GAME OF OUR LIVES THE
David Goldblatt
WINNER of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award 2015
In the last two decades football in Britain has made the transition from a peripheral dying sport to the very centre of our popular culture, from an economic basket-case to a booming entertainment industry. What does it mean when football becomes so central to our private and political lives? Has it enriched us or impoverished us?
In this sparkling book David Goldblatt argues that no social phenomenon tracks the momentous economic, social and political changes of the post-Thatcherite era in a more illuminating manner than football, and no cultural practice sheds more light on the aspirations and attitudes of our long boom and now calamitous bust. A must-read for the thinking football fan, The Game of Our Lives will appeal to readers of Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby and Inverting the Pyramid by Jonathan Wilson. It will also be relished by readers of British social history such as Austerity Britain by David Kynaston.
'Brilliantly incisive. Goldblatt is not merely the best football historian writing today, he is possibly the best there has ever been. Goldblatt's book could hardly be more impressive' Sunday Times
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About David Goldblatt
Reviews for GAME OF OUR LIVES THE
Dominic Sandbrook
Sunday Times
Offers an enlightening, enriching experience. It is based on a formidable range of sources, personal observation and a pleasingly sardonic turn of phrase. Not all football writers know their stuff, let alone the socio-economic context, but Goldblatt does. Altogether this is an exceptional book
David Kynaston
Guardian
Not just the best soccer book in many years but an exemplary account of the changing character of British society in the post-Thatcher era
David Runciman
Wall Street Journal
David Goldblatt examines [English football] peerlessly ... A superb history of a sport and of a nation
Evening Standard
Goldblatt is a trusted guide ... Rich with statistics, this is an admirably balanced account of the beautiful game
Daily Mail
Prodigious research and a fluent writing style ... this is a fine book which should have an appeal much beyond the game
Mihir Bose
Independent
An encyclopaedic portrait of English football stripped of all the non-stop hype. The beautiful game is, after all, a dirty business
Financial Times (Life & Arts)
An intensely readable socioeconomic study of English football in the age of globalisation
New Statesman
A book that informs and inspires, a truly great piece of writing
Philosophy Football
The best pub talker of a book for years
Sunday Sport
Goldblatt has a gift for exploring the way the game holds a mirror up to our lives ... His deconstruction of the modern game could hardly be bettered
Observer
[A] bold analysis of Britain's economic and social change refracted through football
The Times
A salient overview of the past quarter-century
Times Literary Supplement