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The Greatest Fight of Our Generation:
Lewis A. Erenberg
Louis vs. Schmeling
Oxford University Press
October 2005
On Sale: October 14, 2005
288 pages
ISBN: 0195177746
EAN: 9780195177749
Hardcover
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Non-Fiction Biography
Held on June 22, 1938, in Yankee Stadium, the second
Louis-Schmeling fight sparked excitement around the globe.
For all its length--the fight lasted but two minutes--it
remains one of the most memorable events in boxing history
and, indeed, one of the most significant sporting events
ever. In this superb account, Lewis A. Erenberg offers a
vivid portrait of Joe Louis, Max Schmeling, their individual
careers, and their two epic fights, shedding light on what
these fighters represented to their nations, and why their
second bout took on such international importance. Erenberg
shows how in the first fight Schmeling shocked everyone with
a dramatic twelfth-round knockout of Louis, becoming a
German national hero and a (unwilling) symbol of Aryan
superiority. In fact, the second fight was seen around the
world in symbolic terms--as a match between Nazism and
American democracy. Erenberg discusses how Louis' dramatic
first-round victory was a devastating blow to Hitler, who
turned on Schmeling and, during the war, had the boxer (then
serving as a paratrooper) sent on a series of dangerous
missions. Louis, meanwhile, went from being a hero of his
race--"Our Joe"--to the first black champion embraced by all
Americans, black and white, an important step forward in
United States race relations. Erenberg also describes how,
after the war, the two boxers became symbols of
German-American reconciliation. With Schmeling as a Coca
Cola executive, and Louis down on his luck, the former foes
became friends, and when Louis died, Schmeling helped pay
for his funeral. Here then is a stirring and insightful
account of one of the great moments in boxing history, a
confrontation that provided global theater on an epic scale.
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