport and the developments of the industrial revolution, Birley elucidates the reasons for the disparities in popularity and etiquette of cricket and football. His research is impressive in scope, but its purpose is ultimately hindered by his inability to filter out unnecessary facts.

This is a pity, because there is much noteworthy historical material--appealing to historians and cricket lovers alike--in this weighty book. Yet the historical passages are a little clumsily integrated with cricketing developments and the conclusions are somewhat piecemeal, as if Birley still believes that the historian's role is to be an "objective observer" and present "the facts". This is a somewhat antiquated view, but it is commensurate with the subject matter and the hypocritical mores of the founders of the game--the old-style aristocrats who invented the spirit of cricket and with whom, it appears, Birley cannot help but identify himself. --Toby Green

Synopsis
In 1999 Sir Derek Birley was finally recognised as one of the great writers on cricket, when this magisterial work won Britain's premier award for sports books. Immediately recognised by reviewers as both enormously entertaining and a definitive work that will enjoy immense longevity, it is now re-issued in B-format. A Social History of English Cricket is more than an encylopaedic history of the game's development, from its origins as a pastime for schoolboys and rustics all the way through to the modern one-day competitions with their rainbow clothing and floodlit finishes. It is nothing less than the story of English culture, as mirrored in the changing fortunes of an idiosyncratic sport that has always been a complex repository of manners, hierarchies, politics and, as Derek Birley shows, baser distinctions it would rather deny like hypocrisy and gambling. In considering the game of cricket Derek Birley also writes about the impact of two world wars, the influence of Empire, and, in his words, 'the English caste system', in a survey that, contends Ian Wooldridge, 'will teach an intelligent child of 12 more about their heritage than he or she will ever pick up at school.'

But above all, as all commentators have agreed, this is also a superbly witty and humorous book, peopled by larger-than-life cricket characters from Sir Pelham Warner to Denis Compton and John Snow, and - rarely for cricket books - forswearing nostalgia to look forward optimistically to the future of the game just as much as it retrieves the halcyon past. Closing with a warm epilogue about the recent revival of village cricket, A Social History of English Cricket is the tour-de-force of a true cricket enthusiast that will be read for many years to come.

Customer Reviews

The best cricket book I've read so far
Well-researched, this book starts at the very beginnings of English cricket 500 years ago and takes it all the way up to the end of the 20th century. It connects what's happening in the real social world with developments in cricket (which always lagged behind). My understanding of non-cricketing English social history has improved at the same time. An excellent read.

Wonderful Read!
A fantastic book. As a cricket addict I can read about it all day but this book stands out. The author's chatty and lyrical style make it easy to read but the research and quantity of facts in the book is staggering. It's great to read about the non-cricketing side to personalities I've heard of and seen pictures of, but know little more. On the face if it this book should be a bit dry and hard work but believe me, it's not. It's refreshing to read a book that is not afraid to critise some of the legends of the game and bust a few myths particularly the roles of gentlemen and players.

A left-wing assault on cricket's history
It may be unfashionable to say so but I'm afraid I derived little enjoyment from this book, or from the very similar "The Willow Wand" by the same author. As a social history putting cricket into context it is certainly useful and readable but the author continually betrays his socialist bias which, I suppose, is only to be expected from an academic.

Much of it reminds me of the current fashion for television documentaries which tell us how unreasonable our leaders were in that war or that crisis and how they ought not to have behaved the way they did. Yes, perhaps it's a pity the game wasn't run on a democratic basis but that's the way society was at the time and I'm not convinced that everything is so much better now it's in the hands of the professionals.

The amateurs weren't all bad, as Birley implies. Some of them did make more money from expenses than the professionals did from wages and some failed to uphold the standards expected of "gentlemen". But others played just for the fun of it, without financial reward, and were worth their place in the side. Some of the businessmen and gentry enabled counties to avoid bankruptcy; many current observers (including some who owe their current jobs to county cricket) would say, "Pity!" but, to many people, county cricket has given more pleasure than international cricket.

Birley is so biassed about amateurs that he fails to acknowledge that even a professional might have three initials: what about CWL Parker, HTW Hardinge, HAW Bowell, WRD Payton or even JEBBPQC Dwyer, from the period before the First World War?

In fact, he rarely has a good word for anybody. He describes George Emmett, who replaced Len Hutton in one of the 1948 Tests, as "very ordinary" in one book and "wholly inadequate" in the other. This is not the impression one gains from other writers such as David Foot (who wrote the glowing foreword) or Stephen Chalke and, in an interview shown on television recently, Tom Graveney evidently thought he was better than that. Birley is so dismissive of county cricket that I don't believe he can have seen much of it.