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The Olympics That Changed the World
Simon & Schuster
July 2008
On Sale: July 1, 2008
496 pages
ISBN: 1416534075
EAN: 9781416534075
Hardcover
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Non-Fiction Sports
From the critically acclaimed and bestselling author David
Maraniss, a groundbreaking book that weaves sports,
politics, and history into a tour de force about the 1960
Rome Olympics, eighteen days of theater, suspense, victory,
and defeat David Maraniss draws compelling portraits of the athletes
competing in Rome, including some of the most honored in
Olympic history: decathlete Rafer Johnson, sprinter Wilma
Rudolph, Ethiopian marathoner Abebe Bikila, and Louisville
boxer Cassius Clay, who at eighteen seized the world stage
for the first time, four years before he became Muhammad
Ali. Along with these unforgettable characters and dramatic
contests, there was a deeper meaning to those late-summer
days at the dawn of the sixties. Change was apparent
everywhere. The world as we know it was coming into view. Rome saw the first doping scandal, the first commercially
televised Summer Games, the first athlete paid for wearing
a certain brand of shoes. Old-boy notions of Olympic
amateurism were crumbling and could never be taken
seriously again. In the heat of the cold war, the city
teemed with spies and rumors of defections. Every move was
judged for its propaganda value. East and West Germans
competed as a unified team less than a year before the
Berlin Wall.There was dispute over the two Chinas. An
independence movement was sweeping sub-Saharan Africa, with
fourteen nations in the process of being born. There was
increasing pressure to provide equal rights for blacks and
women as they emerged from generations of discrimination. Using the meticulous research and sweeping narrative style
that have become his trademark, Maraniss reveals the rich
palate of character, competition, and meaning that gave
Rome 1960 its singular essence.
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