When Running Made History
(Paperback)
Publishing Details
When Running Made History
By (Author) Roger Robinson
Canterbury University Press
Canterbury University Press
13th February 2019
New Zealand
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
Autobiography: sport
796.42
Physical Properties
Paperback
328
Width 150mm, Height 230mm
Description
Roger Robinson has been witness to many great moments in the history of running, and to those when running made history in ways beyond sport. As an excited child at the post-war London Olympics, an ardent spectator following the drama of Peter Snell and Murray Halberg at Rome, stadium announcer at the transformative Christchurch Commonwealth Games, TV commentator when Ben Johnson got busted, and more recently as a journalist reporting live on the Boston Marathon bombings, Robinson was there. In a unique cross-over of literature, history and autobiography, Robinson tells of running in Berlin at the moment of German reunification and in New Yorks Central Park the day the Twin Towers fell; he is on the TV microphone for Kenyas first major running victory; and has to find words to help a stadium crowd mourn for the lives lost in the Christchurch earthquake. `When Running Made History is a superb depiction of the modern running movement. It provides a compelling, close-up account of the American running boom, the defiant emergence of womens running, the glorious dawn of Africas ascendance, the sports redefinition of ageing, and its important role in environmental conservation. Robinson lets us run alongside as history is made by Emil Ztopek, Abebe Bikila, Ron Clarke, Dick Tayler, Allison Roe, Paula Radcliffe, Nick Willis, Meb Keflezighi and 85-year-old superstar Ed Whitlock. Robinson brings to life the days when running shaped the world, and shows why so many millions love to run and why running is worth loving.
Author Bio
Roger Robinson, now Emeritus Professor, is remembered as an outstanding teacher of English at Canterbury and Victoria universities, and by a wider public as stadium announcer at the Christchurch and Auckland Commonwealth Games, and an acclaimed commentator for TVNZ. His books include `Katherine Mansfield: In From the Margin, the `Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature and `Heroes and Sparrows: A Celebration of Running.
