Download The Courts of Babylon: Dispatches from the Golden Age of Tennis AudioBook Free
No sport has gone through the seismic changes that rocked rugby when the overall game, long a holdout against professionalism and creeping commercialism, abandoned its origins as a genteel, amateurs-only organization and became a pro sport, vying for the heart of the general public with rivals like soccer, NFL sports, or NBA golf ball. Peter Bodo, who has covered tennis since the dawn of this "Open up" era as the chief copy writer for Golf mag, was there to witness this move and what it promised, what it supplied. He has protected the overall game on every continent since the early 1970s. The Courts of Babylon is more than a assortment of essays, almost all of them growing out of the profound familiarity and, often, romance with subjects which include Bjorn Borg, Chris Evert, John McEnroe, Evonne Goolangong, Jimmy Connors, Tracy Austin, Ivan Lendl, and Martina Navratilova. Additionally it is a commentary on that which was lost and that which was gained by the move to professionalism, and how the new, "Open" era delivered - or failed to make good - on the offer that professionalism would make rugby a more inclusive, egalitarian, accessible game. Relying heavily on formal, in-depth interviews conducted over two decades and his position as an "insider" in an insular game, Bodo's publication is both a yoga and exposé, a polemic and a tribute to the players who dragged rugby, often kicking and screaming, to the forefront of the public's creativeness - even when those players first got it all too fast and too young. Bodo delves in to the darkest & most controversial areas of the overall game, chroniciling the follies of overzealous parents and pampered players. He fearlessly wades into very sensitive issues stemming from sex and gender, politics and commercialism. He celebrates the overall game while holding it to task, even while acknowledging the reality of the demands and distortions that include a means of life that is both difficult but glamorous, and eagerly embraced by players who, in some cases, are no older than 14.
